Look Around! Understanding the 360-Degree Cameras in Today's Cars

Marc Urbano|Car and DriverIt’s almost as if there were a drone deployed right over your vehicle, in a perfect holding pattern, casting to the infotainment screen a crisp, clear look at what’s immediately around in every direction.If you’ve experienced it, you know exactly what we’re referring to: around-view monitors, also called 360-degree, surround-view, or panoramic-view systems, give you a quick way to assess what’s around the vehicle when parking or maneuvering in tight spaces—including what you might have missed with windows, mirrors, and a glance over the shoulder. These brilliant systems have become widely available across the vehicle market, and they’ve improved tremendously over the past decade. And if they haven’t saved lives in and of themselves, they’ve certainly saved a lot of collision repair. Marc Urbano|Car and DriverHow Around-View Monitors WorkNissan claimed to have the world’s first Around View Monitor when it introduced the feature in some Japan-market vehicles in 2007, the U.S.-market 2008 Infiniti EX35 gaining it late that year. It’s likely no coincidence that it was first delivered within months of the original iPhone. While this was genius for the time, utilizing compact, high-resolution cameras plus advanced digital processing, the view could be somewhat distorted, and quadrants of coverage where camera views were stitched together resulted in some noteworthy blind spots. With it, several wide-view, high-resolution cameras (usually four, sometimes even more) each provide a digital signal that’s coded pixel by pixel—by color, location, and more. At any given time, the pixel data from each are projected onto a figurative bowl-shaped map, with a central processor reconciling the perspective of each camera and their potentially overlapping pixels at the moment. It works through that math and creates a comprehensive view that’s smoothly stitched together. Making things even more complicated, many systems also now display what’s around (or even under) the vehicle from multiple perspectives, with some even allowing the driver to drag the view around at various angles. That requires quick recalculations for that curved “map” around the vehicle, based on the viewpoint and the static points where the cameras are mounted.Given what these systems are doing, it’s especially impressive how, in some of the latest systems, you neither notice where these camera views are stitched together nor that each camera might be dealing with wildly different levels of lighting, glare, or cleanliness. Marc Urbano|Car and DriverMarc Urbano|Car and DriverWhat Around-View Monitors UseThese cameras aren’t entirely unlike those used in your phone or tablet, but they’re complying to a much higher standard of durability and longevity. They require a different kind of lens (and protective coating)—one that will allow them to keep performing at their peak far beyond the three-year lifespan of a typical smartphone, maintaining clarity and resisting scratches after being caked with mud and dirt, sprayed with road salt, or frozen over in ice. In recent years, HD cameras and faster processors have helped enable the sharper images, multiple views, and smoother rendering. Further, on the way to networked, software-defined vehicles, these systems are now end-to-end digital—and truly connected to the rest of the vehicle, or at least the infotainment. That paves the way for future modes, features, or possibly hardware upgrades.One such example that various automakers have already phased in are invisible-hood or trail-driving modes bringing a semi-translucent overhead view of the vehicle, allowing you to see where boulders or barriers might be under the vehicle. Are Around-View Cameras Shared with Other Safety Systems?No, the cameras that are put to use in around-view systems typically aren’t the same sensors that are used for advanced driving assistance system (ADAS) features such as automatic emergency braking and blind-spot warning—and there are good reasons for that. In the juggling of optical priorities, they’re also optimized to take the best advantage of available light, with a wider field of focus and a lower frame rate than those higher-speed ADAS cameras might use. ADAS features also often rely on input from radar sensors as well.One caution: You’ll still need to watch out for tree branches or especially low awnings. Automakers tend to put the cameras for around-view parking systems below the beltline of the vehicle, often on the bottom of the side-view mirrors—although there’s likely coverage from other sensors for such things at the rear of the vehicle. Although these systems are optimized for when you’re sitting still, their real-time processing allows them to maintain their clarity up to 10 mph or even more in some cases. And the lines are already blurring somewhat. Several automakers have added moving-object, obstacle-detection, or safe-exit warning features that tap into radar and both fields of sensors—”sensor fusion,” in industry jargon—to make a more detailed, more complete, or more reliable picture. So no matter which brand of vehicle you choose in the future, the parking view may keep you safer and the safety features may help bring an even better parking picture. More to Know