How to record Spatial Video with your iPhone 15 Pro / Max

If you own an iPhone 15 Pro or Pro Max, you should start recording your videos in Spatial Video from now on, even if you will never have a Vision Pro (check our previous article):

• Everybody will be able to watch it normally, just like any 2d video. Saving the people without 3D display to see a SBS image.
• You can watch them in any 3D or holographic display, existing and upcoming ones, and the file size is smaller than 4K recordings.
• And most importantly, in the future you will appreciate having your memories in 3D, even if today you watch that same file in 2d. The future will bring us plenty of 3D displays and headsets, including glasses-free holographic displays.

There are no drawbacks, and it adds another dimension for the millions of 3D devices that are coming out soon. The only times for choosing other formats are when recording far landscapes without anything near (4K will be more appropriate), or when you need the extra smoothness of 60 fps recordings.

Enabling Spatial Video

If your iPhone 15 Pro/Max is updated to iOS 17.2 or higher, you can start recording Spatial Video.

Just enable it: you’ll need to go to Settings — Camera — Formats, and enable the switch saying Spatial Video for Apple Vision Pro (it works for any 3D display).

Don’t worry, enabling this does not impede you taking regular video or switching resolution at any moment.

Recording Spatial Video

Open the iPhone Camera, go to video, put your device in landscape orientation, and you will find a new button on the bottom right.

Touch the button and it will illuminate in yellow. That’s it! You can now start recording Spatial Video.

Remember to avoid too close subjects, don’t make the same mistake that most people did with their first 3D camera. Anyway, if you are too close to the subject it will appear a message on the top of the display, watch out if it appears.

When you stop recording… Congratulations! You have now made your first Spatial Video.

It will appear in 2d on most displays, unless the device or App accepts the new standard Spatial Video format (more about this format in the future), then it will appear in glorious 3D.

And we are going to publish another tutorial for exporting spatial videos to other 3D formats and displays. It’s straightforward and very fast.