Omnidirectional camera is a cost-effective and information-rich sensor highly suitable for many marine applications and the ocean scientific community, encompassing several domains such as augmented reality, mapping, motion estimation, visual surveillance, and simultaneous localization and mapping. However, designing and constructing such a high-quality 360$^{\circ}$ real-time streaming camera system for underwater applications is a challenging problem due to the technical complexity in several aspects including sensor resolution, wide field of view, power supply, optical design, system calibration, and overheating management. This paper presents a novel and comprehensive system that addresses the complexities associated with the design, construction, and implementation of a fully functional 360$^{\circ}$ real-time streaming camera system specifically tailored for underwater environments. Our proposed system, UWA360CAM, can stream video in real time, operate in 24/7, and capture 360$^{\circ}$ underwater panorama images. Notably, our work is the pioneering effort in providing a detailed and replicable account of this system. The experiments provide a comprehensive analysis of our proposed system.

翻译：全景相机是一种高性价比且信息丰富的传感器，高度适用于众多海洋应用和海洋科学领域，涵盖增强现实、地图构建、运动估计、视觉监控以及同步定位与地图构建等多个方向。然而，在水下环境中设计并构建一套高质量的360°实时流媒体摄像系统是一项极具挑战性的任务，其原因在于传感器分辨率、宽视场角、供电方式、光学设计、系统标定以及过热管理等多个方面存在技术复杂性。本文提出了一套新颖且完整的系统，专门针对水下环境，解决了功能完备的360°实时流媒体摄像系统在设计、构建与实现中的复杂问题。我们提出的系统UWA360CAM能够实时传输视频、全天候运行，并捕获360°水下全景图像。值得注意的是，本研究首次提供了该系统的详细且可复现的说明。实验部分对我们的系统进行了全面分析。