The Panorama Blog

Tomb Raider Underworld Stereo 3D Screenshots

2011-11-22T23:17:00.000+01:00

Anyone who is interested how stereo 3D gaming may look like:
You can see some Tomb Raider Underworld screenshots by clicking the thumbnail below (still not the same as actually playing the game...). The screenshots are from 3 different levels. Especially at the end, i tried to keep the 'story' intact...
SPOILER WARNING! The screenshots will reveal some key scenes of the game!

(Click thumbnail for images)

Meidling Hauptstrasse, Vienna

2011-06-24T14:02:00.000+02:00

Pentax Spotmatic F, Takumar 55mm/1.8, Ilford HP5

Naschmarkt, Vienna

2011-06-07T22:40:00.000+02:00

Film is still not dead

2011-06-04T23:35:00.000+02:00

At least for me. Still more extractable dynamic range than from a FX sensor and i love the look of true film grain...

Vienna river at Unter St. Veit, new bicycle route along the river

Microsoft ICE Update

2011-04-13T00:44:00.000+02:00

A new version of Microsoft ICE is available.
I would have reported earlier about it, but one of my data disks crashed and i had to restore from backup (keep in mind: even a simple backup is better than no backup!)...

Here is a selection of fixes and new features that may draw your special attention as they are putting ICE one more step closer to the group of professional panorama creation tools - and in some respect even beyond:

Panoramas can be created from video input:
This is not only useful for people without deep knowledge in panorama making (e.g. you don't have to care about nodal point very much), it also allows to create various flavours of "action panoramas" pretty easy.
The following panorama was created using this video. The result is here - uploaded without any post-processing:

Automatic de-vignetting. IMHO as good as PTGui and Autopano Giga. Only Hugin would beat that quality-wise (but at high calculation cost).
...and:
More robust to corrupt/mis-matching metadata. In fact, ICE is able to beat Autopano Giga in that respect. Please note, however, that this is absolutely necessary as ICE still doesn't allow any manual intervention if pre-alignment plays havoc...
One of my favourite "test panoramas" - which was unstitchable without massive manual intervention in Autopano Giga (although APG uses the robot metadata for pre-alignment) - went pretty well within the first attempt in ICE. Only the mast on top of the tower had to be postprocessed in Photoshop:

New Uploads on Austria-360

2011-02-20T17:44:00.002+01:00

Still looking for a simple-to-use CMS for the Website and finding none, so i persuaded mayself to do one more manual update with some panoramas that are waiting since months to be uploaded:

Carinthia

Koelnbreinsperre

Lower Austria

Private Library, Neunkirchen

Vienna

Reichsbrücke

I. Bezirk, Stephansplatz

I. Bezirk, Graben

I. Bezirk, Hohe Bruecke / Tiefer Graben

I. Bezirk, Ankeruhr, Hoher Markt

I. Bezirk, Judenplatz, Jüdisches Denkmal und Lessing-Statue

I. Bezirk, Steindlgasse

I. Bezirk, Schulhof, Uhrenmuseum

I. Bezirk, Tuchlauben

XIV. Bezirk, Otto Wagner 'Leopold'-Kirche

XIV. Bezirk, Otto Wagner 'Leopold'-Kirche

XIV. Bezirk, Otto Wagner 'Leopold'-Kirche

Ars Electronica 2010

2011-02-20T14:19:00.002+01:00

I did tell about the Stereo 3D Images from the 2010 Event, but i forgot to advertize the panoramas which are online at Austria-360:

Click image to go to the Ars 2010 panoramas

Above snippet depicts one of my favourite exhibited projects, a robotic telepresence system which - despite of the weird appearance of the doll - actually works. It is called "Telenoid" by the already very famous scientist Hiroshi Ishiguro.

The (almost) final solution for my battery charging problems...

2011-02-10T22:23:00.001+01:00

I have a countless number of cameras and electronic devices lying around at home with an equal number of differing batteries. Some devices even came with no charger at all and use a dedicated power supply to charge the battery.
So, if you're travelling, your luggage is crammed with cables and chargers of which one usually turns out to be the wrong one and another missing.

Incidentally i found the almost perfect solution for this problem at a local dealer. It's called "Hähnel Unipal" - a charger with two freely adjustable contacts to fit any Li-Ion or Li-Po battery within the 3,6/7,2 Volt range. Plus, it offers an USB outlet to charge USB-powered devices and it can load AA & AAA batties. The only thing i'm missing is a CR123 charging option ;-)

A special tip: If you have problems with retracted contacts, just rotate the battery and charge it upright...

Photosynth Export Plugin for Photoshop

2010-12-08T03:43:00.000+01:00

Some days ago, Microsoft Research announced a new Photoshop plugin to easily publish panoramas to the Photosynth web page.

Photosynth was originally created to process independent snapshots of a location and project them in a reconstructed 3D space - so you can 'walk' through the scenery and view the photos from their respective location (the original name was fittingly called 'Photo Tourism'). The panorama feature - which was added back in March - closed the gap between a single image and a 3D scenery, but only through ICE, a tool for automated panorama creation.

With the new plugin, you can use every tool you like to create your panoramas (even gigapixels and partial panoramas), load them in Photoshop and directly export them to Photosynth.

How to install:

Download the plugin here
Extract the file and copy the file(s) into Photoshop's "import/export" directory, e.g. "C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS5 (64 Bit)\Plug-ins\Import-Export" for the 64bit plugin.

How to use:

Load your panorama in Photoshop
Go to 'File'-'Export'-'Photosynth'
If you are lucky and your favorite panorama editor has the necessary EXIF data included, you will be directly forwarded to the uploader. If not, you'll be faced with a dialog box asking for the extents of the panorama:

In case you have to specify the extents: The values are pretty straightforward. The tricky thing may be a horizon that is not in the center of the image. In that case, you have to define the position of the horizon between 0 and 1:

In a final step, you are presented with the Photosynth uploader dialog where you can specify the usual metadata for your image. After upload, don't forget to open the panorama on the Photosynth website where you can add geodata and define highlights in your panorama (a cool feature to annotate your gigapixel):

Stereo 3D Panorama Samples for Zalman Trimon and other row interleaved 3D monitors

2010-10-30T02:21:00.000+02:00

Here are 2 working prototypes of true, full color 3D panoramas for display on row interleaved 3D monitors.
Although Flash is a performance disaster (can't wait till it supports true HW acceleration) the outcome is nice enough to share it with the lucky ones that have the hardware prerequesites. Be sure to make it fullscreen for a correct depth experience:

Full 360 degree spherical sample (by Wim Koornneef)

Size-reduced sample of high res partial panorama

Many thanks to Erik Leeman who adapted his original Flash preloader to output the required screen format!

How it works:
Row interleaved 3D monitors create the stereo effect by overlaying each row with a special polarized foliage. This method is passive, so you don't need a dedicated operating mode or monitor driver. All you have to do is to display the right image on every even and the left image on every odd line.
This is exactly what Erik Leeman's preloader does: The left and right panoramas are preloaded and overlayed with a mask to ensure that each line will display the matching image.

High Resolution Panorama: Donaukanal - New "Twin City Liner" Station

2010-10-13T01:48:00.001+02:00

The "Donaukanal" in Vienna is a former arm of the river Danube and has been regulated since the 16th century. Originally intended to act as a centrally located harbor and trans-shipment center for the fast-growing town, it has never served that function...(You can still find remainders of a dock some meters away from the "Schottenring" metro station - opposite to Otto Wagner's "Schuetzenhaus")
Until the 80's-90's of the last decade, the area was not very attractive. This changed during the last years, where lots of endeavors have been made to transform the channel to a recreational area. This included a new ship station for the "Twin City Liner", a catamaran connecting Vienna and Bratislava on the waterway. The station has been finished recently, so you can see a high resolution panorama of the building and its surroundings:

Click image to view panorama

Dachstein Gigapixel

2010-10-04T01:45:00.001+02:00

I noticed that i haven't uploaded a high resolution panorama for a long time - so here is one. The panorama is one gigapixel and shows the south side of the Dachstein - one of the largest and highest massivs in Austria.

Click image to view panorama

No HDView version at the moment - i will make a link from the front page of hdview.at as soon as i can remember how to make the viewer available from the same image source...

Sziget and Ars Electronica Stereo 3D Impressions

2010-09-08T16:50:00.002+02:00

Here are some impressions from the Sziget Festival and the Ars Electronica Festival.
No claim of completeness - just an idea how the festivals and the surroundings looked like.

Sziget Festival

Click image

Ars Electronica Festival

Click image

Panotools Meeting Plymouth "GPS Basics" Talk and Photos

2010-09-07T00:11:00.000+02:00

It's really overdue to post this:

A PDF version of the "GPS Basics" Talk at the Meeting can be found here.

Stereo 3D photos can be found here:

Click image to see photos

LuminAR - a robotic lamp as a new interface concept

2010-06-30T14:36:00.001+02:00

I really like the idea behind this interface.

However, for some reason i feel reminded of Luxo Jr. ;-)

Öffentliche Probefahrt mit der U2 und ein bisschen Video Editing

2010-06-13T01:58:00.001+02:00

Gestern wurde ein Teil der neu gebauten U2-Strecke mit einer öffentlichen Probefahrt vorgestellt. Die Strecke ist in Hochlage errichtet und quert die Donau über eine Hängebrücke.

Wie auch viele andere Wiener habe ich die Gelegenheit genutzt und mir ein Bild von der Strecke gemacht. Rein zufällig ist mir auf der Fahrt aufgefallen daß ich durch das in Fahrtrichtung rückwärtige Fenster freien Blick auf die Strecke habe. Die Gelegenheit habe ich für ein kleines Stereo 3D Video genutzt.

Nun war nur noch das Problem, daß eine Rückwärtsfahrt in 3D nicht gerade magenschonend ist. Also auf zum fröhlichen Video-Editieren! Dummerweise bin ich kein Video-Profi und mir stehen auch keine professionellen Editing-Programme zur Verfügung. Aber mit ein bisschen Suche im Internet kann man sich dennoch helfen:

Schritt 1: Teilen des Stereo-Videos in 2 Einzel-Videos mit Stereo Movie Maker

Schritt 2: Extrahieren des Audio-Tracks aus einem Teilvideo mit Virtual Dub

Schritt 3: Umkehren der beiden Video-Tracks mit Video Time Reversal

Schritt 4: Den linken und rechten Video-Track zu einem Side-Side-Video mit Stereo Movie Maker zusammenfügen. Als Codec habe ich hier Xvid genommen.

Schritt 5: Die unveränderte Audiodatei mit Avidemux zum erstellten Stereo-Movie hinzufügen.

Im Gesamten habe ich auf diese Weise das Video nur einmal decodieren (beim Teilen) und einmal codieren müssen. Die Qualität ist somit weit besser als bei meinen bisherigen bescheidenen Versuchen.

Das einzig störende beim Ergebnis ist ein leichtes Ruckeln beim Video. Ich nehme an, das kommt vom ~~codieren~~ Youtube. Da muß ich wohl nächstes Mal noch ein bisschen an den Parametern herumdrehen...

Hier ist jedenfalls das Ergebnis. 3D-Videos funktionieren im eingebetteten Modus nicht, deshalb als Link:

Bitte rechts unten den "3D"-Menüpunkt beachten. Dort kann man den bevorzugten Betrachtungsmodus einstellen (auch reines 2D).

Index page of Stereo 3D Images

2010-06-09T21:38:00.000+02:00

I have set up an entry page to some Stereo Images. Very plain layout, i hope you don't care:
http://dativ.at/stereo/

More coming soon...

Here are also 2 links to videos taken with the Fuji W1. For some reason the quality is awful in Youtube. Hints would be greatly appreciated...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwZzT7yRMFw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzeYQ9Ql1pQ

Otto Wagner church "St. Leopold" and hospital area Steinhof

2010-05-27T00:10:00.003+02:00

...one of the most significant Art Deco "Gesamtkunstwerke" by Otto Wagner is the Vienna Steinhof hospital area with the church "St. Leopold". Its formal vocabulary continues to have effect until today and influences the artwork ort film makers, architecs, artists and game designers.

I thought it is a good opportunity to experiment with the Stereo Flash Viewer, so here are some shots of architectural details:

http://dativ.at/stereo/20100524/index.htm

Of course there are also some panoramas:

Otto Wagner Kirche "St. Leopold" Steinhof in Vienna

Otto Wagner Kirche "St. Leopold" Steinhof in Vienna

Otto Wagner Kirche "St. Leopold" Steinhof in Vienna

Ars Electronica Festival 2010 announced

2010-04-14T10:59:00.000+02:00

The Ars Electronica Festival 2010 is announced to take place from 2.-7. Sept. 2010.
The main location of the 2010 Festival will be within the factory premises of the former "Tabakwerke Linz" - a world-renowned icon of modern industry-architecture.

Please visit the Ars Electronica Festival Homepage for more information and further announcements.

Microsoft ICE, gigapixel robots and Photosynth united

2010-04-13T00:29:00.001+02:00

The new version 1.3.3 of Microsoft ICE has been released last month and there are a lot of interesting features. For panorama photographers most notable are the possibility to...

...create a "structured" panorama: This is very helpful if you have captured a panorama with the help of a panorama robot. ICE will pre-align the images, so junctions that are hard to detect will already fit sufficently (e.g. sky images)
...upload the panorama to Photosynth: The stitched panorama will be viewable without any size contraints on the Photosynth web page.

How the "structured panorama importer" works:
The new importer stays within the design philosophy of ICE. This means, most of the panorama creation steps are automatic.
The downside: if the detection fails for any reason, there is no way to set control points or adjust the position of single images. However, this isn't such a big problem as ICE's detection engine is working pretty well.

To give you a quick glance, here is the screen of the importer dialog: First, ICE will ask for the images belonging to the panorama. Then, the software will try to auto-guess the shooting order. If you are not content with the arrangment you can optimize the image arrangement yourself.

The importer seems to be optimized for Gigapans but any other robot will also work (i have used a Papywizard/Merlin combination).
After the import dialog, the rest of the panorama detection is done automagically and we will end up with a stitched image like this:

Please note that ICE flattened out all exposure inconsistencies.

This is the sample panorama published to photosynth:

For further reference and download, please visit the Microsoft Research page at
http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/redmond/groups/ivm/ice/
For a peek on further planned features, see
http://windowslive.com/Connect/Post/c5a638dc-e84a-4f0a-81f9-c52f9a047aa3
FAQs, Discussions and Known bugs and issues are available at
http://community.research.microsoft.com/forums/112.aspx

Photoshynth 3D Fun!

2010-02-17T23:10:00.000+01:00

The most interesting thing about Photosynth is the possibility to have your images mapped in 3d space. A "classic" panorama is shot from the NPP (no parallax point) so there is no depth information available.
This changes if you're capturing stereo panoramas. They contain the needed depth information, just like the human stereoscopic view with 2 eyes.

I uploaded 2 stereo panoramas from the flak tower in Vienna to Photosynth to see if it really works ... and it did:

The scene looks best in fullscreen using the DirectX viewer !

Here is a link to the default Silverlight viewer, along with the second panorama. The most impressive views are the overhead view and the point clound zoomed out:

Flak Tower 1

Flak Tower 2

Along with the stereo panorama tests i also tried to capture a scenery for 3D by simply capturing a video while walking around. This video acts as an image source for the synth:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csoVkXVKjpI
The result surpasses my expectations:

Click here to explore the resulting synth.

Panorama stitcher - the next generation

2010-01-03T16:13:00.004+01:00

A new generation of the well known and (in many variations) ubiquitous Panorama Tools Stitcher is available, fittingly called "PTStitcherNG" - created by the author of the original software, Prof. Helmut Dersch.
The new application uses SIMD Maths and can delegate the calculations to a CUDA-capable GPU. My personal tests with a Nvidia GTX 260 (GT200b) revealed a speed increase of up to 24 times compared to the (also very fast) PTGui 8.3.6 stitcher!

The stitcher is still in an early beta state, so don't expect it to be feature-rich. However - integration in PTGui is already working.
PTStitcherNG is available for Windows, MacOS and Linux (x86). The most current version can be downloaded here.

~~Please note for version 0.4b and Windows Vista/7: At the moment there is a compile problem, so the stitcher will only run in Win95/98 compabitility mode.~~

Say farewell to Vienna South Train Station

2009-12-13T15:50:00.004+01:00

What the Viennese people always liked to do is to watch a moribund dying:
On 12.12.2009 the Vienna South Train Station was opened to the public for the last time. After that day the demolishion starts to make place for the new "Vienna Central Station". Many parts of the infrastructure were already removed as well as the famous "eyes".

Hundreds of photographers (including me) took the "last picture" of this train station which was built in its present form between 1955 and 1961 by architect Heinrich Hrdlicka. With the central building he combined the already existing stations "Vienna south" and "Vienna East", which were built in the 19th century and ~~severely~~ damaged in WWII.

More images by Michael Hierner (derstandard.at).
You can also explore an overview of the area in high resolution as well as see the monthly progress of the construction work.

Swirl: Google Labs Image search

2009-11-19T14:50:00.003+01:00

As usual when it comes to beta software, Swirl results can look a little messed up.
Still, it looks more promising to me than Visual Search.

"We're All Gonna Die - 100 meters of existence"

2009-11-05T19:02:00.003+01:00

(click image to visit the artist's homepage)

A photograph by Simon Høgsberg.
As a print, this image is 100m by 78cm. As the artist states, the panorama was shot "...in the course of 20 days from the same spot on a railroad bridge on the Warschauer Strasse in Berlin".
Only a few - but definitely some - noticed that they were photographed...

Neues Panoramabuch von Thomas Bredenfeld

2009-10-31T01:02:00.006+01:00

Ein Tipp für wissbegierige Panoramafotografen ist das in Deutsch geschriebene "Praxisbuch digitale Panoramafotografie" von Thomas Bredenfeld.
Das Buch ist sowohl bei Amazon als auch bei Galileo Design ab sofort bestellbar!

Leistungsschau des Bundesheeres am Heldenplatz 2009

2009-10-27T16:00:00.005+01:00

Anläßlich des Nationalfeiertags gab es wieder eine Ausstellung des Bundesheeres am Heldenplatz in Wien:

Alouette III Innenansicht bei Heeresleistungsschau am Nationalfeiertag 2009 in Vienna

Alouette III bei Heeresleistungsschau am Nationalfeiertag 2009 in Vienna

Eurofighter Typhoon at national day 2009 in Vienna

Black Hawk at military exhibition on national day 2009 in Vienna

Picnic on Sidney Harbor Bridge

2009-10-25T22:38:00.003+01:00

Panorama by Peter Murpy
(click image to open panorama)

I'd like to see such a picnic being organized in Vienna! (What about the Reichsbrücke?)

Gigapixel speedtest revised

2009-09-27T21:49:00.004+02:00

A revised version of the Gigapixel Speedtest is now available!

The new version includes project files for PTGui and Autopano with comparable output size and format, so you can directly compare performance of both stitchers.

Please note that PTGui will perform much better in the new version. The main reason for this speedup is, that i have used the "crop" feature available in newer releases of PTGui. This complies with Autopano which will cut unnecessary image parts automatically.

To give you some figures, i have re-rendered the panorama with the new project on my reference system - meanwhile upgraded from Vista 32bit to Windows 7 64 bit:

old project on old system:
2h, 38min
old project on updated system:
1h, 24min (speed increase 1.88 - just by using 64bit!)
new project on updated system:
57 minutes (speed increase 2,77 compared to old numbers!)

Ars Electronica Festival 2009 Panoramas

2009-09-08T14:17:00.004+02:00

The panoramas from the 2009 event are online. Click the image above to enter the index.

Rundumblick vom Telekom-Tower Arsenal in Wien

2009-08-17T01:46:00.004+02:00

Jetzt gibt es eine hochauflösendes (1,4 Gigapixel) 360 Grad Panorama vom Telekom-Tower im Arsenal online:

http://hdview.at/20090428_wteltower/index.html

(Zum Ansehen wird Microsoft Silverlight oder HDView als Plugin benötigt.)

Sehr schön zu sehen sind die fortschreitenden Bauarbeiten für die Umwandlung des Südbahnhofs in den neuen Wiener Zentralbahnhof. Wie man sieht, ist das Gelände schon ziemlich "entkernt".

Zum Vergleich hier ein partielles Panorama vom September 2007:

http://hdview.at/20070921_wteltower/index.html

Hat somit schon ein bisschen historischen Wert...

...Die diesjährige Aufnahme hatte ich eigentlich schon im April gemacht. Ich ich hatte aber noch gehofft, die 4 Teilpanoramen irgendwie nahtlos zusammenzubekommen, was sich leider als nicht wirklich machbar erwies. Dazu ist die Plattform des Towers und somit der Parallaxenfehler leider zu groß.

Hugin 0.8.0 released

2009-08-10T22:21:00.003+02:00

The official version 0.8.0 of the open-source stitcher Hugin has been released.
See the download page at sourceforge or download a Windows version compiled by Allard Katan.

Of course, the new version has a bunch of new features added, but there are some which i consider worth a special mention:

* The new openGL preview window. - This is a big step towards visually oriented panorama editing!

Now you can drag and rotate the panorama with visual feedback and identify images by moving the mouse over the panorama.

Especially the latter was a desperately needed feature to edit my gigapixel panoramas: During photometric optimization (the only one available which actually functions in conjunction with de-vignetting) you have to define some well thought supporting images to prevent the optimizer tending towards pure white. Former versions only offered the option to "switch off" an image and recalculate the whole preview. For several hundred images this was simply useless.

* Celeste sky identification: A built-in engine which helps identifying and eliminating control points on moving objects. The release note says that this feature is currently trained to ignore clouds. As far as my tests revealed, it actually works - a promising and high-potential feature.

* Revamped batch processor: Still has some rough edges but it is already an useful tool for creating larger number of panoramas.

* "Official" GPU support for nona (the stiching engine): Well, i didn't give it a try yet, but i can't wait doing so ;-)

If you want to keep in touch with the latest developments regarding Hugin, also give "This week in panospace" - a blog by Yuval Levy a try...

Digital analogue photography

2009-07-13T22:27:00.011+02:00

Zenza Bronica ETRSi (image by Kurt)

It's the fault of my father.
He endowed me a complete Zenza Bronica ETRSi Set...

So i started to remember the good old times - more than 20 years ago - when i shot B&W photos, developed them and enlarged them in the darkroom. I also started to remember the way of shooting: Every push of the button was well thought (mostly), no instant feedback and the magic of an image evolving from a lifeless piece of cellophane...
Hmm, i think i'm getting old...

Anyway - last weekend i started to reactivate the easier parts of this flashback, bought some rolls of Ilford HP5 and Delta 100 film, a Jobo tank and a Canon 8800F scanner to spare the pain of setting up a complete darkroom. (*1)

The Canon 8800F acts as a bridge between "old style" film photography and the digital world:

The scanner is the most cost efficient way to scan 120 film. It can process one strip at a time with 4 pcs. of 6x4.5 cm negatives.
The data sheet says, that it can scan up to 4800x9600 dpi - but even 2400dpi seem to stress the max. optical resolution of the scanner. Don't be tempted to compare it with a Nikon Coolscan with ~3800 dpi of true optical resolution ;-)
Still, it is good enough for 645 as you'll get ~5 MPix at 1200 dpi and ~20 MPix at 2400 dpi
The good thing about this scanner is the quite high dynamic range it can capture. In most cases, you don't need multi-pass scanning to get a usable image from the negative.
Among other software, there is also a copy of Silverfast included in the package. Although the software is a little clumsy to use, it is worth the extra effort as it will deliver high quality images without having to immerse yourself deeply in the art of film scanning.

Wolfgang - The Finez
Ilford HP5+, Ilfosol 3 14+1, Canon 8800F@1200 dpi

(*1) If you also want to (re-)start with medium format film, here's my shopping list for developing roll film negatives:

Jobo tank system 1500:
- Tank - Item #1520 (tank complete with one reel)
- Film washer "Cascade" Item #3350
- Film wiper Item #3530
- Film clips Item #3312
- Bottles for chemicals, eg. Item #3380 or 2-3 bottles Item #3395
- Graduate Item #3306
- Thermometer, eg. Item #3322
Price should not exceed 200 EUR for all items.
Changing bag - e.g. Kaiser Wechselsack, ~32 EUR
B&W film and chemicals:
- Ilford HP5 or Delta 100, ~4 EUR/Roll
- Developer: Ilford Ilfosol 3 (for Ilford HP5), ~10 EUR/500ml
- Fixer: Ilford Rapid Fixer, ~8 EUR/500 ml
- Misc: Stop bath and wetting agent, ~8 EUR/500 ml each (i personally prefer to rinse the tank instead of using a stop bath)
Don't forget that the chemicals are hazardous waste. While the developer has chemical similarities to a washing agent, the fixer will cause mass mortality in your local sewage plant if you simply pour it in the kitchen sink...

Vorderer Gosausee

2009-06-06T12:58:00.001+02:00

Vorderer Gosausee in Salzkammergut

Lawinenkegel am Vorderen Gosausee in Salzkammergut

Attersee near Weissenbach

2009-06-06T01:04:00.001+02:00

Attersee, Nähe Weissenbach in Salzkammergut

More Panoramas from the Ebensee memorial site

2009-05-28T02:40:00.004+02:00

The panoramas were captured in 2006. For whatever reason i have never added them to the virtual tour.

Go to the Ebensee concentration camp site virtual tour

Some test anaglyph images...

2009-05-17T01:49:00.005+02:00

...taken with a Pentax stereo adapter on D700+50mm

Click image to open gallery

Click image to open Gallery

Stereo-3D High Resolution Panorama Tests

2009-04-26T22:56:00.008+02:00

This weekend i experimented with high resolution anaglyph panoramas. I tried to answer 2 questions that have been identified by me as most important:
- What stereo base to use for the left and right image
- Which suitable method to interconnect both panoramas to an anaglyph image

I have used the Gigapan device with a Canon G9 mounted. The stereo image was created by moving the tripod. Stitching with Autopano Giga 2 and PTGui, alignment with PTGui and manual Anaglyph creation with Gimp/PS.
It turned out that creating 2 identical panoramas was a bigger problem than expected, so i need to do some more experiments. Keep that in mind when exploring the panoramas below.

Here are 3 sample anaglyph panoramas. They are downsampled to approx. 50%, so processing the images was a little easier and faster. Click thumbnails to view the full panoramas (red-cyan glasses needed):

Meidling Train Station
Stereo base approx. 10 cm. Both panoramas were warped to fit without caring for a "consistent" stereo image. It is easiest to view but has some bent lamp poles and other inconsistencies.

Flak Tower 1
Stereo base approx. 1 meter. Good looking as a small image, but very difficult to view when zooming in. Such a panorama would need dynamic adjustment of the left and right image while viewing - just like done when at time of shooting in 3D-movies.

Flak Tower 2
Stereo base approx 10cm and manual adjustment of left and right layer to guarantee best possible viewing experience. Still - stitching inconsistenies are very noticeable.

Next step is to work with a 2 camera setup...

Zenitar Fisheye 16mm f2.8

2009-04-23T23:27:00.018+02:00

At last, my new Zenitar lens arrived. After waiting one month and paying off the minister of finance with additional 70 EUR, i have a full frame fisheye lens for my Nikon and M42 mount cameras.
The lens offers good value for the money, but you have to bring some things into order before using it the first time:

Clean the lens from grinding swarf. Don't forget it's Russian: high quality build, but apparently no final inspection before leaving the factory ;-)
Mount the adapter for non-M42 cameras.
Adjust focus ring for infinity on non-M42 cameras.

So, here is a tutorial how to adjust your Zenitar 16mm fisheye and prepare it for first use.

Caution: Work gently, do not force anything. If you use compressed air, keep some centimeters distance and avoid blowing at full power. Do not tighten the screws forcfully. The next grade after "tight" is "broken"!
Please don't forget that you will do the following steps at your own risk! Don't come wailing to me, complaining that you have ruined your lens!

What you need:

A set of of small screwdrivers
Bottle of compressed air

Cleaning the lens from grinding swarf
- First, you have to open the rearward mounting plate of the lens. Set aperture to f22. Remove the 3 screws and lift the plate
- Use adequate compressed air to remove the swarf. Blow into the side of the lens stack to remove particles that already rest on the lens surfaces.
- Re-mount the plate. Take care to mount it accordingly, otherwise the lens diaphragm won't work. See below for correct position. The clip must extend into the lens on the right side of the pin. Carefully rotate the plate clockwise until the screw holes match. If you do it correctly, you can see the diaphragm opening while turning the plate into position.
- Re-apply the screws.
- Now unscrew the front part of the lens and clean the inside with compressed air.
- Re-mount the the front part.

Mounting the adapter (Nikon)
There is a red dot on both sides of the adapter which has to align with the focus mark on the lens:

Screw in the adapter - then unscrew counterclockwise a few degrees until the marks align:
Fasten the small screw on the adapter to fix this position:

Adjust focus ring for infinity
- Set focus to infinity
- Now you have to move the focus rubber ring away from its position. That's best done with your fingernails and a little cautious force:
- This will reveal 3 holes with hidden screws. Loosen the screws (approx. one turn will be sufficient).
- Move the focus ring approx 2 degrees clockwise. In my example, i have selected the middle position between infinity and 1.2 meters. This should give enough headroom to focus even beyond infinity.
- Now carefully tighten the 3 screws, mount the lens on the camera and use a feature far away to focus to infinity. Use a piece of tape to fix the ring in this position and re-open the 3 screws.
- Remove the piece of tape. Align the focus marker and the infinity symbol and re-tighten the screws.

Now you're done! Enjoy your new Zenitar!

One downer at the end of the tutorial: On my Pentax ESII, for an unkown reason, the Zenitar sometimes blocks the shutter. I suspect, the rear filter housing extends too far into the camera and blocks the mirror. Unfortunately, the filter housing cannot be removed as it is part of the optical system of the lens. Any tipps how to circumvent this problem would be greatly appreciated....

Panoramas of the new Ars Electronica Building

2009-04-14T09:24:00.006+02:00

The "ship deck" (used as an event space)

Fablab in the main exhibition hall

"Deep space" - the "Cave" successor

Some panoramas photographed in April 2009 from the newly rebuilt Ars Electronica Center in Linz.
The building is located directly at the riverside of the Danube river and should resemble the shape of a ship (the topmost panorama shows the "ship deck", acting as an event space). Below the deck is the main exhibition hall.
The highest part of the building houses the "Deep Space" display system, the successor of the "Cave".

See more Ars Electronica Panoramas at the 360cities homepage.
Learn more about the Ars Electronica Center at the AEC home page.

Firefighter training, by Ignacio Ferrando Margelí

2009-04-09T20:13:00.003+02:00

Click image to open the panorama at abaco-digital.es

I just wonder where the photographer was standing while taking the panorama...

5 months of U.S. Arctic research - a blog by Matt Nolan

2009-03-24T13:47:00.006+01:00

Dr. Matt Nolan spent 5 months in the U.S. Arctic - mostly around the McCall Glacier - being part of the IPY4 (4th International Plar Year) expedition. He documented the research with 200 spherical panoramas and a dozen gigapixel images.

To view his work, you can visit his blog directly, or browse the low resolution panoramas on 360cities.net.

Wolf prints in the natural weir (13 May 08 15:54) in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

Time's up

2009-03-15T20:48:00.003+01:00

...für den Wiener Nordbahnhof. Das Gelände muß zu einem großen Teil einem Wohn- und Gewerbegebiet weichen.

Rich Internet Application Statistics

2009-03-11T13:23:00.006+01:00

Click image to view stats at riastats.com

According to the Website, the data was collected by observing ~50.000 unique browser accesses per day - across 42 sites during the past 30 days.
(numbers edited, see comment below)

Baustelle des Hotel- und Geschäftsgebäudes von Jean Nouvel am Donaukanal

2009-03-08T22:43:00.008+01:00

Infinity Room, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney

2009-03-05T13:36:00.012+01:00

Infinity Room - Phalli's Field, by Yayoi Kusama

Panorama by Peter Murphy

click image to open panorama at mediavr.com
Quicktime needed for display

click image to open panorama at mediavr.com
Quicktime needed for display

Spaziergang am Gmundnerberg

2009-03-02T19:58:00.004+01:00

Bahnhof Attnang-Puchheim

2009-02-22T20:55:00.005+01:00

Schönbrunner Berg

2009-02-15T20:15:00.003+01:00

Würstelstand am Schwedenplatz, Wien

2009-02-08T20:57:00.006+01:00

Microsoft ICE: Stitcher from Microsoft

2008-09-24T00:47:00.005+02:00

Power Station Wiestal, captured with Canon Ixus 70, stitched with Microsoft ICE

Microsoft Research has released a free stand-alone panorama stitcher called "Image Composite Editor". It is an automatic panorama stitcher focused towards easy assembly of panoramas for hobbyists and occasional photographers.
To find out more about the features, read the announcement at Microsoft Research

Some interesting features, packed with this software, are worth to point out:

easy to use panorama editor to align the panorama
direct output to HDView and Deep Zoom tiles, so you can stitch high resolution panoramas without having to care about file sizes.
Planar stitching modes:
- mode 1: assemble images without warping. Useful for assembling a large image from scanned parts, e.g. a large map.
- mode 2: rotate, skew and resize images to fit. Useful if you stitch a panorama where the single images are captures from different positions
- mode 3: stitch large horizontal scenes ("wall panoramas")

"Flickr HDR" vs. "The real thing"

2008-08-21T01:38:00.007+02:00

Sometimes, terms tend to establish with just a portion of the original meaning. This also seems to apply to HDR imaging. If you follow the threads and images on various photo discussion boards and platforms, you will notice: most times, HDR is meant for a certain look, not for the technology itself.

To help to understand the difference, Erik Reinhard - on of the pioneers of HDR imaging - wrote an article about "Flickr HDR" which is worth reading.

Why care?
If you want to be able to master the various problems and pitfalls of HDR, you have to be able to understand exactly, what type of image you're actually working on. I personally prefer to distinguish between 3 types of images - each one with important differences in workflow (e.g. tonemapping):

LDR: That's what you will certainly use most of your times. It is the range, your camera can capture with one shot (no matter if you use JPEG or RAW).
MDR: Images with extended range, typically a bracketed image. Still, this image will not contain the full dynamic range of the scene you capture.
HDR: This is "The real thing". Everything (all brightness and color), including the light source itself is included in the image. Thus, such images can even be "reversed" by using them as a light source, e.g. for computer generated scenes - called image based lighting (IBL).

Just for the sake of funny comparisons:

Flickr HDR: http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=hdr
Real HDR: http://hdview.at/hdr/index.html, using
http://research.microsoft.com/ivm/HDView/HDR.htm

Please do not forget: This is not to critizise the artistic value of an image - we're talking about the technology!

Another new version of Slicer

2008-08-12T21:16:00.002+02:00

Changes in Version 0.0.4.1:

Full automatic mode: Slicing, stitching, if applicable - cutting - and HDView creation can be done in full automatic mode. You set the parameters, the rest doesn't need any manual intervention.
Creation of some helpful batch files for the above tasks. You can start (or repeat) every step by simply clicking the appropriate batch file.

Also, there is a manual available now. It is included in the ZIP-file at http://dativ.at/slicer but you can also access it here for reference.

New version of Slicer uploaded

2008-08-10T03:10:00.001+02:00

Changes in version 0.0.3.0

Bug fixed: Some slice numbers caused program errors
A single PTGui project can be dragged onto the Slicer icon to start the application with the work file
Can now create a batch file which converts the sliced panorama parts for HDView
EXIF date for each image in multiplier is re-read. So all batch-created panoramas will show the correct date.

The file can be downloaded as usual on the Slicer page.

HDView Beta 3 released

2008-07-27T01:41:00.017+02:00

Microsoft Labs has released a new version of HDView which now has evolved to a high dynamic range, high resolution image viewer.

The most apparent new features are:

the possibility to use 8-, 16-, or 32 bit (HDR) images.
New high dynamic range adaption methods: "auto-contrast" and "realtime tonemapping", enabling an adequate display of HDR images.
This feature comes with a price to pay: You need a reasonably modern GPU which supports pixelshader 2.0 or above. If your GPU doesn't support it, you can still explore the images but you can't use the auto-contrast or tonemapping feature.
a new viewing type: fisheye mode. This is very helpful if you have to display a very wide viewing angle, but it is also fun just to play with...

Also, there are a lot of not so apparent things that changed without being noticeable at first glance:

Color management: You can embed color profiles which will ensure that the images are best possible viewed on your specific hardware (monitor)
You can directly use KML Photo Overlays. This means, images prepared for Google Earth display can be viewed in HDView
The 3DConnexion device and the XBox controller can be used as an input device
etcetc... Read more about the new version at the HDView blog!

Demonstration and test samples:

Spherical HDR panoramas at http://hdview.at/hdr

(click image to open list of HDR panoramas)

NY Rooftop by Christian Bloch, EdenFX

(click image to open panorama)

KML Photo Overlay examples,
Images are served directly from the gigapan.org site:

(click image to open)
Original GigaPan image

The Panotools Meeting 2008 is near

2008-07-18T00:11:00.002+02:00

If you haven't booked till now: don't forget the Panotools Meeting 2008 in Prague!
The conference will be held at the FAMU (University of Film and Photography) from Monday 4th August till Thursday 7th August 2008.

For furter information go to the Panotools Meeting Homepage and sign up to the dedicated Yahoo group at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/panotools-meeting

Fotos von der Scalaria Air Challenge 2008

2008-07-14T00:54:00.006+02:00

... am Wolfgangsee. Mit dabei die Dornier Do-24ATT und das Experimentalflugzeug S-Ray 007 von Iren Dornier.

Hier geht es zu den Impressionen von der Flughow!

The Worldwide Panorama: Elevation

2008-07-07T01:13:00.004+02:00

(Click banner to go to the WWP entry page)

The shooting of June 2008 has been released to the public!

You can see my submission here.
Also, visit a high resolution partial view at gigapan.org.

A forgotten place in the heart of Vienna

2008-05-09T03:25:00.006+02:00

Click to open panorama

The old Jewish cementery in Währing is situated directly next to the Metro Station "Nussdorfer Strasse" - though this didn't help the cementery to become a forgotten place.

Click to open panorama

Although some well-meant singular actions in the past years the place becomes more and more decayed. It will soon be irretrievably ruined if no miracle happens.

Click to open panorama

The cementery had to be closed to the public - not only because of the threat of vandalism - but also because of the danger by falling trees and open crypts.

See more images of the Cementery

and
Get more information about the Cementery at the Wikipedia

...in Deutsch

Movies from the motorbike

2008-05-06T23:54:00.011+02:00

I found some spare time to experiment with my "bike-videos" again.
Meanwhile, i have found a smaller recording device than the DV-cam, a Canon Ixus 70. It can take videos at 640x480 with up to 30 fps - a good precondition to capture movement:

The duct tape's purpose is to stabilize the "RAM-Mount", which is constructed to hold a GPS device. The pin-joints are rubberized to dampen the vibrations - but that only provoked the opposite. You end up in having to beat 3 sorts of shakyness:
- Shakyness caused by the surface of the street
- Head wind vibrations (...and the "weak" RAM-Mount)
- Vibrations of the handle bar - making the video unusable at engine speed above 5000 rpm.

So i had to postprocess the video with VirtualDub and the Deshaker plugin. Luckily, Deshaker's standard settings with some tweaking did a pretty good job, as you can see at the borders of this video (It shows the way through the "Weissenbachtal", a street in Upper Austria, connecting the Attersee and Bad Ischl):

Here's an other one, depicting the way along the Hallstaettersee, from the Gosauzwang through Hallstatt to Winkl:

Austria-360 Updates

2008-04-28T23:37:00.005+02:00

Here is a complete listing of panoramas i've uploaded to Austria-360 the last few days.
Also, there is a new map page and thumbnail listing sorted by districts, as well as a Google Maps page with geo-referenced panoramas.

Parlament

Maria Theresien - Platz, Naturhistorisches & Kunsthistorisches Museum

Rathaus (Town Hall), "Eistraum"

Burgtheater Wien

Schottentor, Vienna University

Musikvereinshaus at night

Praterstern

Handelskai, old cannon-boat

Bahnhof Wien-Mitte

CAT (City-Airport-Train) Wien-Mitte

Karlskirche at night

MQ (Museum Quarter) outside at night

MQ (Museum Quarter) inside

Spittelberg Area

Volkstheater & Museumsquartier

Train platform Suedbahnhof

Hietzing Metro station

Hietzing - Schoenbrunn Entry

Technisches Museum

Europaplatz

Westbahnhof from outside

Westbahnhof, Main Hall

Train platform Westbahnhof

U6 and U3 Metro Station Westbahnhof

U6 and U3 Metro Station Westbahnhof

Tram Depot

Aeussere Mariahilfer Strasse (Outer Mariahilf Street)

270 gigapixel images in 3,5 months

2008-04-16T00:02:00.007+02:00

(image: View of Santa Monica from "The Shores" luxury apartments, by XRez)

Another incredible project by Greg Downing and his XRez team - an assignment for move.com, a real estate company

On his interview on VRMag, he tells more about it: "The proposal was, to do this kind of image in 147 neighborhoods in 34 cities in 3 1/2 months in order to have the images ready for their new website launch."

Read more about it on the VRMag website!

Go to a preview of the new move.com website

Metro Praterstern 2008

2008-04-15T23:56:00.002+02:00

Click image to open the index page

The last visit to the Subway building site Praterstern, Vienna.
The panoramas show the state of work 2 months before the opening of the metro station (which will happen on May 10th).

Slicer bugfix

2008-03-10T01:42:00.002+01:00

Bug fixed in slicer, thanks to Pedro Silva!
More information and download of version 0.0.2.1 at the Slicer page.

Vienna seen from Telecom Tower Arsenal

2008-03-05T23:38:00.007+01:00

Click here to view panorama using MS HD View

This panorama is published in full resolution (3,3 Gigapixel). It was captured using a Fuji S3, Nikkor 70-300@300mm and my trusty Gigabot.
Shooting the 788 source images took 1 hour. Stitching was done with PTGui in 100 slices (see slicer tool) to increase render speed and minimize needed disk space.

On the upper left corner you can see a small black square. The size of this square represents the size of one source image. This should give you an impression about how small the individual photos actually are.

All Vienna Metro (Subway) stations

2008-03-02T20:08:00.006+01:00

Took some time (years), but now all stations currently in service are photographed ... phew.

You can either load the overlay for Google Earth by visiting this page, or you can explore the Vienna Metro through the Google Maps interface.

Please note: The default station locations provided by the Google Maps interface are partly missing and sometimes completely wrong. Please do not trust Google. Chances are high that you will get lost in Vienna. Use my overlay instead ;-)

Das HDRI-Handbuch in Deutsch

2008-02-26T18:24:00.004+01:00

Wie ich meinem Postkasten entnehmen konnte, ist nun die deutsche Übersetzung des "HDRI-Handbook" erhältlich. Auch die DVD mit den Tutorial-Bildern und Programmen (in Deutsch, soweit vorhanden) ist dabei.

Somit können nun auch die Englischverweigerer unter den Fotografen die Vorteile höheren Dynamikumfangs in vollen Zügen geniessen...

(Freut mich übrigens, daß der dpunkt.verlag auch den Co-Autoren automatisch ein Exemplar zukommen läßt - nicht unbedingt selbstverständlich, da das englische Original vor einem Jahr und beim amerikanischen Schwesterverlag rockynook erschienen ist.)

hdview.at news

2008-02-25T23:51:00.005+01:00

Pedro Silva kindly contributed 2 exeptional high resolution views of Lisbon/Portugal.
Click on the thumbnails to explore the panoramas using MS HDView technology:

Lisboa - da Castilho ao Castelo, do Sheraton à Rua do Ouro

Lisboa - Castelo e Baixa

Also new: the possibility to browse the panoramas using Google maps.

Lightprobes cleaned up and expanded

2008-01-21T19:51:00.001+01:00

13 different light situations and a rendered sample scene for each lightprobe.
Please click here to enter the page!

In-Game Panorama

2008-01-21T16:00:00.002+01:00

Project Gotham Racing 4 on XBox 360

Racing Track: Macao

Car: Ariel Atom 300

GPS for Photographers

2007-12-23T22:09:00.000+01:00

Wintec offers a nice little gadget named "G-Rays 2" (or WBT-201).
It is mainly a GPS-Mouse which can be connected via USB or Bluetooth. This doesn't sound extraordinary if there wouldn't be another feature: It can log data without the need of any external device. You can even "flag" a specific location by pressing a button on the device.
The data can then be processed with "Time Machine X", a software included in the package. You can convert your GPS tracks to many common file formats and even auto-geotag your photos.

Some selected technical data:
- Atmel Antaris 4 Chipset
- can track 131000 points with internal memory
- up to 12hrs. battery lifetime in logging mode
- Uses standard Nokia BL-4C battery type
- standard mini-USB connector (also used for charging)

German readers may click here for more information.

Slicer: Sliced Gigapixel Rendering and PTGui Template Multi-Apply

2007-12-16T13:26:00.000+01:00

The new version of the Slicer-App. can now multi-apply a PTGui project as a template for any number of images in a given directory.

The "multiplier"-feature can be used for:
- precision heads: Batch-stitch a days work without having to load every single image set.
- panoramic movies: Create the accompanying project files for your panoramic movie frames.

Download and usage instructions can be found here.

4 basic tipps to speed up Windows (Vista) for faster stitching

2007-12-02T15:07:00.001+01:00

Here are 4 basic tipps to speed up your computer

Large object movie

2007-11-19T11:30:00.000+01:00

Mt. Wilson telescope, captured by Carel Struycken:

Quicktime version

Flash version

See the telescope as Panorama

The HDRI-Handbook is available!

2007-11-19T11:23:00.001+01:00

Click here to go to the HDR Handbook Homepage.

You can order the Book via Amazon.

The topics include:

Understanding the foundation of HDRI
Tools for a High Dynamic Range Workflow
How to capture HDR images: now and tomorrow
Tone mapping for creating superior prints
HDR Image processing and compositing
Shooting and stitching HDR panoramas
Image based lighting and CG rendering
World premiere of Picturenaut and Smart IBL
Creative uses and unconventional applications

Ars Electronica 2007 - The panoramas

2007-11-04T22:16:00.000+01:00

The panoramas from the 2007 event are now online.

One of the festival's main themes concentrated on "Second Life" and presented an interference of virtuality with reality. Unintentionally, the exhibitions in the "Mariengasse" and "Pfarrplatz" exposed some scurrility by taking place in a street struggling with abandonment and forsake - something you may be familiar with in Second Live...

Click to open the AE 2007 pages

Sound is still missing, unfortunately. No time to edit and add the snippets to the panoramas. I hope to catch up soon.

Sliced Gigapixel Panorama Rendering: "Slicer"

2007-10-07T14:42:00.001+02:00

One of the most annoying problems in gigapixel imaging is the fact that most image formats can't handle large files. Some proprietary (like Photoshop PSB) or rare (like VIPS) can do, but using them will inhibit continous workflow.

In an attempt to circumvent this restriction - and to make rendering faster, i have created a small helper application that will divide a large PTGui/Hugin project into smaller slices.
The rendered panorama slices can be easily post-processed or assembled in your favorite application.

You can download the current version here: http://dativ.at/slicer/

Update 2007/10/17: Microsoft Research has updated its HDMake tool. It can now assemble tiled source images. See this HDView blog entry for more information.

Compiling latest Hugin on OpenSuSE 10.3

2007-10-07T13:56:00.002+02:00

Good news: with openSuSE 10.3, most dependent libraries for Hugin 0.7beta are in the correct state, so here's a quick roundup how to get and install:

Download latest sources:
svn co https://hugin.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/hugin/hugin/trunk hugin
See http://hugin.sourceforge.net/download/ for more information
Create bootstrap:
./bootstrap
run "make", then "make install". You can speed up things with modern computers by using more than 2 CPUs, e.g. "make -j2" will use 2 CPUs.
At least for Gnome, Hugin will automatically create a start menu entry

What else is needed to run Hugin?

Mandatory: The panotools library (pano12):
svn co https://panotools.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/panotools/branches/pano12/libpano libpano12
See http://panotools.sourceforge.net/ for more information
Optional: Autopano-SIFT (Tool for automatic creation of control points)
http://user.cs.tu-berlin.de/~nowozin/autopano-sift/
Install instructions for the ignorant:
- unpack autopano-sift-2.4.tar.gz
- copy all files from the ../bin subdirectory to your harddisk (e.g. /usr/local/bin)
- configure Hugin to use autopano-complete.sh for control point creation
Optional: Enblend (Tool for seamless blending)
I recommend still using Enblend Version 2.5 as V3 introduced GPU-based calculation which - at least on my computer - turned out to be tricky to compile.
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=123407

More annotated HDView

2007-09-14T01:33:00.000+02:00

Linz, Upper Austria
View from Pöstlingberg

312 images captured with a 300mm lens in auto exposure mode.

Control point creation with Autopano-SIFT, warped and blended with Autopano Pro. The resulting image is uploaded with a resolution of 0.65 Gigapixel.

Also new: A detailed tour through Vienna by Wolfgang Stich, based on the View from Danube Tower

Annotating Gigapixel images using HDView

2007-09-01T23:59:00.000+02:00

One of the most fascinating things you can do with gigapixel images is, to annotate the panorama and create a "guided tour" within the image.

I worked out how to control Microsoft HDView by injecting new view parameters with Javascript.
This is fairly easy to implement, so here is an example:
http://hdview.at/200706_gmunden2/index.html

Choose a name from the drop-down list and press the "Show me!" button. This will change the viewport to the selected feature.

Gigabot Software Update 0.3c

2007-09-01T20:28:00.000+02:00

I have made minor changes to the Gigabot software:
- Bug in "reshoot"-mode fixed
- Shorter timings for faster operation

You can download the binary here.
If you want the most recent source code, please don't hesitate to contact me.

Ars Electronica Festival 2007

2007-08-29T10:53:00.000+02:00

"Goodbye Privacy"

Image: Seeker
Leon Cmielewski, Josephine Starrs (AU)
Award of Distinction Interactive Art
(c) the Ars Electronica Picture Archive

Quoting the Ars Electronica website, this year's "[...] focus will be on these late-breaking phenomena of a new culture of everyday life being played out between angst-inducing scenarios of seamless surveillance and the zest we bring to staging our public personas via digital media".

The festival is taking place from 5. to 11. September 2007 in Linz, Austria (see program and content). A detailed schedule is also available.

I will visit the festival and the exhibition to capture some immersive images of the festival's atmosphere.

See some images from the 2006 event

Subway Extension Vienna

2007-08-27T01:40:00.000+02:00

Work in progress updated: Donaukanal/Schottenring March 2007

Technical information:

3 bracketed shots (Fuji S3 extended range) merged to HDR with PTGui Pro and saved as Radiance (.hdr) files.
Photoreceptor tonemapping to 8bit TIFF with Picturenaut
Further postprocessing with Gimp: Local contrast enhancement, color normalisation and sharpening

2 extreme hobbies...

2007-08-26T03:09:00.000+02:00

Extreme ironing - captured by extreme underwater panography

Captured by guruguru360.com
See an image of his setup

Microsoft HDView and Dynamic Range Adaption

2007-08-26T01:31:00.001+02:00

The new beta 2 of HView offers an interesting feature: "Auto Tone Adjust"

It is some sort of dynamic range adaption - a feature highly anticipated by panorama photographers. Instead of pre-computing the best visual appearance for the whole image, you can let the viewer calculate the appearance on the fly.
If you already use HDView on your webpage, this feature is automatically added to your published content - no need to edit or re-publish.

Some interesting uses of this feature:

High resolution panoramas with very distant features (this town is approx. 12 km away from the camera position)
A low contrast image as a fake HDR source (see this example)

3 different types of adjustment are available. You can toggle these types by clicking a button in the upper right window of the viewer:

No tone adjust: leaves image as it is

Medium tone adjust: enhanced contrast

High tone adjust: enhanced contrast and colors

You can set the default tone adjust method by adding a parameter to the XML call in your HTML page, e.g.

args =
'FileName=control.xml&BackgroundColor=0&ToneMode=1'

will change to medium tone adjust setting.

Some caveats:

HDView beta 2 still works exclusively with LDR images. Although the new HDPhoto-format can deal with HDR images, HDView can't display them (this may be adressed in one of the next beta versions of HDView).

Tone adjustment seems to be calculated on a per-tile base. This can clip small distinct features. Images that consist of one tile (e.g. a single jpeg image viewed with HDView) won't be adjusted at all.

Large featureless areas can lead to clipping colors in "high" mode, e.g. a view window with large amount of sky may expose weird colors.

Compare the visual appearance with a standard viewer:

Zoomify version
Microsoft HDView version no tone adjust
Microsoft HDView version medium tone adjust
Microsoft HDView version hight tone adjust

New panorama uploaded to hdview.at

2007-08-25T18:29:00.000+02:00

Another high resolution panorama by Wolfgang Stich:
Grossglockner Pasterze Glacier

Click the thumbnail to open the panorama.
The original 1.2 Gigapixel image was resized to 665 Megapixel.

Easily integrate Google Maps in your webpage

2007-08-22T02:13:00.000+02:00

You can now integrate a Google Map into your website without custom programming via Maps API. Just create the needed code via "Create Link" and paste it into your own HTML code.

Larger view of the map

Now i only have to find out, how to set the properties for this iframe to open links in the parent window...