A panorama is worth 10,000 words

By Edson C.Soriano, special to HostingTech-
Sometimes, a picture isnt worth a thousand words. If youve ever seen a photo of someone visiting the Grand Canyon, you probably know what I mean. Instead of a photo that captures "Joe dwarfed by one of natures grandest, awe-inspiring monuments," you end up with a snapshot of "Joe smiling next to a guard rail." For the amateur shutterbug, a traditional photograph is just not enough to get the full "feel" of a location. Enter immersive imaging.

Immersive imaging creates a 360-degree photograph, consisting of multiple shots that capture a portion of a full panorama. The shots are pieced together to create a seamless 360-degree image, which is viewable on just about any computer, regardless of platform. The picture can also be compressed enough to be served on a website.

Immersive photography is fun, fairly easy, and affordable for beginners. Of course, the more serious you become about VR, the more expensive the gadgets get, and professional-grade gear is quite a bit pricier.

Immersive imaging has become commonplace online. Car manufacturers and dealers alike are using it to show off their new models - inside and out. Real estate sites like www.RLTY.com use it to display the insides of homes.

For my research, I purchased a Manfrotto (www.manfrotto.com) tripod and a Kaidan KiWi photographic panoramic VR (virtual reality) tripod head (www.kaidan.com) to use with my Canon Digital Elph camera (see HostingTech, Sep. 2001, p. 10). How expensive was the gear? Roughly $250.00, excluding the camera. I picked up my equipment at www.red-door.co.uk. The site is well laid out, and includes many useful links for immersive photographers at the bottom.

The Elph camera comes with Canons "stitching" (the process of piecing the photos into one panoramic image) software called Photo Stitch. The Kaidan VR head has detailed instructions that include everything you need to know about setting up your camera on the tripod. The trickiest part is getting a distance calibration to get the focal point correct (although even that wasnt terribly difficult).

Once everything is set up, the system is pretty intuitive (feel free to send any questions to the e-mail below). Although there is no need for technical lessons from your faithful über-geek, I have provided a few examples of my recent immersive images at www.vrsidmouth.com (you need QuickTime Player to view these images).
 
 
Reproduced from an original article in Hosting Tech.