GigaPan

Correcting the Ghost People

2010-11-15T01:01:00.000-05:00

A photograph captures a moment in time. A GigaPan is often presented as capturing a single moment, but
as we know it captures many disconnected moments, and things happen between those moments.

One of the most distracting things is when people move between frames. Often there will be a reasonably complete image of a person in the space where two or four images meet. If the person has moved the Stitch program tries to blend the different views into one view. Sometimes this is an entertaining effect, but mostly it is simply distracting.

The most frustrating are the images where there is a good image of a person on one of the pictures, but it is being obscured by another image. Wouldn't it be great if you could just make the 'extra' images go away? Read on for a simple way to fix (some) of these GigaPans.

The simple way to make the Stitch program ignore something is to take it away. So the essence of this technique is to simply delete the parts of the person which are confusing the stitcher. But normally if you erase part of a JPG image you get a white, or black, area in the picture - which just messes up your image more.

So the trick is to create a transparent layer in your image, and then save the image in a format other than JPEG, like the PNG format, which supports transparency.

Here is a sample image. There is a certain charm to some of these distortions, but perhaps a more realistic depiction is desired...

First look at the images in the 'Select Images' tab. If you hold your mouse over an image it reveals the image name.

You want to identify the images which overlap to include your subject.

Then open these images. I am going to use The Gimp program in this example. The Gimp is an open source image editing program. It runs on Mac, Windows, and Linux, and because it is open source everyone can download it for free.

So once you have the files open look for the best images of your subject. In this case I we are lucky (well, we are lucky because I selected this example in order to maximize for luck :-) We have a clear view of the woman in one shot.

The image below this includes an unfortunate movement, and an overlap of the subject.

We add a transparent layer by going to Layer->Transparency->Add Alpha Channel

Then use one of the select tools to select
the area which we want to get rid of.

The lasso tool is likely your best bet, but depending on the details in the subject the Rectangle Select may be fine.

Once you have selected the area you want to get rid of go to Edit->Clear.

The area you selected is replaced with a light and dark grey checkerboard pattern as a marker that this is now transparent.

Save the image in PNG format by File->Save As, and then select 'PNG' format. There is a dialogue box, but for now accept the defaults and save the image.

I use the original image name, in this case 'IMG_3843', but the extension is changed to PNG. This means that you have two copies of the image - the original (most likely) JPG, and the new image.

Repeat this process for each image which has a bad view of your subject.

1. Layer->Transparency->Add Alpha Channel
2. Select the area to remove.
3. Edit->Clear Make sure you get the checkerboard pattern. If you get an empty white area it means you didn't do step 1.
4. File->Save As and change the extension to PNG

Now back to the Stitch program! Select Add Images and add all of the images with a png extension. This is easier if you click the 'date modified' column so that the newest images are shown first - since you just edited the png files they will appear first.

Finally, remove the original JPG files which are now repeated by the PNG's. You will get images with black holes in them - but that is okay. The Stitch program knows that these are areas which are transparent, so it will not use the information from the transparent area during the blending process.

So save and stitch the panorama, and you should have a much improved image!

There are still some artifacts in the stitched version of my example, but at least it doesn't look like a Picasso painting.

(not that there is anything wrong with Picasso!)

Happy stitching, and if you have questions, or a better way to do this, please let me know!

GigaPan: Democratizing information and bolstering bioliteracy

2010-09-27T11:08:00.000-04:00

Fine Fellow Alex Smith wrote a fantastic article about his experience with gigapan for the quarterly newsletter of the International Barcode for Live Project.

Alex concludes, "There are many parallels between the GigaPan and DNA barcoding as complementary forces for democratizing information and bolstering bioliteracy. Both are publicly accessible, both will be annotated through time by a community of experts and non-experts alike and both exist as a synthetic connection from the digital to the natural world.

One key to our capacity to understand the changes caused by the increasing pressures of the urbanization and degradation of natural environments will be ongoing monitoring through time. If such monitoring is democratized and publically available as DNA barcodes and GigaPans, then a marginalized environment may become more valued by the human population."

Check out the full article at http://ibol.org/gigapan/.

Fine International Conference on Gigapixel Imaging for Science

2010-09-10T11:32:00.000-04:00

Science Like You've Never Seen Before...

The CREATE Lab and Carnegie Mellon University, with The Fine Foundation, are pleased to announce the first Fine International Conference on Gigapixel Imaging for Science. Aiming to explore innovative use of GigaPan in the classroom, the field and the laboratory, the conference will feature all aspects of gigapixel technology in the science field.

November 11–13, 2010
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA

Early registration ends September 13, 2010.
Learn more or register for the conference: http://gigapixelscience.org

Education Day

2010-02-25T07:05:00.002-05:00

This is a nice description of some GigaPan and other technology empowerment activities during a special visit by local students thanks to the Consortium for Public Education.

LBJ's Oval Office

2010-02-24T05:58:00.003-05:00

Thanks to David Engle, there are GigaPans of LBJ's Oval Office and Lady Bird's office ready for exploration- and there is a great deal to find. Enjoy.

New issue of GigaPan Magazine is out!

2010-01-21T20:03:00.002-05:00

I am proud to announce that Volume 2, Issue 1 of GigaPan Magazine is now published. Check out the wonderful imagery on the theme, Environmental Portraits. It is a wonderful issue, thanks to all.

Embedding Tutorials

2010-01-05T14:28:00.000-05:00

I've created a few tutorials on using the Embed Wizard for embedding your gigapans in your web site or blog. Check them out at http://gigapan-embedding-tutorials.blogspot.com/.

Enjoy!

Fossil GigaPan

2009-12-03T12:18:00.002-05:00

Thanks to Professor Richard Edmonds in Dorset, UK, there is a new and beautiful example of macro-GigaPanography of a rock with a whole lot of fossil evidence.

Friends of the Pittsburgh Urban Forest

2009-12-03T10:00:00.000-05:00

The Friends of the Pittsburgh Urban Forest are using GigaPans to document their wonderful work- this is a nice example of imaging for public outreach and for documentation. Enjoy.

GigaPan Magazine new issue

2009-11-29T14:11:00.002-05:00

The newest issue of GigaPan Magazine is out: Culture Shop - thanks to everyone who made this possible, including Dror Yaron who is editing the magazine. Enjoy.

Jim Richardson blogs on the GigaPan

2009-11-16T21:20:00.000-05:00

National Geographic photographer Jim Richardson has written a
blog entry on using GigaPan at a Small World guitar concert. I wish I had been there!

Educational Article

2009-11-16T06:29:00.001-05:00

Here is a brief article in the Tribune-Review about one of the schools now using GigaPan for international cross-cultural exchanges.

Stephen King meets GigaPan

2009-11-09T12:32:00.002-05:00

A very nice set-up GigaPan has been shot for publicizing Stephen King's newest book, there is an embed on wired; and the original image is at: GigaPan.

Nice Educational Article

2009-11-06T17:26:00.001-05:00

Here is a nice article about the use of a gigapan for geomorphology class by Winona State University staff and students. Enjoy...

GigaPan goes to the world series

2009-10-30T10:16:00.002-04:00

Thanks to David Bergman, the photographer who took our ever-famous Obama inauguration photo, GigaPan is at the world series! Enjoy this gigapan from the first game, in Yankee Stadium, on Major League Baseball's website. More details soon.

Fine Outreach for Science begins

2009-10-22T22:47:00.002-04:00

The third ever Fine Outreach for Science workshop started tonight with a wonderful reception. We are honored to welcome 31 ecologists, anthropologists, geologists, historians, designers, environmental researchers [the list goes on!] to Pittsburgh for this very special event where interdisciplinary sharing is combined with a complete introduction to the GigaPan system, which each scientist takes home with them as newly inducted Fine GigaPan Fellows.

Two Outside Projects

2009-10-22T06:46:00.002-04:00

It is always a pleasure to see others using GigaPan in new ways. Thanks to some of our educational outreach from the CREATE Lab we are seeing educational and experimental projects with GigaPan devices cropping up. Here are two recent examples:
Photographer Rick Braveheart documents Badlands National Park

Pittsburgh Art Institute use the GigaPan robot for their own presentation website

A new milestone

2009-10-19T09:14:00.000-04:00

We are very happy to pass a major milestone; there are now more than 25,000 publicly viewable GigaPans on this website. Congratulations to everyone. Searches across all manner of terms yield outstanding images and snapshots, and for this everyone should be proud.

Buenos Aires time capsule

2009-10-16T16:57:00.002-04:00

A wonderfully creative lab in Argentina is doing a Time Capsula project for the Argentinian government because their country is celebrating its 200th anniversary next year. As part of this, they are taking some outstanding GigaPans of Argentina. The collection is really well worth looking at. The tag is "capsula2210" and I have enjoyed looking both at the most popular view as well as the largest panoramas from the lab. Enjoy.

Darwin's Darkest Hour

2009-10-06T19:45:00.002-04:00

Announcing NOVA's Darwin's Darkest Hour. The show airs tonight on PBS, and concurrent with this WGBH/NOVA has released an interactive website about the Galapagos Islands. Thanks to Randy Sargent and the GigaPan team working with WGBH, we are very proud to show GigaPan panoramas of the Galapagos Islands integrated into their interactive multimedia platform. A special thanks also goes out to Bruce Perry and his wonderful GigaPanning that made this possible. Enjoy.

5 Gigapixel Manual pano!

2009-09-30T10:00:00.003-04:00

Congratulations to Zoran who posted a five billion pixel panorama inside Macedonia. The really amazing part is that he put this panoarama together manually, using no robot. Very impressive. Thank you to Kilgore for making us aware of this upload.

NASA piece on GigaPan

2009-09-30T08:51:00.001-04:00

Thanks to our friends at NASA/Ames, we've been notified that GigaPan is a featured story on the latest NASA 360 program. You can listen to it here.

Half Terapixel Recognition

2009-09-21T09:10:00.003-04:00

Thanks to the observations of our friend Kilgore, I'm happy to congratulate Ron Schott for having established a whole new record. He has uploaded more than half a terapixel of GigaPan data to the site now. And his average GigaPan size is more than one gigapixel. Few can make that claim. Congratulations Ron!

A new first

2009-09-11T09:24:00.003-04:00

OnOrbit has a nice article about the highest GigaPans ever taken from the surface of the earth, thanks to Scott Parazynski- both an astronaut and now an Everest climber.

Pine Ridge Camp

2009-09-09T09:37:00.002-04:00

I am back from National Geographic Photo Camp in Pine Ridge, South Dakota, part of the Lakota Nation lands. The time there was, in many ways, life-changing. We have greatly enjoyed collaborating with National Geographic to bring both DSLRs and Gigapan equipment to the students there. For a taste of their panoramic productions so far, the tag to look for is pineridge.

One fun challenge. This pano has a rattlesnake in it. Really. Can you find it?

Gigapan Magazine issue 2

2009-09-03T14:41:00.005-04:00

GigaPan Magazine has just published its second issue: South Pole. It is a wonderful exploration. Thanks to Ella Derbyshire, our guest editor, who is a frequent gigapanner and the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station Physician. Enjoy.

And I'm back from South Africa, so I look forward to posting again.
Elephants are something I saw there. Along with the Kogelberg Biosphere Reserve.

New interview

2009-07-10T06:40:00.001-04:00

Dave Warner at LensFlare35.com has done a quick interview about GigaPan. He himself is a GigaPan user as well. Enjoy their interview podcast at their website.

Gigapan Dialogues news story

2009-06-24T00:06:00.003-04:00

Here is a story from today's Pittsburgh Tribune-Review about the Gigapan Dialogues project we are working on together with UNESCO's International Bureau of Education. We are in the midst of running an international conference this week with teachers from South Africa, Trinidad, Tobago, Brazil and Indonesia meeting here with five rural and urban schools in southwestern Pennsylvania.

GigaPan on Hawaii Public Radio

2009-06-19T09:55:00.004-04:00

Everyone, enjoy a Hawaii Public Radio interview with two of our wonderful GigaPan community members who are also Fine Outreach for Science fellows.

If you go to the ByteMarksCafe website and download the MP3 file, go to minute 20:30 to hear the interview with Richard Palmer and Kim Bridges. Congratulations and Mahalo Kim and Richard,
Illah

Curated Iran set

2009-06-17T14:15:00.002-04:00

In these very trying times in Iran, our thoughts are with the citizens of that country and we have curated a set of GigaPan panoramas taken in Iran onto our front page to help humanize the places and people of that country.

GigaPan and art

2009-06-02T06:51:00.001-04:00

The Mattress Factory has an exhibit of Thaddeus Mosley work and features a GigaPan of his home available for exploration- a nice art application of GigaPan. Enjoy exploring either in person in Pittsburgh at the museum or on their blog page.

New Feature: messaging

2009-05-27T14:01:00.001-04:00

As some of you noticed as we started silently testing this last week, member messaging is now enabled. Go to "my home" and look for the "My Messages" tab to send messages to and receive messages from any GigaPan user. Thanks to Miriam on the engineering team for this new feature. Enjoy!

Carina Nebula

2009-05-26T12:52:00.002-04:00

This is too cool not to blog. Rob Nijlaan has posted a gorgeous, highly explorable image from Hubble. Enjoy!

Let the FOFS year 2 workshop begin!

2009-05-20T23:32:00.002-04:00

Tomorrow we begin the second-year Fine Outreach for Science workshop in Pittsburgh, PA. This is an exciting year, bringing together six returning Fine Fellows from our program last year with two dozen new world-class scientists and journalists who will be receiving deep training in all aspects of GigaPan production and dissemination. For a good time, check out some of the panoramas that the Fine Scientists have taken over the past year.

Graduation Day, Carnegie Mellon

2009-05-18T13:26:00.002-04:00

The best graduation GigaPan Panorama, so far, has been shot thanks to the joint work of Jeff Baker and Randy Sargent, here. The Canon G10 was an excellent camera for this purpose, and the folks at Gigapan Systems have written a few pointers for such panoramas of crowds. Here are their pointers:

Graduation Shot Tips and Ideas

Freeze Motion – Capture the whole scene and crowd, and then re-shoot areas in motion to drop these shots into the final panorama in post-production
Practice, Practice, Practice – Set up your Epic and take a test run of the empty commencement area before the big event to make sure you are all set to go
Location is Everything – Depending on your surroundings, set your tripod above the crowd or at an elevated level to capture the full scene. Set the white balance on your camera to daylight, cloudy, tungsten, or fluorescent,
Batteries - Always make sure to bring an extra set of re-chargeable batteries, just in case.

And a few more tips:
o Unplug the batteries in the Epic when transporting it to ensure they don’t drain if the OK button is accidently bumped.
o Re-chargeable batteries can drain even when they are not being used, so be sure the batteries you charged a week ago are still charged.

User Profile pagination!

2009-05-07T15:02:00.002-04:00

Announcing....more pagination!
Thanks to the Gigapan engineers, we have just release an improvement on the User Profile page that is really helpful for our most popular GigaPanners-- pagination of gigapan panoramas and also of snapshots. So for instance you can go by both user Id and by username to check out Kilgore's work:

http://gigapan.org/viewProfile.php?userid=3529

and you can do the same with his username now:

http://gigapan.org/viewProfile.php?userid=Kilgore661

Pittsburgh Pop City announced Gigapan Magazine

2009-05-06T09:50:00.004-04:00

Pittsburgh innovates is a nice piece in our own Pittsburgh's POP City magazine about the new first issue of GigaPan Magazine.

This is due to the wonderful outreach efforts of Dror Yaron, outreach
coordinator of the CREATE Lab who has been enabling others to start telling their stories even more broadly using the GigaPan technology.

GigaPan in the Mattress Factory

2009-04-27T15:05:00.001-04:00

It is a new milestone that the Mattress Factory, a fantastic museum in Pittsburgh, PA, is hosting a show by sculptor Thaddeus Mosley, that includes GigaPan technology as part of the exhibit. Here is an article about this wonderful work.

Argentina Epic 100

2009-04-24T12:29:00.001-04:00

This is a beautiful overall image from our Argentinean friends with an Epic 100 using a Digital Rebel (EOS) DSLR. I love the overall look of the evening picture as the sky darkens left to right.

Great Pittsburgh Work of Art Award

2009-04-20T10:58:00.002-04:00

Congratulations to the Manchester Craftsmen's Guild MCG Youth program, and our very own Dror Yaron, who are finalists for a "Work of Art" award from the Greater Pittsburgh Arts Council. This is a wonderful honor for their work for:
using Gigapan Technology to develop learning experiences that connected youth with their communities and opened collaborations around the world.

Epic 100

2009-04-14T09:33:00.001-04:00

So by now everyone knows that Gigapan Systems just released the Epic 100. We are having fun with this, and can't wait to see who out there tries out some DSLR's in the community with the 100. Let us know how that goes and we'll report back to everyone.

Fast search!

2009-04-13T09:50:00.000-04:00

Just in case you hadn't noticed, a new search functionality has been released thanks to the outstanding work of the GigaPan software team. Search has become several times faster and I encourage you to give it a spin, trying out some favorite terms and seeing what you discover both in terms of panoramas and in terms of user-annotations. Enjoy, and a big thanks again to the software engineers who worked so very hard on this.

Chicago O'Hare GigaPans

2009-04-03T10:51:00.003-04:00

Just in case you haven't heard yet, Chicago has announced a fantastical set of full-size printed out, 30 foot wide GigaPans in the halls of O'Hare airport, as well as touchscreens where travelers can explore GigaPans that the CREATE lab and others have taken. One Daily Herald story. Also, you can visit the Chicago tourism website and actually tour the GigaPans right here.

Easter Egg Exhibit & Prize

2009-03-31T04:59:00.003-04:00

The folks at Gigapan Systems have announced an easter egg Gigapan contest which will be good fun. So, hide many things, take a Gigapan and post it. So we can all find your entries easily, I suggest tagging all of them with "easter" and "2009." There is even a first place prize: a Manfrotto 190 CX tripod. I believe this will be the first time Gigapanning can yield a prize. Their deadline is 12PM EST on 10 April.

6 trillion pixels and counting!

2009-03-30T10:25:00.002-04:00

We're happy to announce that we have broken the 6 trillion pixels milestone on Gigapan.org. To be precise, this morning there were a total of 6,034,848,260,503 pixels worth of panoramic imagery being served. Congratulations everyone, and thank you for being part of this new movement!

GigaPan in England

2009-03-18T10:04:00.003-04:00

Next week we are conducting a special GigaPan workshop at the Study Gallery in Dorset, England to train scientists who study the world heritage site, the Jurassic Coast. Bournemouth University will be setting up a special lending library of GigaPan imagers for those who graduate from this course, so this is an exciting new direction. In addition on Thursday evening, 26 March, at 7PM I will be giving a public lecture about the GigaPan project there, at Bournemouth University in Allsbrook Theatre. This workshop is funded by the
Fine Family Foundation and the Fine Foundation, so all thanks to them for making this possible.

Brazil in GigaPan images

2009-03-17T06:41:00.002-04:00

Last year, an artist from the Andy Warhol Museum started working with a GigaPan in order to create a website relating to a celebration of Brasilia, Brazil. I am impressed with the embedded results because it looks so beautiful. Enjoy...

Fast Conversations

2009-03-13T13:38:00.001-04:00

With many thanks to the Gigapan development team, the front page will now have more dynamic content, including links to news and other places of interest. Look for many more improvements in the coming months. Some of you may wonder where Conversations have gone. The orange Conversations button at the top right is now far faster, reimplemented architecturally, and so you can now enjoy browsing the many connections and discussions going on in our community. Enjoy.

Huffington Post

2009-03-12T13:07:00.002-04:00

A very nice mention in the Huffington Post about the Gigapan Epic. Enjoy.

Coal SD850 SD880 comparison

2009-03-12T09:36:00.004-04:00

Here are two snapshots of nearly the same coal seam with the SD880 (left) and the old SD850 (right) from almost exactly the same position. The SD880 snapshot shows much better resolution, which is promising. In general a nice effect of the Gigapan system is that as camera technology improves an existing Gigapan robot benefits as a side effect quite naturally.

SD880 tests

2009-03-11T10:50:00.004-04:00

All, one of our favorite simple cameras, the Canon SD850, is no longer sold; so we have been trying out its "newer neighbor," the SD880. The results are somewhat encouraging, although it does have some vignetting against the blue sky at full zoom. Some examples worth looking at (thanks to Kilgore and Marti for these):
Coal Mine
By the River
Queen Square

The detail at full zoom is reasonably good, which is good news.

Geneva Auto Show

2009-03-09T14:47:00.003-04:00

Bryon Paul McCartney has taken some nice GigaPan panoramas of the Geneva Auto Show. There is a wide shot and a close-up of the newest, most expensive Bugatti. The twin panoramas have been embedded on ImageEngineers. Congratulations, Bryon.

New Scientist article

2009-02-27T06:24:00.002-05:00

There is a wonderful New Scientist article here about the Fine Outreach for Science fellows who are using Gigapan. Our very own Richard Palmer, Ron Schott, Sarah Sharpe and Bill Wallauer have their work with Gigapan in science described. Congratulations!

Gizmodo reviews GigaPan

2009-02-19T09:11:00.002-05:00

There is a new review of the GigaPan Epic out by Gizmodo. The review is a mixed bag, but shows a wonderful example of a stitched Gigapan panorama with tons of resolution within. The reviewer, Mark Wilson, did make a few mistakes, and it is a pleasure watching GigaPan Nation respond for us all. Thanks Eric Byers for pointing out that in fact it is easy to export to TIFF from the stitcher, and that most of us use batteries with our GigaPans that enable many hundreds of shots with ease (I used rechargeable NiMH myself). Thanks for the community support.

Discovery Show - Daily Planet talks GigaPan

2009-02-13T09:03:00.002-05:00

The Discovery Channel's "Daily Planet" series just released an episode on TV that you can access on-line that you should take a look at. They filmed this in celebration of Darwin's 200th birthday anniversay, and at about minute 13 it features Alex Smith, one of our Fine Foundation Gigapan fellows, talking about their Barcode of Life project at the University of Guelph. He shows how they use GigaPan to capture the environment of the DNA specimens they collect and this features live usage of the website with a giant touch screen. Enjoy!

Gigapan documentary

2009-02-09T23:32:00.004-05:00

We have uploaded a documentary produced by Bruno Gex and UNESCO's International Board of Education. The nine minute piece describes joint work between UNESCO-IBE and us at Carnegie Mellon University deploying Gigapan for inter-cultural understanding with learners in Soweto, a township in South Africa and students in Pittsburgh PA. This is a good introduction to our educational Gigapan and Global Connection work.

Through the GigaPan

2009-02-06T06:44:00.002-05:00

This just in: the last blog entry has images of the GigaPan in Zion National Park.
Here is one of those Gigapans, now uploaded: Zion National Park

GigaPan in the Wild

2009-02-05T09:41:00.005-05:00

We just received a great message from a new Gigapanner, Chintan Gandhi. We love hearing about peoples' adventures with their new Gigapan, so keep these coming and enjoy the below
pictures of a GigaPan imager "in the wild." Thank you Chintan for sharing these images.

My wife and I did a whirlwind hiking trip of the four corners this Christmas. Before we left I ordered Gigapan while it was in beta. I just wanted to say I had a blast with this robot. It is a lot of fun to use. Here are a few shots of the robots doing its magic at the famous Horseshoe (Page, AZ) and at Angles Landing (Zion National Park, UT). I wish I had taken pictures of Gigapan at all the places I used it. I will have to remember that next time.

Beyond the Inauguration Gigapan

2009-02-02T17:14:00.002-05:00

Gigapan users, we have had a response exceeding our expectations in regards to the 2009 Inauguration Gigapan. We continue to receive tremendous traffic, much of it now originating in other countries where the news is spreading like wildfire. I have hesitated to change the curation of gigapan.org's front page away from the Inauguration panorama because so many are still coming to the site for the very first time. Wonderful Gigapans are being uploaded though, and one of these days I do promise to begin curating the front page with a diversity of images once again. Thank you for your patience and don't forget to use that Most Recent button every day.

Extreme Resolution

2009-01-30T07:50:00.003-05:00

Richard Palmer is a member who has special expertise in extremely large resolution Gigapans, among many other fantastic types of shots. He recently uploaded an incredible example- a Gigapan of
Koko Crater. This is more than 11 billion pixels, and what really stands out is the detail with which you can see hikers on the opposite side, hiking away. Truly stunning.

Global Connections

2009-01-28T15:37:00.004-05:00

We have an educational example of Global Connection going on in
this panorama, one of the excellent panoramas taken in Iran by payam195r. A comment on his panorama talks of violence, of Islam and of Iran. Payam responds in a way that hearkens to our goals with Gigapan and with the Global Connection Project in general. Thank you Payam!

Inauguration flood!

2009-01-26T10:54:00.002-05:00

Well you have all noticed the just amazing response to David Bergman's inauguration photo. There are articles in all manner of blogs, and there is even a short article in the
Christian Science Monitor. We are so pleased with the response and hope our community grows by leaps and bounds! We hope you understand why we'll keep the inauguration Gigapan on the gigapan.org front page for a few days yet. Then curation will resume...

Inauguration Gigapan!

2009-01-23T06:41:00.003-05:00

Well we have a great inauguration gigapan thanks to David Bergman, to whom we lent a Gigapan only a week ago in the hopes he could cover inauguration. Big thanks to Gigapan Systems for making this happen. The gigapan is here and there is one article about it already
in Gizmodo.

Walking Tours

2009-01-15T16:03:00.002-05:00

Thanks to some outstanding Gigapan community members, something fun to share is an example of a walking tour:
link

These are walks around Bath and much more is to come. I cannot wait until wizards make it
easy for all to create animated tours. It is coming.

Recipe-filled Dinner Gigapan

2009-01-07T07:02:00.002-05:00

I have finally finished something I have been meaning to share for two months. Our thanksgiving gigapan - contains snapshots with links to all the recipes we used. Enjoy.

NPR embeds Gigapans

2009-01-06T05:29:00.005-05:00

Thanks to Ron Schott for noticing that NPR has embedded Gigapans into an on-line story for the first time:
Murals Depict Power of Law and Justice

My wife and I heard the story on the air and were thinking, "what a great application for Gigapan. All these murals. We should contact them and convince them to use it." Of course they already had.

Inauguration Gigapans

2009-01-06T05:07:00.003-05:00

Hi everyone,
Here is a networking message from the folks at Gigapan Systems for you all. The 2009 Presidential Inauguration is an historic event to capture with some gigapans, and Gigapan Systems is working on having some cameras there. They are wondering who from amongst our community is also going to be there, to coordinate. So, if you are planning to gigapan there, please email them if
you want to collaborate: customerservice@gigapansystems.com

thanks
illah

Top tech story at the UK Times online

2009-01-02T18:40:00.001-05:00

This is fun-- the Times publishes the most popular on-line tech stories of the year. This year we are on their list-- and in fact Gigapan is #1. Thanks to Randy Sargent for discovering this:
http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article5415040.ece

10,000 Public Gigapan Panoramas!

2008-12-05T09:02:00.002-05:00

Congratulations to everyone: the gigapan.org site hosts more than 10,000 publicly viewable panoramas now. This is a wonderful milestone. The credit for the 10,000th public panorama uploaded goes to Miroslav Kralcak whose panorama is
Torrent de Parells- quite a beautiful shot in Spain. Congratulations Miroslav on your 118th upload.

Gigapan Exhibit at ICE

2008-12-02T07:35:00.003-05:00

We just returned from the International Conference on Education, which is run by UNESCO's International Board of Education. We were honored to be invited to have an exhibit there, and even to give a speech to the ministers of education about our educational work with UNESCO using Gigapan. Here is a Gigapan taken by Laura Tomokiyo and Illah of our exhibit, which was well visited at the exhibit floor of the international conference. This is a fun view because you can see how impressive the Gigapan panoramas are when printed out several meters wide.

AIR gallery panorama

2008-11-19T12:43:00.002-05:00

All, here is a panorama taken inside the AIR gallery, where Gigapan Conversations opened last Friday. This is fun to explore just to see how we bring the GigaPan world to life in a physical space- especially how the public will be commenting on the gallery walls. The space is quite large, and this is a panorama of just a small portion of the gallery, perhaps 1/4 of the total space.

More Storytelling by Members

2008-11-17T15:38:00.005-05:00

Kilgore661, one of our most active British members, has just created a story-telling site as well. Here is an excellent overview of the city of Bath in the United Kingdom. Inspired I believe by Sarah Palin, it's entitled "Zoom, Baby, Zoom." Enjoy.

Storytelling with Gigapan

2008-11-14T11:27:00.003-05:00

Well Ron Schott has prototyped something that we are very happy to see. Here is a website he has created that uses gigapan imagery to take you on a guided tour. I just tried it on Firefox and it worked very well in that browser. We are working on features to enable all members to tell stories like this, so if your web hacking skills leave you wanting more tools, be patient and we hope to satisfy you soon. Thank you Ron for sharing this- it is outstanding.

Veterans Day curated set

2008-11-10T09:41:00.002-05:00

We are pleased to release a large curated set in honor of Veterans Day. It is now active, and each time you refresh or re-visit gigapan.org you will see one of the numerous Veterans and Memorials related gigapans on our site. I am touched that the site has such an impressive collection of imagery that, on a topic as important as this, a truly compelling set can be created with ease. Please share the link with those who will appreciate these Gigapan panoramas by individuals all around the world.

Gigapan Gallery Show in Pittsburgh

2008-11-06T06:12:00.003-05:00

We have already had a first Gigapan gallery show in Johannesburg, South Africa, and we are proud to announce an upcoming educational Gigapan Conversations show in Pittsburgh, PA. The location is really quite cool-- Artists Image Resource is a nonprofit where artists can do lithography, screen printing, digital imaging, printing, building- and it is where we do most of the very large-scale printing of Gigapans on their very large paper, such as this one of Fynbos on my wall. Here is the official Carnegie Mellon news release about the opening we will have on 14 November, Friday, at 5pm. The gallery show is especially neat in that gallery visitors will be able to continue and extend conversations right on the gallery walls, just as they would on the gigapan.org site- so it's a physical realization of gigapan.org.

Gigapan event in Belgium

2008-11-04T16:02:00.001-05:00

Gigapan was invited to the NEXT consumer electronics fair in Brussels,
Belgium, the largest such fair in the low countries (Belgium, the
Netherlands, and Luxembourg). We will be presenting the Gigapan
robot, stitcher, and website at a booth at the fair, and will be
uploading Gigapans of the fair and the surrounding Brussels expo
center (site of the 1958 world fair). NEXT
(dutch and French only); Here is a link also for the
Brussels Expo

9,000 Gigapans posted!

2008-10-27T16:57:00.003-04:00

Congratulations are due to Russ Dodd for posting the 9,000th Gigapan panorama ever to our small community. We would never have guessed one year ago when this project website began that there would be so many wonderful panoramas shared by so many enthusiasts. We will have to work out a special prize, of course, for the 10,000th Gigapan panorama upload. In the meantime, let's enjoy Russ's Gigapan.

Earth Science continues!

2008-10-24T06:14:00.003-04:00

There has been so much appreciation of Ron Schott's excellent collections of geological curated gigapans that even though Earth Science Week ended a week ago, we continue to feature new sets from Ron on the front page of gigapan.org. Today is Coastal & Shorelines, and there will be two more themes before we are all done: Yosemite National Park; and Sediment, Rocks, Roadcuts & Outcrops.

This has been a wonderful guest curation experience. I encourage everyone to consider creating collections of Gigapan panoramas that we will be happy to feature on the front page. If you have a collection and you are ready to share it, contact me by email with your list at illah at cs.cmu.edu.

Gigapan Gallery in atoms not bits

2008-10-16T13:46:00.003-04:00

We just returned from South Africa, where MuseumAfrica in Johannesburg now has a beautiful gallery exhibit called 'Gigapan Conversations.' This is a collection of Gigapan panoramas and conversations between students in Soweto and Pittsburgh, PA about culture, inclusion and history. Here is a link to some information about this first try at taking the internet world of Gigapan into the physical world of paper. If you have a chance to visit the gallery, notice that there are special conversation markers there that you can use to add to the ongoing conversations on the gallery walls! This project is part of our partnership with UNESCO to bring the world closer through cross-cultural connections.

Earth Science Week

2008-10-15T06:00:00.003-04:00

This week is Earth Science Week, and thanks to member Ron Schott we are presenting curated geologically themed Gigapan panoramas on the front page each day of the week. Today is mountains, my very favorite category. For more information visit Earth Science Week's website.

Nextfest Gigapan

2008-09-24T05:17:00.002-04:00

The Nextfest team coordinated a team of well-versed Gigapanners to fly into Chicago and, in preparation for Wired Nextfest, take Gigapans of a beautiful array of Chicago landmarks. These will be on display at Nextfest this week, and we are pleased to curate them for the front page of gigapan.org -- so please go to the front page and reload often and explore the variety of images.

Beta Testing of Gigapan units continues

2008-09-15T10:43:00.002-04:00

We are pleased to let you know that the distribution of Beta Test Gigapan units has resumed! The company we worked with originally, Charmed Labs, has teamed up with others and now a new company is able to build and help to run the Beta test for Gigapans. To sign up directly with this new company go to their website to register your interest in the Gigapan hardware.

Post-Hurricane Ike Gigapan images

2008-09-15T10:41:00.002-04:00

We have already seen two Gigapan panorama uploads from Houston in the wake of Hurricane Ike. They are at: this curated page. We also know about other Gigapanners who will be taking more shots and uploading just as soon as they have power. So stay tuned for more. Our thoughts and well wishes go out to all those in the southern seaboard right now.

Conversations are Cool

2008-09-09T13:15:00.002-04:00

We are pleased to see more people partaking of conversations on the website. That right-most orange button, "conversations," is an experiment in starts threads of back-and-forth about what you find in the panoramas and snapshots throughout gigapan.org. It's awkward to browse them, but you may find it rewarding. Once you have made a snapshot or added to a conversation, you will receive email updates whenever others respond to your comments (so long as you wish). I encourage you to give this a try. As an example of an across-the-ocean conversation, take a look at this one: http://gigapan.org/viewConversation.php?id=23110

Burning Man

2008-09-05T05:54:00.003-04:00

Gigapanner Extraordinaire Rich Gibson has just returned from Burningman and took literally dozens of Gigapan panoramas that he has been uploading. One of my favorites is a billion pixels from a crane:
http://gigapan.org/viewGigapan.php?id=8582

See an article also at O'Reilly Radar:

GigaPan Mission & Vision

2008-09-05T05:51:00.005-04:00

We have recently heard some great stories about individuals stumbling onto our mission and vision for GigaPan and its home project, the Global Connection Project. There are two good places to read about our motivation for doing what we do with GigaPan, and here are links to both of them. We hope you enjoy learning more about the 'why' behind this project:

About Gigapan
About Global Connection

The Curation Story

2008-08-29T07:07:00.002-04:00

You may have noticed that the Gigapan pano's shown on the front page of gigapan.org are curated by us. Several have asked what can improve the chances that panoramas make it into this selected set and the answer is easy: upload a great panorama, be sure to write some descriptive text about it, and take some snapshots inside it. Those are all key to getting your panorama curated to the front page. We have been curating sets of panoramas, anywhere from four to twenty at a time, and when you go to gigapan.org's home page you are shown one at random. I hope you enjoy the variation on the front page.

More Gigapan Outreach

2008-08-25T11:48:00.002-04:00

We love seeing websites begin to incorporate Gigapan explorability into their presentations, and a number of news organizations have begun doing this. One fun, new scientific foray is involved with the work of the Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World at Brown University. Here is their embedded Gigapan page:

http://brown.edu/Departments/Joukowsky_Institute/fieldwork/gigapan.html

Private Gigapans

2008-08-20T23:48:00.003-04:00

The Gigapan development team has released private Gigapan features which make it possible for authors of uploaded Gigapan panoramas to easily make their panoramas private. Also, the author can then share the Gigapan pano with anyone by emailing them the URL when they log in and access the private panorama. Gigapan.org is all about sharing and exploration, so we hope you use this feature wisely and sparingly. One great way to use 'private' is to upload your Gigapan pano as private, add your commentary, snapshots and geolocation, then make it public with all the i's dotted and t's crossed.

Announcing a New Explore Score

2008-08-07T14:40:00.000-04:00

The way we have calculated the Explore Score score for the past year has depended on the volume of visits to each Gigapan panorama over the life of our one-year-old website, and this method makes it hard for new Gigapan panoramas to obtain high scores without being in a major periodical (like Sports Illustrated, in the case of the Yankee Stadium high-scorer).

Explore Score is now a totally new value that takes into account not just volumes of visitors, but how richly the panorama has been annotated and the degree to which it is a subject of conversations. In a way, it is a measure of how “explorable” we believe the image to be. As with all scoring algorithms, you are going to see some of your favorite panoramas rise and others fall based on this new scoring methodology. We hope you will agree that, on balance, this change turns out to be an improvement in scoring true explorability and in giving new panoramas a better chance.

Welcome to the GigaPan Blog!

2008-08-04T11:11:00.000-04:00

Welcome to the GigaPan blog. We intend to use this venue to make you aware of feature additions and changes on the GigaPan website and to provide you with more information on the status of retail sales of the GigaPan camera system. There is also a great deal of outreach activities employing the GigaPan technology all over the world, from schoolchildren documenting their neighborhood identity to internationally recognized scientists documenting biodiversity. This will also be a great vehicle for telling you about some of these programs and the GigaPan gallery shows coming up that will showcase all sorts of Gigapanners. On this last note, Robot 250 just came to an end. At www.robot250.org click on “Media” for a gallery of images, some taken in the GigaPan gallery that we set up at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, PA as part of this event. There was even an interactive kiosk with three trackballs in this gallery that enabled museum visitors to explore Gigapan panoramas.