A group of organisations including xRez, Microsoft and The US National Parks Service have produced a web site that allows you to zoom into images of certain parts of Yosemite valley in amazing detail.
They’ve taken 1000s of high resolution digital photos then using some clever Microsoft software to combine them all so you can seamlessley zoom in from the widest angle shot showing several miles of the valley edge to a close-up of climbers. You can go close enough to see the color of their socks!
For more about how they did it and to see the results here. Just zoom in until you see an image, then keep going and going and going… I’ve stood in Yosemite valley and been blown away by its size, this technology helps you appreciate just how impressive the valley is.
Photosynth is an application and website developed by Microsoft Live Labs (think of Live Labs as a bunch of mad scientists who get to try out interesting ideas in a lab, and share them with the public) which lets you create a 3 dimensional feeling scene using just normal photos. For example, say you visit the Opera House in Vienna and take a dozen or so photos inside the auditorium – uploading these to Photosynth would result in a photosynth view which you can zoom in out, pan left/right, up/down giving you a real feel for being there. Best of all, its free and you can share your “synths” with the world.
There are some impressive synths already posted to the site – the Taj Mahal is the best I’ve seen. You’ll need to install the viewer to see this (don’t worry, you’ll be prompted when you visit the site). Just think what you could do if you combined this with the photos on Flickr which had be geo-tagged. I bet we see something like this soon.
Go have a play…