Tag Archives: PhotoSynth

Microsoft PhotoSynth is AWESOME!

I have a confession to make. My favorite iPhone app is made by… (wait for it!) Microsoft! Yes, I said the “M” word! This program is awesome and easy for creating 360° panoramas, it’s called Photosynth. Actually, it’s more than 360°, it’s right/left and up/down and all the pieces in-between. I’m going to call it 720° panoramas, okay?

This is the last one I did, and it’s actually one of the better ones. Other than looking straight down, it’s pretty much perfect. Just so you know, the app calculates everything on the phone before you upload and share it. Plus, it tags it with your location. Once it’s on the website you can point out certain highlights (buildings, bridges, etc.). It’s amazing!

Direct link to the Hart Plaza 720° Photosynth.

To view them, it appears you need MicroSoft Silverlight or HTML 5 (at least the latter is why I think you can view it on an iPhone that does not have the app installed).

You can view all of my Photosynths at the Msoft Photosynth site.

Also, from the web site, you can specify where you were and what you were facing, I see that making for some interactive hopping from Photosyth “bubble” to “bubble”…

Direct link to the Deserted Warehouse 720° Photosynth.

The second one is a deserted building that I like in Downtown Detroit. It’s where I took the lost bride photo

This is the first time I tried to embed them and it looks pretty good so far. Please let me know if you have problems viewing them. And I’m also interested in how they might view on your mobile devices.

Update: I couldn’t view the embedded Photosynths on my iPhone so I added direct links. Those seem to work fine.

Phone Service at the Inauguration

So the CTIA (Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association) has asked people to only text during the inauguration and not overwhelm the cell services with photo images even though they are spending millions temporarily upgrading D.C. I’m not sure how they asked them, but that’s what the NY Times says.

Here’s the fun part! CNN has asked everyone to text them a photo of ‘the moment’. Then they plan to so a PhotoSynth which is to assemble all of the photos to show it from all different angles. The photo synth is a neat option to build a viewable multi-angle “photo” from all the images. If you’re on a PC you can see samples here (actually you can create your own if you have enough photos). Let’s see how that works out. (Found at the Skype Journal.

Here’s a good YouTube explanation of PhotoSynth.

Send your Obama Inauguration photos to CNN.

Follow up articles reporting: FOXnews, PCworld, MS-NBC, CNN, NPR. Sounds like it was spotty but many calls went through first time, but those were PR people from the companies so I’ll wait to see what the attending bloggers say…