Panoramic Earth Moves to HTML5

It has been a while coming, but Panoramic Earth is now moving to an HTML5 panorama viewing engine. Up to now the site has been using a Flash version of KRPano. While this has proved great for several years, Flash is not well supported by mobile devices, especially if made by Apple. As the number of mobile users has increased, so this anomaly has been a growing issue.

Panorama of British Museum - Great Court from Stairs supplied by Panoramic Earth

For a while it has been possible to render equirectangular spherical panoramic images in HTML5, but not cylindrical. This meant that only part of the content of the site could be viewed with the new viewer. However, things have now moved on meaning that over the next few days all the 10,500 plus panoramas will be converted to the new version.
The viewing engine still comes from KRPano, one of the most popular panorama viewers on the market. With it come some new functions as well. Practically speaking, viewers on computers will notice little difference, but for mobile devices this will transform their user experience.

Panoramic Earth about to Change

The New Site Screenshot

For several months now we have been working on a major site upgrade for Panoramic Earth, completely redesigning the look, feel and functionality of the site. The good news is that the principles remain the same, still showing great 360 panoramas from around the world from panoramic photographers. Still linking the images to Google maps with local and travel information.

The better news is that the site will be easier to navigate, better to look at and have much more functionality. These two screen shots show some of the differences to be expected:

The Old Site Screenshot

• Much cleaner feel and navigation.
• Immediate presentation of some local information without scrolling down.
• Thumbnails linking to nearby images.
• Incorporation of the Krpano flash panorama viewer giving smoother action.
• Larger, high resolution images suitable for full screen viewing.
• Ability to display both spherical and cylindrical 360 panoramas.
  
• Ability to embed single images as well as whole regional tours.
• Local directory for each destination covered giving local travel links.

Most of the work is now completed and we expect to be able to announce a 'go live' date soon. The use of high resolution images, and incorporation of spherical panoramas, will mean some changes to the uploading and editing procedures for photographers, but this will remain a relatively simple affair.

We are very excited about these changes, offering a much better viewing experience for our visitors and expand the services we can offer the travel industry and community. 2010 will be a year of change, expansion and improvement for us.

Improved Search Result Presentation

Searches for panoramas on Panoramic Earth has just got smarter as we have just implemented changes that make these more useful. Instead of a simple A-Z list of the search returns, these are now tabulated in a more meaningful way as shown below:


You get -

• Panorama ID - a site ID given to each panorama
• Location Name - An active link which will take you to the location listed
• Region and Country Listing - Shows you where in the world the location is found at a glance.

The search covers more than just the location title. For example, a search for 'victoria' will return both panorama locations with 'Victoria' in the title and also images from Victoria in Australia and other places where Victoria relevant to the search request.

This is much more useful than the old way of presenting search results as shown above.

Panoramic Earth v2.0 Launched (new and improved)...

Panoramic Earth version 2 has finally arrived. As I mentioned in March, we have been working on updating the site to make it more useful to everyone. The new version was made live on the 19th April, marking the end of months of effort and time.

So please feel free to explore. I would be really interested in any comments or observations anyone has. Let me know about any difficulties you had getting around, was it easy to use, did things load and run properly etc. Leave your comments about the site as comments to this post here.

• On the new site you will find a growing number of panoramic images of different places from around the world link to a Google map. Each place will have it's own description too.
• Submit your own panoramic images and descriptions of places you have visited to Panoramic Earth.
• If you want to comment on any of the locations you find on the site then feel free to do so. On almost every page you will find a comment box near the bottom. You will have to register with Panoramic Earth in order to access this.

To get you going here are a few of the many places you can explore on Panormaic Earth:

London | Budapest | Rome | Vienna | Bangkok | Singapore

Otherwise, visit the home page go from there. Your comments will be taken into account as the site continues to develop.

Move Over to Beta.blogger - Post Tags

The Panoramic Earth blog today moved over to the newer version of Blogger. One thing that this will mean is that people will be able to move through relevant blog entries with greater ease. Each entry will now contain a series of tags at the bottom. By selecting one of the tags you will be shown only the entries with the same tag. This can be helpful when trying to compartmentalize the information.

For example, I expect to add a little more detail about some of the locations that have been photographed for Panoramic Earth. Using the tag system you will be able to see what information is given about specific places featured, like Rome, London and panoramicearth (for website related entries). I will also be going through some of the older posts and adding tags to them as time is available. Some of the more important tags will be listed down the side in future as well, allowing rapid access to specific areas of the blog.

Who knows, maybe one day you will be able to select the tag cloud and see what are the most common subjects written about.

London and Rome Index

There are now some 50 destinations covered by Panoramic Earth. Some of these are skiing areas in Europe while others covers some cities and other travel destinations. We are now beginning to produce lists of all the individual locations that have been photographed in each of the cities. So, if you want to know what is covered in either London or Rome then you can now do so by following the links given below. We will continue to gradually provide indexes to all the other non-skiing destinations covered in the future.

London Index

Rome Index

You will find the locations listed alphabetically within categories. In the meantime we are also working on constructing the tours and maps for some other cities. These will include Paris for which the panoramic images are being put together as this is being written.

Part 3 - Panorsaurus Head Review

Previously on PanoramicEarth (as so many US series start off with any episode before immediately switching to a bunch of ads) – we covered some of the differences between the Panosaurus panoramic head and the Manfrotto MN303 panoramic head. Neither alone fully met our needs for a light weight system that could be quickly packed away and transported with minimum setup time at a new location.

System Combination:
Thus an amalgam of the two was used, providing a more lightweight (and cheaper) system than upgrading to a Manfrotto MN303SPH system. The combination worked, in a ‘thigh-bone connected to the hip-bone’ fashion, thus:

• Manfrotto 055PRO tripod with Assy support plate connected to-
• Manfrotto 438 Compact Leveling Head connected to-
• Manfrotto 300 Pan Rotation Unit (allows ‘click stop’ rotation required) connected to-
• Manfrotto 3/8” to ¼” thread adaptor connected to-
• Panosaurus head.

In this way the whole of the panoramic head combination was easily detached from the tripod in one easy maneuver and stashed in a backpack along with the camera for easy transport. All that was needed was to simply slide the camera off the horizontal arm and pack that away with the Panosaurus plate still attached to it. Setup time at a new location took less than a minute including leveling of the camera. The Panosaurus does have a base plate marked with regular divisions for rotation, but I wanted to be able to rely on constantly having the same rotation angle every time as this made post processing easier.

Yes, there are other systems available, but for a relatively cheap option, having already invested in the Manfrotto 303 gear, this seemed a reasonable way to progress to be able to shoot 360 spherical images if required. It would be interesting to obtain a King Pano system to have a look at as well.

Thus far this new system has been used to shoot over 600 panoramic images in Paris, Vienna, Budapest, Prague, Rome, Barcelona and Bratislava. The results of all this mad rushing around is currently being processed and will be added to the PanoramicEarth.com city tours in due course.

Part 2 - Panorsaurus Head Review

The Panosaurus, designed and manufactured by Greg Rubottom, is a light weight self-assembly system and detailed instructions. It can be used to take both cylindrical and spherical panoramic images. It is made of light weight materials (aluminium upright arm and PVC for the other parts), and therefore is unsuitable for cameras over 1.5kg in weight. Both Red Door and Tawbaware have written reviews on the product. It is a fully adjustable system, very flexible and light. That said we have found the following limitations with the system. On the whole though, for the money the Panosaurus is a light weight, durable, flexible and relatively cheap system for taking spherical panoramic images. It is well worth considering as a possible system, but be aware of some of the limitations.

Looseable Leveling Indicator
The Panosaurus does have it’s own level monitoring system. This is a spirit level held by a magnet to the centre of the base arm. Obviously, this is removable, and the user must take care not to loose it. In our hands, the magnet quickly came detached from the level bubble as the two components are simply glued together. It would be better if this could be permanently fixed to the unit somehow. Most people will use an additional leveling unit on their tripod to make life easier, and often these will have their own spirit level in them.

Tripod Attachment Issues
The Panosaurus screws directly onto the tripod head. If you are wanting to detach the system quickly then you will need to combine it with another system that allows for rapid detachment from the tripod. For our uses this was essential, as we were quickly moving form one location to another, often shooting over 20 locations a day. With the Manfrotto system this is taken care of by their own quick release mechanisms and attachments. However, most of the Manfrotto gear has 3/8” threads.

The Panosauraus only has a ¼” thread hole in the base for attaching to a tripod. If you want to attach to a 3/8” bolt then you will need another adaptor. It would be better if the system came with a 3/8” thread and contained an small screw-in adaptor that could convert this to a ¼” thread if needed. That way it would be able to fit all accessories and tripods without having to purchase other equipment. We needed to attach this to the Manfrotto 438 ball leveling system, and therefore had to buy an additional thread converter.

Click Stop versus Full Adjustable Head Rotation
The Panosaurus has not ‘click-stop’ as you move the head round. If you want to use a click-stop system then you will need to add it on. Again you may need a thread adapter to do this. We know the number of shots needed for our use, that this would always be consistent and wanted something that would always align in the same manner. The click stop method of taking panoramic shots also helps in low light conditions, or where the camera has had to be raised above head-height when it would not be possible to see the markings on the base plate easily.

Horizontal Arm Indicator
The vertical arm has a groove in the top to help align the horizontal arm to the required angle. It would be an improvement if this indicator groove progressed down the vertical arm a short way, and was painted white.

In the next post we will show how we combined the Panosaurus with some Manfrotto components to suit our needs of a light weight spherical imaging system that could quikly be packed away.

Panosauraus Panoramic Head Review #1

Manfrotto Panoramic Head

Up till now, most of the images on Panoramic Earth had been taken using a Manfrotto (MN) 303 panoramic head system. The MN303 can only be used for cylindrical panoramic images, but not those that can pan up and down – spherical panoramic images. The MN system has proved very reliable in every situation we have found ourselves – and this includes from snow-covered mountain tops to volcanoes and caves. It is made of metal throughout, thus is very durable, and can hold quite heavy equipment. The release system to mount it onto the tripod is all a quick release locking system allowing it to be packed away rapidly, knowing that it can be re-assembled just as fast in exactly the same nodal point configuration next time round. The price you pay for this is weight. When considering to upgrade for spherical images this became, as well as the cost, a major consideration. For the work done in cities and on rugged terrain saving weight makes for happier backs.

With this in mind we looked at a number of other options. including the Panosaurus, which is promoted as a low weight, low cost option - an ‘Affordable Fully Spherical Panoramic Head’ and available in the UK through Red Door VR Ltd.. We have now used this system to shoot over 300 panoramic images in both city and outdoor situations.

In the next couple of posts we will look at various aspects of our experience in using the Panosaurus panoramic head, snags encountered and observations made.

Social Bookmarking Made Easy

Many people have heard of social bookmarking. This allows you to store all your bookmarks online through various services like linkaGoGo and del.ico.us. In each case the user can create tags and other ways of identifying and sorting bookmarks into groups. del.ico.us uses tags and tag bundles to sort the bookmarks while linkaGoGo uses different folders to store them, some of which can be shared with the wider community and some kept private. This allows you to see and manage your bookmarks anywhere in the wold, and see what other people may have considered useful about the same subject.

The Socailizer ‘allows you to easily submit a link to several social bookmarking systems. Instead of having a link to each social bookmarking website, you have a single link to all of them.’ This is a free service from eKstreme.com, and makes it much easier for webmasters to allow users to add bookmarks to their system of choice. Panoramic Earth intends to be adding bookmarking icons on some of the pages shortly.

Panoramic Earth Supports IRCA and SafeSurf

We are happy to announce that PanoramicEarth.com is now completely labeled with both the Internet Content Rating System (IRCA) and SafeSurf labels on all pages.

In recognition of the problems of ensuring that unwanted web content is not thrust unwittingly upon the user by website owners (whether accidentally or deliberately) we support the efforts of both the IRCA and SafeSurf to provide a means of rating web content in a responsible manner.

Naturally, these indicate that all the pages of Panoramic Earth are safe for all people of all ages.

Panoramic Earth - Some History

So, where did PanoramicEarth.com come from, where are we going, or is it all just round in circles? Well, it can certainly feel that way when taking panoramic images, as anyone who has done so for some time will be able to tell you. The whole concept of creating a library of panoramic tours from around the world started some 7 years ago in the recesses of the brain of Martin Watts, the main force behind MAI Technology.com.

A few years later, almost over the proverbial pint, this was being discussed with Peter Watts (yep, brothers), with London in mind. The challenge then was to be able to successfully accomplish a couple of things. A kind of Mission Impossible (ish). London is a big place, a busy city and very popular as a travel destination.

Challenge 1 : The Photos.
Not quite as easy as it sounds. London is big. It is busy, and people don’t tend to take the needs of anyone else, least of all someone with a tripod, into account as they rush by (well, through if you are unlucky).

After the people come the huge numbers of buses, vans and other vehicles both large and small that delight in obscuring the building of interest. It is simply not a matter of just turning up and pointing a camera. Especially when the best locations for a given shot appear to be the middle of the road.

And then you can toss in the greatest variable of all – the British Weather. As has been commented not a few times, London is not quite as sunny as would be indicated by the current tour. No, indeed. But endless grey clouds and raindrops an appealing picture make, do not.

Challenge 2 : The Usage
Having battled through the former, finally rising tired from looking at pixels, the second challenge has been to get it ‘out there’. How do you, on what was then a non-existent budget, promote the tour effectively and will people really want to see it. Well, more on that later, but we have managed to get to the point where a search for ‘London Map’ on Google, MSN and others, will show the-london-map.co.uk among the first page of returns. The golden page. On a shoe string. With hours of slog. Well, maybe the domain name helped a bit ;)

This gives us confidence that what we have managed to do for London, we will be able to do for the other locations we cover in the future. After that came Hawaii Island, two weeks of running around, all those fantastic beaches and no time to swim (except twice at the end of long days).

And where will we go from here? Well, look out for Paris, New York, Rome, Barcelona and others which all feature in our plans for 2006.

Panoramic Earth meets Stumbleupon.com

Every once in a while an event catches your eye, and causes you to look a little further. This was our experience recently with Stumbleupon.com. Suddenly, like an exploding supernova lighting up the night sky, the referrals from this site flashed upon our web logs. It has been interesting watching the development and demise of this traffic source over the recent weeks. There are always a few sources of traffic that you get used to seeing. A couple of our regulars for us include both Flybirdy.com and Britainexpress.com, both of which regularly shine in our traffic sky, and both were equally eclipsed by Stumbleupon in recent days. Yet as Stumbleupon fades away in the traffic skies, both Flybirdy and Britainexpress grow brighter and brighter.

Sadly, like all supernovae, this brightening of our web life seems to have vanished as quickly as it came, leaving only an afterglow in our memories as we wonder where these inter-site travellers have gone to next. All that we can say is that we wish you well in your travels, thank you for coming by in such numbers. Maybe one day another new cluster of Stumbleupon members will burst upon our horizons again. At that point we at PanoramicEarth.com will have to change our analogy here from a supernova to a commet. Until then...

So, so long and thanks for all the clicks.
And may all your browsers always paginate.

Tagzania

Our Tagzania experiment:


Tagzania, a site that allows users to put points onto a Google Map location database and then add a comment and reference tags to it. Anyone who has used del.icio.us will be used to tags for web pages. These act as your own labels for your stored information. However, these tags effectively form part of a searchable database of information that allows other users to find your entries.

As an experiment, Panoramic Earth entered map points for the images we have taken in London. A sample of a Tagzania map is shown above. Each of the markers will give a little more information about the location itself. This has been useful as we have been able to collect the geomaping data on the way through, which will hopefully be used in a future development of the Panoramic Earth site.

More Panoramic Earth Tagzania locations.

Creation of PanoramicEarth.com

Both The London Map and The Hawaii Map used to have their own domains. It has now been decided to create one site to house both these and other tours as they are made. Thus was born PanoramicEarth.com. Soon after this other locations like Oxford in England and the Balearic Island of Mallorca off the South of Spain were also added. The site now attracts around 3,000 visitors a day, and this is growing month by month. New tours are continuing to be added during the coming year. I intend to visit at least 6 cities, probably mostly in Europe, though New York and Las Vegas are also under consideration depending on funds. There is also a possibility of Hong Kong being added to the collection.

One of the beauties of the whole project is that the tours may be used by other websites as embedded content, so don’t be too surprised if you come across the tours in other places and think, “That looks familiar…”. The London, Mallorca and Hawaii tours are also displayed in over 80 other websites as of February 2006. You will know it is a Panoramic Earth tour due to the presence of an acknowledgement sating “Tour by PanoramicEarth.com, powered by MAI Technology” underneath the tour itself.

Panoramic Earth also contains a growing number of European ski resorts using the same principle of panoramic images linked to (in this case) a piste map of the skiing region. There are around 30 listed to date, and the Jungfrau region in Switzerland was photographed extensively in January 2006 and is about to go live on the site. Each tour is also accompanied by local resort information useful for skiers and snow boarders alike.

So, take a browse, let your fingers do the clicking and see what some of these places have to offer.