• Please use real names.

    Greetings to all who have registered to OPF and those guests taking a look around. Please use real names. Registrations with fictitious names will not be processed. REAL NAMES ONLY will be processed

    Firstname Lastname

    Register

    We are a courteous and supportive community. No need to hide behind an alia. If you have a genuine need for privacy/secrecy then let me know!
  • Welcome to the new site. Here's a thread about the update where you can post your feedback, ask questions or spot those nasty bugs!

First 'real' virtual tour

B

Ben Rubinstein

pro member
Hi,

First 'real' virtual tour, taken exclusively with the Sigma 8mm fisheye so kindly donated by some anonymous soul!

This is a 15 million dollar house in the center of Jerusalem just 5 minutes walk from the actual center. A beautiful and old house nearby the college I've been working for and next door to the house where Ben Yehuda, the 'inventor' of the modern Hebrew language lived some 100 or so years ago.

I did this work for an estate agent who tells me the fees for just a couple of these houses would allow him to retire :) I'm hoping he will be pleased, I hadn't realised just how huge this place was, 21 seperate panoramas, 7 hours of computer time (heck even a wedding only takes me 5 hours!), next time I'll have a far better idea how to price!

The 8mm was incredible, this thing is as sharp and flares far far less than my 16-35L, most of these pano's were 4 shots only and although I had to clone the tripod legs out, it was worth it for the lack of hassle. I had assumed that the 180 degree coverage would give me a full two axis 360 degree tour if the tripod was level but I've now learned that I need to shoot a top and bottom shot to complete the top-bottom 360 degrees. There was practically zero problems even though I was not using a nodal rig however when I do finally get it (my fault) there will be even less, read zero issues even when working in such tiny rooms as I found myself. I will be happy to regain the photoshop time!

I had just 45 minutes to do the whole job as the owner is in the States and the person with the key couldn't stay long. Otherwise I may have been tempted to HDR it. It would of course have involved many more hours of photography!

Anyway your opinion and suggestions please gentlemen and ladies, be gentle with me, I bruise easily! :)

www.studio-beni.net/full.html
 
B

Ben Rubinstein

pro member
On an aside, I've no idea how this lens manages to hold so much DR, more so than any other lens I own. It's not that it's lacking in sharpness or contrast, not in the slightest, it's as sharp and contrasty as any other prime, just manages to hold huge amounts of shadow and highlight detail at the same time. Incredible little chunk of glass...
 
M

Mark Hampton

New member
Ben Rubinstein said:
On an aside, I've no idea how this lens manages to hold so much DR, more so than any other lens I own. It's not that it's lacking in sharpness or contrast, not in the slightest, it's as sharp and contrasty as any other prime, just manages to hold huge amounts of shadow and highlight detail at the same time. Incredible little chunk of glass...
Click to expand...

Ben,

this reminds me of a computer game - like an adventure game... but from 10 years ago..

I don't have anything to add in terms of photography it does its job and i am no expert in the VR stuff (dont even ken how you would make the images)- navigation on this does not feel intuitive enough for me ... but i play 3d shooting games so i am used to running around whole houses..

does it have to be so linear? Can we only view from predefined spots or can we move our POV...

could be interesting if it was like Call of duty MW...

just some thoughts...


cheers
 
Asher Kelman

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
A word of thanks to our anonymous sponsor and angel!

Hi Ben,

I'm delighted to see the idea of the 8mm lens and the expansion of your work to do virtual tours can work so well for you. The 8mm idea I got from the brilliant work of Nicolas Claris as his tours of boats are both immaculate and amazing. The idea of progressing from your two types of work came to me when I had the pleasure of shooting with you in Jerusalem. You artistically document ancient buildings in Yemin Moshe for your soul. then for a living you switch to intense, grueling wedding work. Given your skills and experience, virtual tours for high end real estate and corporations seems to me so much more civilized and less stressful then event photography of any kind. Best it leverages the artistry you already have honed your skills with so well.

Good ideas are ten a penny. In the end, only those rare flashes of inspiration that are really practical and can be implemented well, actually count. So I'm especially thrilled that this lens is as useful for you as I had hoped. The kind person who paid for it is a mench and an angel! (You know who you are, my respect and affection for your good deed!)

This is not, BTW, the first time we've had such kindness in OPF. One fellow sent a Crown Graphic to a photographer starting off in NY shooting high end art in NY Galleries and that really helped put him on his feet!

Asher
 
Asher Kelman

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Can the forward or backward tilt of the pano be limited somehow?

Ben,

Let me add a point of the pano tilting violently sometimes if one is not careful.

The fact that the tour from AutoPano does not tilt forward or backwards over the zenith or nadir is reassuring as that makes one giddy and disorientate in a short time. For the very small rooms, if the vertical tilts could be limited a tad, that would improve the user experience. After all, there's no need to see the place as a drunk. This is an advanced feature perhaps and not possible to tune in Autoppano tour but maybe Valentin, Bart, Cem or someone else knows how to address this?

Asher
 
Asher Kelman

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Another thought!

I did not at first follow what the pulsating circles were for, then it became so obvious and I was "in". "Click on pulsating circles to explore" might be helpful when it first loads.

Asher
 
B

Ben Rubinstein

pro member
Hi,

The navigation thing is a real problem, I'm looking at Panotour (the successor to Autopano Tour) which does seem to have some nice options specifically to help for this issue.
 
B

Ben Rubinstein

pro member
Here is the same show but using Panotour and arrows for the navigation.

www.studio-beni.net/full1.html

It does look somewhat more streamlined, thinking of couging up the 99 Euro but it still looks like the resolution is crippled at a low rate, it won't let you zoom in to detail, just turns to mush. Annoying as the next version up is a lot, lot more expensive, 3 times the price.
 
B

Bart_van_der_Wolf

pro member
Asher Kelman said:
the red arrow is much more understandable. Maybe could be smaller. The rock and roll tilting forward and

back still needs to be tamed. Any ideas, Bart?
Click to expand...

Hi Asher,

Yes, it is caused by the wide initial FOV. When the default FOV is reduced (you can judge the effect by zooming out a bit) the movements appear to be slower. This is just an illusion caused by the FOV setting in the viewer (nothing to do with the lens), but I understand that in the smaller rooms one would like to give an impression of a more spacious room.

On some VR tour builder applications (e.g. Pano2VR) there are also settings possible to influence the mouse control effect (speed, and linear motion or more like inertia), but I don't think that they are available in Panotour Pro. It would not surprise me if it is possible when using the KRPano commands directly (command line or batch file input, or with an XML setting).

Cheers,
Bart
 
B

Bart_van_der_Wolf

pro member
Mark Hampton said:
I need to look at software - you should be able to get from a 360 a 3d render.... all the information is there...
Click to expand...

Hi Mark,

Unfortunately depth information is missing. For that one usually needs to shoot stereo pairs, although it can also be somewhat extracted from focus bracketed image stacks.

It is still impossible to look behind objects, when shooting from a fixed position. For that one needs to create a full 3D model of the surroundings (like in your virtual 3D Galway link), which requires different software (and a lot of processing power, time, and a skilled artist/operator).

One can get one's feet wet with such modeling software by downloading the free Google SketchUp application which is surprisingly useful for its price.

Of course for the really serious 3D modeling work one requires applications like 3Ds-Max Design, complemented with e.g. a Maya rendering engine for photorealistic rendering. That'll set you back a significant amount of money even before you can do anything.

Cheers,
Bart
 
B

Ben Rubinstein

pro member
Been looking at Panotour Pro, still can't work out how to do a nadir or zenith image, how to have the pano zoom in to the resolution of the actual image (even when it's selected, seems resolution crippled by the program), etc. The documentation is non existent which is inexcuseable for a $400 program!

KRPano seems far better but I've never been good with the whole programming thing. Are there any other and good tour programs which are more intuitive for multiple pano tours if I'm going to spend?
 
B

Bart_van_der_Wolf

pro member
Ben Rubinstein said:
Been looking at Panotour Pro, still can't work out how to do a nadir or zenith image, how to have the pano zoom in to the resolution of the actual image (even when it's selected, seems resolution crippled by the program), etc. The documentation is non existent which is inexcuseable for a $400 program!

KRPano seems far better but I've never been good with the whole programming thing. Are there any other and good tour programs which are more intuitive for multiple pano tours if I'm going to spend?
Click to expand...

Hi Ben,

Without hesitation I can recommend Pano2VR. As most programs, it is not perfect (although close), but very powerful and realtively easy/intuitive to use for such complex functionality. The tutorials on their Website are very clear.

Editing Zenith/Nadir images is quite easy with the built-in Patch tool (simply rotate the preview up or down, export to e.g. Photoshop, edit, and seamlessly re-import into the original image while it is still open). Overall image quality is almost as good as from KRPano (which still rules in that aspect, and has some unique projection capabilities).

Pano2VR can also be used for large rectilinear images, a bit like Zoomify, to pan and zoom in/out of high resolution images or limited FOV rectilinear panorama projections.

I'm using the Beta version of the upcoming next 3.0 version (features can be unlocked when one has a licence to the current 2.3 version), which adds lots of additional functionality, e.g. HTML5 as an alternative to Flash (which doesn't work on iPhone/iPad).

Cheers,
Bart
 
G

Georg R. Baumann

Inactive
Ben Rubinstein said:
Why Georg? I got your original post in my email, lots of good stuff there, certainly food for thought!
Click to expand...

Good. I was about to send it to you per email over your website today. I deleted it because I realized that my views and experiences might trigger a hefty discussion, and the Internet is not a place to discuss such things in my world. I sent you a PM with more in depth considerations on a possible road to achieve what I suggested.

Best of Luck and 'stay focussed'! ;)
Georg
 
B

Ben Rubinstein

pro member
The estate agent loved it, showed it to 3 other estate agents who also want me to do this for them. He then showed it to his father who is one of the biggest tour guide companies in Jerusalem who is very excited about using this for virtual tours with commentary for a website that he's been planning.

Still a long way to go but I owe this all to you, especially Asher who has always had far more confidence in that I have ever had, the donations of lens and pano setup which has made this possible, to all of you, thanks!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top