When you work in the virtual tour business, you have the privilege to witness technological advances almost daily.
But every once in a while these changes combine to create an effect that can only be described as a Game Changer.
Today we are proud to share such an culmination of technological advances.
For a lack of a better word: we’ll call it a Hyper Definition Virtual Tour , but before we get to the technical details, have a look at it:
Virtual Africa presents: The highest definition picture ever taken of Cape Town.
It might not look like much on first glance, but try the following and be ready to be blown away: click on the full screen button (bottom right) and then ZOOM !!
Some details as to the size of this image:
- It was created by stitching 1850,fully zoomed (x 20 optical zoom), 10 MegaPixel images together.
- The time it took from the first shot (top left) and last shot (lower right) being taken, was about 3 hours.
- It’s 205 000 pixels wide.
- The end result was a 25 GigaBytes RAW file which takes about an hour to open on my Macbook Pro.
Despite the size of the image, you can view it here because of a method called ’tiling’.
It works exactly the same way as mapping platforms such as Google Maps.
for example: When you view the whole of South Africa in Google Maps, the image obviously does not contain the high detail imagery of every rooftop in the country. It’s only when you start zooming in, that Google Maps loads the relevant information.
The same happens here. We’ve taken our very big picture and created hundreds of thousand lower definition pictures (or tiles) from it. As you zoom into the picture, only the appropriate tiles are loaded.
This allows you to explore a very large image on a relatively slow internet connection. Simple, but smart.
In the coming months we hope to use images like these to organize data, visually.
Once again, similar to Google Maps, we can overlay information on top of this image to further enhance your exploration of Cape Town and the good news is that we are currently working on a few projects which will allow us to do just that.
In the mean time, we would love to hear your suggestions as to what we should call this kind of image/virtual tour…..
Related posts:
- Another Hyper Definition Image of Cape Town We have been overwhelmed by the response to our recent Hyper Definition Image of Cape Town and appreciate so many people taking the time to...
- Coolest Picture of Cape Town – EVER! We recently took and compiled the biggest (highest definition) picture ever taken of Cape Town. For those curious as to how we did it, I...
- Cape Town Stadium in High Definition 360º With all the hard work in the running up to the World Cup Soccer, I almost forgot that we created a very cool interactive virtual...
- Sneak Peak at the next set of Hyper Definition Pictures 2010 has started with a BOOM here at Virtual Africa. We’re literally flooded with requests to create virtual tours of guest houses, hotels and restaurants...
- Cape Town Gigapan function FlashProxy() {} FlashProxy.callJS = function() {} Zoom into any part of the city to understand why this is such a cool picture. ...
Looks like you might have used the kit from
http://www.gigapansystems.com/
The most famous gigapixel shot was the one of Barack Obamas inaugural speech
http://www.gigapan.org/viewGigapan.php?id=17217
Love the Lions Head shot
Did anyone else see that naked lady sun-tanning… That was awesome! And in super high def… nice one guys! It’s like Where’s Waldo to the power of 1000! Except Waldo is hot!
No, where? Come on….. share!!
Don’t see the lady….
That’s absolutely stunning! Fab work!
Type your comment here… Wonderful. It does Cape Town proud as it should. Looking forward to the Camps Bay and Franchhoek shots. Good luck and Thanks.
Absolutely incredible. Are you planning to do any more places. Where does one aquire the technology and equipment to create something like this.
thank you for the compliment….
We are planning to do 1 of Camps Bay two more of Cape Town and one of Franschhoek in December, so follow me on twitter @tinusleroux for the announcement or drop you email in the box to the right to get updates from this site.
i’ll try and sit down some time during the new year to write a tutorial on how to do it, but the sort answer is that we use a combination of technologies….
Really cool. Congratulations.
If you’ll allow me to be critical also:
It’s a big shame that you didn’t use a better camera and manual focus, since some of the photographs (notably the top cable car station) is misfocussed, and the per pixel sharpness could have been better.
Going to so much trouble warrants the use of a DSLR shooting in RAW mode, with a good quality zoom lens.
Very COOL pic!
Couple of funny things (obviously where the different frames have been stiched together).
Look at the guy in the orange shirt walking up the steps into the building with the steel mesh dome on the roof he has no legs. and also there is a pair of legs on the street below with no body. Some other funny stuff with the cars as well.
But awesome pic dude! Very impressive!
Absolutely fantastic!!! Thank you.
Type your comment here…I live in Cape Town and it makes me proud. Thank you Tinus
Absolute fantastic .I would love to see the Drakensberg mountians in this format .
It kept me out of my work for then rest of the day
Excellent work…Great way to promote CT and SA. Well done guys!!
The dude going up the stars at the Cape Town Administrative Civic Centure got no legs….They all Float!
Absolutely phenomenal. Brought back so many happy memories, of what is without doubt, the most beautiful city in the world.
Absolutely phenomenal. makes me long for my “home away from home.”
Great job, guys
This picture is way to good to be left on the net. It would be great to see it printed billboard size. It’s absolutely brilliant. A beautiful Cape Town night shot would also be great with the mountain all lit up. Well done – you’ve done a fantastic job.
A great experience, keep it up. Willie in Swaziland
Oh my ……Stunning!!!
try “Eagle Eye on Cape Town”
Guys this is amazing … I am totally gobsmacked – well done !!!
I hope Durban is next on your list?
We had the same experience as William on arrival in 1957.
Absolutely Awsome no other word describes this superb set of pictures.
extremally well done
Regards
Barry
Awesome result, Tinus. You are to be complimented. Having spent 23 years in the photographic industry servicing and maintaining equipment, I can appreciate the technical effort that’s gone into this.
Well done Tinus, i’m a proud South African – and love Cape Town
Is this what they call, ‘the big picture’?
WOW, this pic is GREAT, well done!!!! haha, i zoomed into the right of the big building behind the red building, there really is a hot chick tanning
Superb! and very different from the Cape Town which i saw when i got off the immigrant ship in March 1948 – we got off the “Indrapura”, went through a Customs shed, across a small railway line and then walked straight up Adderley Street!
This is nearly as good a definition of the one of Obama’s inauguration where one can pick out the faces of every person there.
Great stuff guys, just shows SA is not that far behind in technology as some would believe.
I take exception dear sir, hehehe
This image is in fact about 8 times size of the Obama gigapan.
Although it covers a broader field of view, the definition is actually higher as well.
It’s just that the subjects are MUCH further away.
But credit where credit is due, that was an AMAZING image.
Very impressive indeed. Now I really am “homesick”. I lived, worked and loved in
C-T for a number of years and “wow” has it changed for the better. “walked around all the familiar places that I could find on the picture, waiting for more.
Good luck with the FIFA party, stunning stadium Though.
Cheers, Thijs (from Holland).
Super photo. I love this and will post on my Blog.
Excellent website! I’m enjoying the 360’s that you guys take.
Props for the duct-tape on the gigapan camera
Really amazing!!! I love modern technology
Makes life easier!
I found this so amazing…..I think someone must award you with a big prize.
Fantastic!!
thank you very much. we’ve never had a response like this to our work before and that is a big enough reward in it self.
if you do want to help …. spread the new!
Good work, keep it up guys
Great job keep it up ..would be great if you can take a pic of CPT this weekend of the FIFA draw so that we can post it for people to see how we host events and welcome visitors
Great job Tinus!
Type your comment here… When you are a way from home and you see pictures like this just makes you think what are you doing. in new zealand at the moment.
Hey come on now. You need to tell us what buiding and were!
I thought this was a joke, but that is really well spotted Slaymantis.
Slightly disturbing, but well spotted anyway, lol
The young lady in question is enjoying the sun on the largest building visible behind and to the right of City Hall.
This might be the best way to encourage people to find out where City Hall is ….. hehehe
A couple having a rub down in the penthouse a few buildings to the left of the tanning blond too.
It begs the question of is this an infringement of a persons right to privacy?
Some names for the application: Crystal Earth, Big Brother, Peter Pan (for panning in), Pixie eye (1000’s of pixels…), extrospective zoom (vs. introspective)
Awesome Pic
Very very impressive!
Really cool. Now if only you had done it with a Canon 5D or 1Ds 21.1 MegaPxel camera …
funny …. it took me 2 weeks to put together as it is……. with a 5D I would still be busy …hehehe
Type your comment here..Absolutely amazing.I havent seen something like
this.Just too good.
Type your comment here…Wow, this is truely amazing! Hope you get to do the entire City Bowl area.
That is…. AMAZING!!!! so so soooo cool! I can even see my offices
Awesome
This is sooooooo amazing! What next??
O, yes this is amazing.Thank you.
that’s amazing. respect.
name? bird’s eye
bird’s eye….. that’s an idea.
what about eagle’s eye?
Hey, this is awesome. Did you buy the gigapan in SA? If so, where?
great photo…. spent ages zooming around!
This is amazing! I could spend hours on this photo
what about using a helicopter..? 3hours in the air can be done i guess, and then you’d be able to catch all the peninsula too? great effort guys!!
Very, very impressive.
Please redo it when Capetown is green after winter. It would look even more spectacular.