tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33221746976905433482024-03-13T04:35:26.242+00:00panovoyantgeoXUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger32125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-50682070944441185902009-09-10T19:54:00.000+01:002009-09-10T19:54:22.246+01:003D Birmingham in Google EarthI'm not sure when it happened, but all of a sudden in GE Brum's gone 3D.
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/SqlK3kt5tsI/AAAAAAAAA98/2W1OH2KGls0/s1600-h/MWSnap485.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/SqlK3kt5tsI/AAAAAAAAA98/2W1OH2KGls0/s400/MWSnap485.bmp" /></a></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-67751011865241010512008-10-24T19:24:00.006+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.723+01:00V-Chat Cartoon City in VRML<p>Another V-Chat room, this time the Cartoon City. Click in the image and navigate by dragging the mouse or using the cursor keys. Don't forget to explore below ground (use Alt-drag with <a href="http://www.parallelgraphics.com/products/cortona/">Cortona</a>). This may even become a series.</p><p><OBJECT CLASSID="CLSID:86A88967-7A20-11d2-8EDA-00600818EDB1" CODEBASE="http://www.parallelgraphics.com/bin/cortvrml.cab#Version=5,1,0,167" WIDTH="400" HEIGHT="300"><PARAM NAME="SRC" VALUE="http://www.panovoyant.com/vchat/cartooncity/vchat_cartooncity.wrl"><PARAM NAME="VRML_BACKGROUND_COLOR" VALUE="#CDCDCD"><PARAM NAME="VRML_DASHBOARD" VALUE="false"><PARAM NAME="VRML_SPLASHSCREEN" VALUE="false"><PARAM NAME="CONTEXTMENU" VALUE="true"><PARAM NAME="NAVIGATIONMODE" VALUE="2"><PARAM NAME="NAVIGATIONSTYLE" VALUE="plan"><EMBED SRC="http://www.panovoyant.com/vchat/cartooncity/vchat_cartooncity.wrl" TYPE="model/vrml" WIDTH="400" HEIGHT="300" VRML_SPLASHSCREEN="FALSE" VRML_DASHBOARD="FALSE" VRML_BACKGROUND_COLOR="#CDCDCD" CONTEXTMENU="TRUE" NAVIGATIONMODE="2" NAVIGATIONSTYLE="plan" ></EMBED></OBJECT></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-9622610369346297222008-10-20T22:53:00.015+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.723+01:00V-Chat Compass in VRML<p>Remember Microsoft V-Chat? If you do you, and have the <a href="http://www.parallelgraphics.com/products/cortona/">Cortona VRML</a> plugin, you should recognise the Compass world below. V-Chat was one of the very first 3D chat clients. It hasn't been available for many years, and even if it were you'd be hard pressed to find a server where it's in use. Out of curiosity I had a peep at the file structure, figured it out and converted to VRML. Click in the image and navigate by dragging the mouse or using the cursor keys.</p><p><OBJECT CLASSID="CLSID:86A88967-7A20-11d2-8EDA-00600818EDB1" CODEBASE="http://www.parallelgraphics.com/bin/cortvrml.cab#Version=5,1,0,167" WIDTH="400" HEIGHT="300"><PARAM NAME="SRC" VALUE="http://www.panovoyant.com/vchat/compass/vchat_compass.wrl"><PARAM NAME="VRML_BACKGROUND_COLOR" VALUE="#CDCDCD"><PARAM NAME="VRML_DASHBOARD" VALUE="false"><PARAM NAME="VRML_SPLASHSCREEN" VALUE="false"><PARAM NAME="CONTEXTMENU" VALUE="true"><PARAM NAME="NAVIGATIONMODE" VALUE="2"><PARAM NAME="NAVIGATIONSTYLE" VALUE="plan"><EMBED SRC="http://www.panovoyant.com/vchat/compass/vchat_compass.wrl" TYPE="model/vrml" WIDTH="400" HEIGHT="300" VRML_SPLASHSCREEN="FALSE" VRML_DASHBOARD="FALSE" VRML_BACKGROUND_COLOR="#CDCDCD" CONTEXTMENU="TRUE" NAVIGATIONMODE="2" NAVIGATIONSTYLE="plan" ></EMBED></OBJECT></p><p>I did try it with Octaga, but it needs more work before everything functions as it should in that player.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-84573833880540008132008-09-19T17:57:00.007+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.723+01:00Adobe Redefines Political Correctness<p>You couldn't make this stuff up! According to Adobe, 'married' is no longer considered to belong to the set 'marital status'. Download the Adobe Media Player, head for Options and then to User Profile. Under Marital Status you will find this:</p><p><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/SNPbZfERFtI/AAAAAAAAAdQ/xBCyB93JIwQ/s1600-h/amp.bmp"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/SNPbZfERFtI/AAAAAAAAAdQ/xBCyB93JIwQ/s400/amp.bmp" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5247779221699368658" /></a></p><p>I haven't quite worked out what 'Previously Committed' means.</p><p>Second thoughts, don't bother to download it. Practically everything I've attempted to view feeds me an advert, followed by a black screen with the message 'This video is currently not available in your country'. Guys, here's an idea: now that you know from my profile that I am a committed male from the UK, how about not bothering to offer content that I can't access?</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-64564374175550964252008-09-13T14:52:00.008+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.723+01:00Feeling Software Photo to 3D Demo<p>Hot on the heels of the beta release of their <a href="http://www.presto3d.com/">Presto3D</a> 3D model marketplace, Feeling Software have released this video demonstration of their forthcoming image-based modelling software:</p>
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<object width="400" height="300"> <param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /> <param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /> <param name="movie" value="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1713262&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" /> <embed src="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1713262&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="400" height="300"></embed></object><br /><a href="http://vimeo.com/1713262?pg=embed&sec=1713262">Feeling Software Demo</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/user628588?pg=embed&sec=1713262">joshk</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com?pg=embed&sec=1713262">Vimeo</a>.
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This appears to be an implementation of the <a href="http://www.feelingsoftware.com/content/view/91/173/lang,en/">Feeling Real</a> technology they announced a while ago. It is not clear whether there will be a stand-alone version, or whether this will be the latest in the current trend of software+services. A page at Presto3D <a href="http://www.presto3d.com/construct">indicates at least the latter</a>. This has some parallels with Microsoft's <a href="http://photosynth.net/">Photosynth</a>, where pictures are processed into 3D point clouds and camera pose estimates on the client machine before being uploaded to Microsoft's servers. A few more details are found at the <a href="http://www.enlighten3d.com/2008/09/12/create-3d-models-from-photos/">ENLIGHTEN3D</a> blog.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-49620515306807885052008-04-28T20:43:00.006+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.723+01:00The Multimap Alternative<p>In recent posts I've complained about the automatic (and unannounced) redirection from MS Live Search Maps of UK users to Multimap. I have to say that my complaint is more about the unannounced and seemingly random nature of the redirection, rather than a complaint about the destination.</p><p>I always used to use Multimap. Prior to Google Maps and Live Maps it was simply the very best mapping and aerial imagery site for the UK. Nowhere else gave anything like the photographic resolution, though it didn't approach that available today. Clearly many people have turned their backs on Multimap, but it certainly doesn't hurt to go back and have another look.</p><p>The site is very different to how it used to look, and has a much cleaner appearance. You can chose between the more traditional navigation ('Basic Maps') and the more modern AJAX style interface ('Interactive Maps'). Bizarrely, and annoyingly, it forgets where you were looking at if you switch types of map, and drops you back at the last place you searched for when you switch between the basic and interactive styles, defaulting to the Lake District if you used the navigation controls rather than the search box.</p><p>Choice of maps is definitely Multimap's trump card. At the 500 yards to 1 mile scales you can select either Tele Atlas or Ordnance Survey 1:50k scale maps. Having large area OS maps available like this is excellent. The OS Get-a-map experience offers 1:50k and even 1:25k map extracts, but only in small patches of 400x400 pixels, and you lose a bit off the bottom of that with the copyright statment. Multimap offers a much bigger 933x642 map area on my monitor. It must be borne in mind that whilst this is possibly the best free online OS map display, it is smaller than the alternative non-OS maps from both MS and Google.</p><p>The Tele Atlas maps are perhaps more geared towards the UK user, with motorways in blue rather than the Live Maps brown. Comparing map currency between Multimap, Live Maps and Google Maps reveals a complicated picture. No doubt this varies hugely from place to place, but for a patch of my home town of Bromsgrove where there has been some recent building construction, I found Google Maps to have the most recent aerial photography and Live Maps to have the most recent road mapping data. Multimap is an oddball, in that it uses different road data depending upon whether it is in Map mode or Aerial Photo mode with a road overlay. The former uses (c)2007 Tele Atlas, the latter a more up to date (c)2008 Navteq/(c)2007 Intermap.</p><p>There is still advertising on the Multimap site and unfortunately it is of the annoying, distracting animated flash banner variety, which is a big minus for me.</p><p>On the plus side Multimap gives a continuous display of post code district, grid reference, latitude and longitude. This information is placed below the map area, which entails scrolling. There is some initial awkwardness as you realise your mouse wheel is for scrolling windows and for zooming maps - just make sure you point at the right area of the screen for what you want. A minor niggle, but one that does not tend to arise with the two alternatives as they don't tend to put all that much below the map, if anything. One more plus: Multimap can search by grid reference, which is something the others cannot do.</p><p>The left hand pane shows a series of collapsible panels for 'Useful Information', 'hotels and accommodation', 'search history' and 'favourite routes and places'. There doesn't seem to be a way to remove or rearrange these. Personally I'd remove the hotels bar, or at least move it to the bottom, as it will definitely be the least used of those.</p><p>The Get Directions section is rather tidy. The routes I've checked all look sensible, and it includes the option for walking as well as driving routes. As an added gimmick It even tells you your carbon footprint for the journey!</p><p>The 'Find a Business' section seems awkward to use. When you search it defaults to showing numbered pins in a small map area. These reveal panels with a little more detail when clicked. Alternatively at this point you can select the rather more accessible results list, which is accompanied by a thumbnail map. The listings all seem to be drawn from Thomson's Local Directory, which I'm sure is broad, deep and current. I just can't help feeling that the interface needs more work.</p><p>So in summary, Multimap has some unique features which make it of interest to UK users, in particular Ordnance Survey maps and grid references. It doesn't do everything as good as Live Maps or Google Earth, but I think overall we just have an embarrassment of riches. My advice is to try the features of each and use different tools for different jobs.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-46006001732500380732008-04-25T23:53:00.006+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.723+01:00Multimap just keeps coming backSo far this evening on two occasions Live Search Maps/Virtual Earth for UK users has redirected back to Multimap. Please guys, this is becoming a total bore. The changes <a href="http://virtualearth.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!2BBC66E99FDCDB98!14442.entry">announced last week</a> really don't strike me as anything you can't test offline.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-82128237215456671382008-04-13T12:17:00.009+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.723+01:00Microsoft Drops the Ball with Virtual Earth in the UK<p>Update 2: ...but picks it right back up again. <a href="http://virtualearth.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!2BBC66E99FDCDB98!14442.entry">All is explained</a>. It's a bit like Pam's dream.</p><p><em>Update 23:48 13th April: It looks like somebody is listening, as Live Maps has been reinstated for UK users, at least for now.</em></p><p>For the last couple of days UK users accessing MS Live Search Maps, perhaps hoping to use the enhanced Virtual Earth 3D features <a href="http://virtualearth.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!2BBC66E99FDCDB98!14129.entry">excitedly announced</a> on the Virtual Earth/Live maps blog, have found themselves unexpectedly dumped at <a href="http://www.multimap.com/">multimap</a>. Now, multimap offers some useful features, but it isn't Virtual Earth.</p><p>Want the 3D interface? Forget it.</p><p>Want to use your SpaceNavigator? Forget it.</p><p>Want to access your stored collections, pushpins or 3D models? Forget it.</p><p>All gone.</p><p>As a partial fix, you can pretend to be a US user by heading to <a href="http://maps.live.com/?mkt=en-us">http://maps.live.com/?mkt=en-us</a>, and everything seems to work, though of course you lose the integration with Live Search.</p><p>There are reports that Microsoft are reviewing their decision in the light of the number of complaints they have received about this. It would be nice to hope that a more intelligent way of integrating the best of multimap into Virtual Earth could be found, rather than chucking out half of Virtual Earth to support multimap.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-17346558138523673972008-04-04T17:04:00.006+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.724+01:00Viewfinder<p>The <a href="http://interactive.usc.edu/">University of Southern California Interactive Media Team</a> have recognised the difficulty of aligning photographs in Google Earth for PhotoOverlays and have made it the target of their <a href="http://interactive.usc.edu/viewfinder/index.html">Viewfinder</a> project. They state their objective as "to provide a straightforward procedure for geo-locating photos of any kind" and specify that "a 10-year-old should be able to find the pose of a photo in less than a minute".</p><p>Aligning PhotoOverlays in Google Earth can be a very time-consuming job. For example, my <a href="http://panovoyant.blogspot.com/2007/09/abbey-road-live-webcam-overlays.html">Abbey Road</a> and <a href="http://panovoyant.blogspot.com/2007/08/gliding-at-upavon-two-photooverlays.html">Gliding</a> PhotoOverlays were very tricky to set up, even with the help of <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/abbeyroad/">flickr photos</a> showing me exactly where the camera is for the former, and a bit of messing about with Imagemodeler for the latter.</p><p>To get a good match, not only do you have to figure out the position on the map where the photograph was taken, you also have to determine how high off the ground the camera was, its orientation (pitch, roll and yaw) and the characteristics of the lens used. With so many variables you can end up tweaking for ages and still not get things exactly right.</p><p>The Viewfinder team have focussed on two 'pose finding' methods. The 2D-to-2D method starts with the user selecting the position from which the photo was taken on Google Maps, then using a browser-based tool that feeds back the equivalent Google Earth view to refine the position and orientation of the camera. A screen shot from Google Earth is then loaded into a second tool in which the translation and scaling of the photo can be fine tuned to achieve the best match.</p><p><object width="425" height="355"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/UNhAVytajW4&hl=en"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/UNhAVytajW4&hl=en" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="355"></embed></object></p><p>Even more amazing is the 2D-to-3D method, in which a 3D model of an element in the scene is brought into correspondence with the photograph by dragging model vertices to their projected positions, in a manner reminiscent of canoma.</p><p>
<object width="425" height="355"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/g1SQUNo5bv4&hl=en"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/g1SQUNo5bv4&hl=en" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="355"></embed></object></p><p>The Viewfinder team's <a href="http://interactive.usc.edu/viewfinder/index.html">progress report</a> makes fascinating reading, and hopefully is a taste of things to come. It isn't mentioned in the progress report as a related program, but I think there would be obvious benefits to linking Viewfinder with <a href="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4452669873579375047">PhotoSketch</a>.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-1844136453888325082008-03-30T20:55:00.002+01:002009-05-27T00:29:31.556+01:00Gliding at Upavon Panorama<p><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" width="400" height="300" id="pano1" align="middle"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="sameDomain" /><param name="movie" value="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/preview_pano.swf" /><param name="quality" value="high" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#ffffff" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="flashvars" value="movie=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/pano.swf?xml_file=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/upavon1.xml&redirect=window.location&preview=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/upavon1_preview.jpg&zoomMax=4&panhome=300" /><embed src="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/preview_pano.swf" quality="high" bgcolor="#ffffff" flashvars="movie=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/pano.swf?xml_file=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/upavon1.xml&redirect=window.location&preview=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/upavon1_preview.jpg&zoomMax=4&panhome=300" width="400" height="300" name="mymovie" align="middle" allowScriptAccess="sameDomain" allowFullScreen="true" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer"></embed></object></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Enford, Wiltshire, UK51.284225742199105 -1.786136627197265651.282548242199105 -1.7897846271972657 51.285903242199105 -1.7824886271972655tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-51935538370088432712008-03-30T13:51:00.006+01:002009-05-27T00:30:12.268+01:00St Mawes Castle Panoramas<p><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" width="400" height="300" id="pano1" align="middle"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="sameDomain" /><param name="movie" value="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/preview_pano.swf" /><param name="quality" value="high" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#ffffff" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="flashvars" value="movie=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/pano.swf?xml_file=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes3.xml&redirect=window.location&preview=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes3_preview.jpg&zoomMax=4&panhome=300" /><embed src="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/preview_pano.swf" quality="high" bgcolor="#ffffff" flashvars="movie=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/pano.swf?xml_file=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes3.xml&redirect=window.location&preview=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes3_preview.jpg&zoomMax=4&panhome=300" width="400" height="300" name="mymovie" align="middle" allowScriptAccess="sameDomain" allowFullScreen="true" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer"></embed></object></p><p><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" width="400" height="300" id="pano1" align="middle"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="sameDomain" /><param name="movie" value="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/preview_pano.swf" /><param name="quality" value="high" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#ffffff" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="flashvars" value="movie=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/pano.swf?xml_file=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes2.xml&redirect=window.location&preview=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes2_preview.jpg&zoomMax=4&panhome=300" /><embed src="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/preview_pano.swf" quality="high" bgcolor="#ffffff" flashvars="movie=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/pano.swf?xml_file=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes2.xml&redirect=window.location&preview=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes2_preview.jpg&zoomMax=4&panhome=300" width="400" height="300" name="mymovie" align="middle" allowScriptAccess="sameDomain" allowFullScreen="true" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer"></embed></object></p><p><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" width="400" height="300" id="pano1" align="middle"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="sameDomain" /><param name="movie" value="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/preview_pano.swf" /><param name="quality" value="high" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#ffffff" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="flashvars" value="movie=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/pano.swf?xml_file=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes1.xml&redirect=window.location&preview=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes1_preview.jpg&zoomMax=4&panhome=300" /><embed src="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/preview_pano.swf" quality="high" bgcolor="#ffffff" flashvars="movie=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/pano.swf?xml_file=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes1.xml&redirect=window.location&preview=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stmawes1_preview.jpg&zoomMax=4&panhome=300" width="400" height="300" name="mymovie" align="middle" allowScriptAccess="sameDomain" allowFullScreen="true" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer"></embed></object></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0St Mawes, Cornwall, UK50.155517798992143 -5.023986697196960450.15508829899214 -5.02489869719696 50.155947298992146 -5.0230746971969609tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-85515000149313064972008-03-30T11:51:00.004+01:002009-05-27T00:27:53.822+01:00Panoramic Image of Bromsgrove<p>Back in September 2004 St. John's church had an open day, which included an opportunity to ascend the tower before its closure for two years for the refurbishment of the spire. I took my compact camera and snapped a series of images from each side of the tower, and have stitched them together to form a 360 degree panoramic image.</p><p>I am presenting the panorama here in the form of Adobe Flash. Click the 'load' button to download the preview panorama on this page, which you can look around in by dragging with the mouse. Once loaded, click the 'open' button to see the panorama in full screen. If you have a mouse wheel you can zoom in and out of the image.</p><p><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" width="400" height="300" id="pano1" align="middle"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="sameDomain" /><param name="movie" value="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/preview_pano.swf" /><param name="quality" value="high" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#ffffff" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="flashvars" value="movie=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/pano.swf?xml_file=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stjohnstower.xml&redirect=window.location&preview=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stjohnstower_preview.jpg&zoomMax=4&panhome=300" /><embed src="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/preview_pano.swf" quality="high" bgcolor="#ffffff" flashvars="movie=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/pano.swf?xml_file=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stjohnstower.xml&redirect=window.location&preview=http://www.panovoyant.com/images/stjohnstower_preview.jpg&zoomMax=4&panhome=300" width="400" height="300" name="mymovie" align="middle" allowScriptAccess="sameDomain" allowFullScreen="true" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer"></embed></object></p><p>There is also a <a href="http://www.panovoyant.com/qtvr/stjohnstower01.mov">Quicktime version</a> available.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Bromsgrove, Worcestershire, UK52.334162301568838 -2.064806073904037552.334059801568841 -2.0650340739040374 52.334264801568835 -2.0645780739040376tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-84596057529735548202008-03-30T11:48:00.003+01:002009-05-27T00:24:27.928+01:00Bromsgrove High Street PanoramaBromsgrove High Street on a damp Sunday morning in late September 2007.
<object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" width="400" height="300" id="pano1" align="middle">
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Click the 'load' button to download the preview panorama on this page, which you can look around in by dragging with the mouse. Once loaded, click the 'open' button to see the panorama in full screen.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Bromsgrove, Worcestershire, UK52.335741428374384 -2.059721946716308652.335690428374384 -2.0598359467163085 52.335792428374383 -2.0596079467163086tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-10627115270153989012008-01-19T12:26:00.001+00:002009-05-17T14:24:32.724+01:00VideoTrace - 3D from Video<p>The <a href="http://www.acvt.com.au/">University of Adelaide's Australian Centre for Visual Technologies</a> in collaboration with the <a href="http://cms.brookes.ac.uk/staff/PhilipTorr/">Oxford Brookes Computer Vision Group</a> have released a demo video and paper describing their <a href="http://www.acvt.com.au/research/videotrace/">VideoTrace</a> software.</p><p><object width="425" height="355"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/vda2RAEuW_g&rel=1"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/vda2RAEuW_g&rel=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="355"></embed></object></p><p>This is rather like Sketchup Photomatch on steroids! They are currently looking for commercial partners to turn this into a product. It looks very much like the sort of thing Realviz might be interested in (in which case it will be rather expensive), or hopefully even Google.</p><p>I'd like to see a demo of it modeling an urban street scene, which I'd imagine would give pretty good results.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-1988050158205298592007-10-16T23:31:00.001+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.724+01:00Microsoft Virtual Earth Meets Dassault 3DVIA<p><a href="http://bp0.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RxVFrINlLWI/AAAAAAAAAIo/lOoDCLoGar8/s1600-h/ve3dviatp.bmp"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp0.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RxVFrINlLWI/AAAAAAAAAIo/lOoDCLoGar8/s400/ve3dviatp.bmp" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5122076758444944738" /></a></p><p>Today's upgrade of Microsoft Virtual Earth brings with it a surprise. Hidden away in the Collections menu is an 'Add a 3D Model' item. Follow that and before long you'll have a "technology preview" version of Virtual Earth 3DVIA installed.</p><p>The software has a highly simplified tool set that is reminiscent of Sketchup's basic tools. Simple though they are, I am sure that plenty can be done with them. As yet I can see no way to import existing models to the software, which is something of a disappointment. However, it does at least allow you to save your work to the local machine, so models can be created at leisure before being published to Virtual Earth.</p><p><a href="http://bp0.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RxVAaINlLVI/AAAAAAAAAIg/Qcl-lULKSSE/s1600-h/3dvia.bmp"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp0.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RxVAaINlLVI/AAAAAAAAAIg/Qcl-lULKSSE/s400/3dvia.bmp" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5122070968829029714" /></a></p><p>Clearly Microsoft are serious about competing with Google in the virtual world stakes. They have adopted a similar strategy of making a 3D modelling application freely available to the masses.</p><p>The ante has certainly just been raised.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-62879461292561508042007-09-28T00:10:00.002+01:002009-05-27T00:31:15.186+01:00Avoncroft Stable in SpiV Shockwave<p>The <a href="http://www.avoncroft.org.uk/">Avoncroft Museum</a> in Bromsgrove has a fine collection of old buildings and is open to the public from March through to December. It has been an ideal place to obtain images for 3D modeling, as the buildings are well spaced out and you can get photos of most of them from all sides. There is also a wide range of building complexity, from very small, simple builings to larger and more complex structures. The wood frame and brick stable presented here is the first of a series of building models from Avoncroft.</p><p>This model was created with the help of Google Sketchup, Realviz Imagemodeler and VTour, e-on Vue6 Infinite and Photoshop CS2, amongst other more minor utilities. The method I use is certainly not the fastest, but it does give good results, so I'll outline the workflow.</p><p>The photos were taken with a Canon EOS 350D with a nice wide 10-20mm Sigma lens. It always amazes me that "high zoom" is used as a selling point for consumer cameras - give me wide any day! The Sigma has very low distortion, but I still put the photos through DXO Optics Pro, which does a fine job of removing what distortions there are along with sprucing up any areas with dodgy exposures - always a risk when photographing buildings against a bright sky.</p><p>I use Imagemodeler for the first modeling step, just pulling out the principal points of the building to make sure the model ends up with the right proportions. I could have jumped straight to Sketchup in Match Photo mode, but I find that I get better results by starting with ImageModeler. Once Imagemodeler has given me the principal points, I export a dxf and import that to sketchup for the main modeling task. I could of course do the whole model in Imagemodeler, but Sketchup is faster, easier, more stable and allows export to 3D Warehouse. Using the imported points as guides I rough out the basic building structure. Starting from one of the larger faces, I then dip into Photoshop and create a perspective-corrected texture image from the source photos. This step is very easy, using the crop tool with the perspective box ticked. The thing to remember about this tool is that the proportions of the resulting rectangular image will rarely be correct. One day I'll work out under what conditions the proportions come out right. However, for the purposes of modeling it does not matter, since the Imagemodeler work ensures the proportions of the face the texture is applied to are correct, and the texture proportions are automatically corrected. This is also a good place to 'shop out anything you don't want in the textures. From here it is a matter of business as usual in Sketchup, using the applied textures as a guide to detailing.</p><p>Once the building model is complete, the next step is to get it into VTour for the SpiV treatment. Export from Sketchup is in obj format - the freebie version won't do this, but it may be possible going via Blender or Flux Studio. I prepare a 360x180 degree panorama in Vue, which gives great skies, and grab a ground texture which then gets the seamless tile treatment in photoshop. All that goes into VTour via some judicious editing of a pre-calibrated rzml file. The final step is an export to SpiV:</p><p><object id="SPi-V_object" classid="clsid:166B1BCA-3F9C-11CF-8075-444553540000" codebase=
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width="400px" height="300px" >
<param name="src" value="http://www.panovoyant.com/vtour/avoncroftstable/dswmedia/SPi-V3d.dcr">
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pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/"
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progress="true" logo="false" bgColor="#ffffff">
</embed>
</object></p><p>There are many ways to embed 3D in a web page, but SpiV is one of my favourites as it affords reasonably easy navigation. The drawback is that you must have Shockwave installed (apparently about 50% of people have). Unfortunately there is no linux version of Shockwave available, so I am exploring some alternatives. Hopefully I can find one that is free, takes advantage of 3D hardware, has sane environment navigation controls and is truly cross-platform</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Stoke Prior, Worcestershire, UK52.313091504362575 -2.072840631008148252.312886504362574 -2.073296631008148 52.313296504362576 -2.0723846310081484tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-78157684210618396052007-09-20T22:32:00.004+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.725+01:00GE Object Movie Snapper<p>Update: The GEAirlines plugin and Vista don't seem to like eachother, so it looks like XP only.</p><p>I've uploaded the web page utility I use to make QTVR and Flash object movies from Google Earth. The <a href="http://www.panovoyant.com/geoms/geoms.html">GE Object Movie Snapper</a> automates the process of grabbing a set of still images suitable for compiling into an object movie.</p><p>There are still a few enhancements I want to make to this, such as giving some feedback of progress. There also seems to be an issue with the eye altitude jumping about with terrain height on some movies. For a future version I want to include the ability to look outwards and grab images for 360° panoramas.</p><p><a href="http://bp3.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/SBJW2QiqBxI/AAAAAAAAAWk/1o3Z6zrugJ4/s1600-h/geoms01.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp3.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/SBJW2QiqBxI/AAAAAAAAAWk/1o3Z6zrugJ4/s400/geoms01.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5193308810464855826" /></a></p><p></p><p>Before it can be used you will need:</p><p><ul><li>the <a href="http://earth.google.com/">Google Earth</a> application (of course!)</li><li>the <a href="http://www.googleearthairlines.com/">Google Earth Airlines</a> plugin</li><li>a utility such as <a href="http://gardengnomesoftware.com/pano2qtvr.php">Pano2QTVR</a> to compile the images to an object movie</li></ul></p><p>Note: The page works with IE7 and FF2. Opera doesn't like the plugin and Safari doesn't like the javascript.</p><p>At the bottom of the page are a number of input boxes. You can set the parameters in any order, but I find the following sequence works well:</p><p>First set the root filename for the image set. Images are saved in the form <i>'filename_<row>_<col>.bmp'</i>, where <row> and <col> are the row and column numbers of the image, counting from zero.</p><p>Navigate to the desired location and click 'Get Position' to load the latitude, longitude and range. These parameters can be set manually if desired.</p><p>If a full azimuth object movie is needed leave the Minimum and Maximum Azimuth settings as they are, otherwise set them as desired. Buttons are provided for each to grab the current view.</p><p>Set the number of Azimuth steps. The default of 24 results in full azimuth object movie stills taken at 15° intervals.</p><p>Set the Top and Bottom Elevation angles. An elevation angle of 0° is looking straight down and one of 90° is a horizontal view. Usually it is best to set the Bottom Elevation angle to a couple of degrees less than 90 to avoid the viewpoint going underground.</p><p>Finally set the Altitude of the point at which the object movie will focus on. This value is in meters relative to the ground at the chosen latitude and longitude.</p><p>Note that using the "Get Position", "Get Latitude" and "Get Longitude" buttons after a non-zero altitude is set will result in their values changing to the point on the ground projected beyond the elevated focus point from the current view point!</p><p>Click the Preview button and the view will cycle through the image views you have defined. This has the added bonus of pre-loading the Google Earth cache.</p><p>Once you are happy with the settings make sure the browser window is large enough to show the entire plugin box and click the Snap Image Set button. <b>The screen grab won't work properly if the whole image isn't visible!</b> The instructions at the top of the page will disappear and the images will get saved to C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Local Settings\Temp\GEAPlugin.</p><p>Hover over the bottom left of the image area until the navigation gadgets fade out before snapping the image set, otherwise it will appear on all the images. The snapped image size is 640x480 pixels, and is fixed in the "content" div size. The script does very little range and sanity checking on the input parameters. Crazy in, crazy out.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-69660374980650994192007-09-20T13:54:00.001+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.725+01:00Metaplace<p><a href="http://bp3.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RvJt1J0HvdI/AAAAAAAAAH4/uuwiSS4Omfs/s1600-h/metaplace_logo_rgb_low_rez.png"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp3.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RvJt1J0HvdI/AAAAAAAAAH4/uuwiSS4Omfs/s400/metaplace_logo_rgb_low_rez.png" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5112269286953958866" /></a></p><p>Having been a fan of on-line 3D environments from V-Chat, Activeworlds, 3dAnarchy/Adobe Atmosphere through to Second Life, I came across this interesting development today. <a href="http://www.metaplace.com/">Metaplace</a> describes itself as a "next-generation virtual worlds platform designed to work the way the Web does".</p><p>Metaplace is an online gaming oriented development from <a href="http://www.areae.net/">Areae</a>, headed by Raph Koster of Ultima Online fame. Here Raph demonstrates some Metaplace features:</p><p><object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/tZiB_JcRH_s"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/tZiB_JcRH_s" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object></p><p>He discusses it further at <a href="http://www.raphkoster.com/2007/09/18/metaplace/">his website</a>. A little more detail and some screen shots are at <a href="http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/09/18/techcrunch40-session-8-entertainment-for-all-ages/">TechCrunch40</a>. <a href="http://gigaom.com/2007/09/18/metaplace-unveiled-raph-koster/#more-10250">GigaOM</a> have a particularly interesting article.</p><p>The demonstrations so far have been 2D or isometric. This is not too surprising in the light of Raph's recent paper <a href="http://www.raphkoster.com/2007/09/05/agdc07-designing-for-everywhere/">Designing for Everywhere</a>, in which he examines the features of various online games and implies that factors other than the display method are the secret of mass popularity. However, there does appear to be a <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/duncanriley/1403769045/in/set-72157602073146569/">3D terrain editor</a> in an a related flickr photoset, which indicates that Metaplace will move to encompass 3D too.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-66514569700616802292007-09-15T19:04:00.002+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.725+01:00Automated Object Movie Creation<p>Having made a couple of object movies from Google Earth by hand, I don't particularly want to repeat the experience! It is repetitive and takes ages: select a viewpoint; grab the screen; give it a filename; repeat 168 times. I had a look at the <a href="http://earth.google.com/comapi/">Google Earth COM API</a> which allows scripting of view positions, but unfortunately its screen capture capabilities are limited to black and white images, with an automatic degradation in image quality every so often.</p><p>Fortunately, Luca Rocchi at <a href="http://www.googleearthairlines.com/">Google Earth Airlines</a> has come up with a nifty plug-in that allows GE to run in a browser, exposing its interface to javascript. The even nicer thing about it is that it supports proper screen grabs</p><p>After a bit of playing I now have a script that automatically generates the image set <a href="http://gardengnomesoftware.com/pano2qtvr.php">Pano2QTVR</a> needs to create an object movie. Once its been tidied up and given it a more user friendly interface I'll post it up</p><p>For now, here's a preview:</p><p><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=8,0,0,0" width="320" height="240" ><param name="movie" value="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/toureiffel320x240.swf"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><embed width="320" height="240" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/toureiffel320x240.swf" allowFullScreen="true"></embed></object></p><p>(Drag on the image to stop that annoying autorotation)</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-27061997370296190032007-09-12T20:51:00.001+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.725+01:00Google Earth Quicktime Object Movie<p>This little experiment captures a tiny corner of Google Earth in a Quicktime object movie. I chose London's Battersea power station as the subject, though with hindsight that was probably not the most glamorous of places I could have picked. Nevertheless it is instantly recognisable (to the British and <a href="http://www.batterseapowerstation.org.uk/floyd/floyd.html">Pink Floyd</a> fans at any rate ;) and there's a very good model of it in the 3D Warehouse.</p><p>It will need a few seconds to load, then, provided you have Quicktime installed, you will be able to change the view point by dragging on the image:</p><p><object classid="clsid:02BF25D5-8C17-4B23-BC80-D3488ABDDC6B" codebase="http://www.apple.com/qtactivex/qtplugin.cab" width="320" height="240">
<param name="src" value="http://www.panovoyant.com/qtvr/batterseaps_ge.mov">
<param name="scale" value="tofit">
<param name="controller" value="false">
<embed width="320" height="240" pluginspage="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/" type="video/quicktime"
src="http://www.panovoyant.com/qtvr/batterseaps_ge.mov" scale="tofit" controller="false">
</embed>
</object></p><p>The object movie was created with <a href="http://gardengnomesoftware.com/pano2qtvr.php">Pano2QTVR</a>, a utility that allows both QTVR panoramas and object movies to be constructed.</p><p>An extension to Pano2QTVR allows the object movie to be output in flash format:</p><p><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=8,0,0,0" width="320" height="240" ><param name="movie" value="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/batterseaps_ge.swf"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><embed width="320" height="240" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/batterseaps_ge.swf" allowFullScreen="true"></embed></object></p><p>The source images for the object movie have to be laboriously captured one at a time with Ctrl+Alt+S (or the mac equivalent) from Google Earth. View positioning is accomplished via the use of <a href="http://www.panovoyant.com/kml/objectmovie_24x7.kml">this kml file</a>. This will allow easy positioning over most of a hemisphere in 24 azimuth steps at each of 7 elevations. It stops a couple of degrees short of ground level to avoid plunging the viewpoint underground. Note that the values of YOUR_LONGITUDE, YOUR_LATITUDE and YOUR_RANGE will need to altered to your chosen location before the file is any use!</p><p>If anyone knows a way to automate the image capture process, please drop me a line.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-24298310517043096662007-09-09T00:12:00.001+01:002009-05-17T14:24:32.725+01:00Starship Enterprise NCC-1701-D<p><b>Update:</b> It appears that the latest version of Google Earth, v4.2.0196.2018 beta released 12th September, breaks the GroundOverlay. Hopefully they will get this fixed in the next version. Thanks to Frank Taylor at <a href="http://www.gearthblog.com/">Google Earth Blog</a> for the tip.</p><p>Who says GroundOverlays are for overlaying the ground? It's been a busy week and no posts since Monday, but I haven't been idle. I've put together a multi-overlay of the Starship Enterprise, based on an original set of blueprints by Ed Whitefire that I came across in an article by <a href="http://www.cloudster.com/Sets&Vehicles/STNGEnterprise/EnterpriseDPlans.htm">Phil Broad @ cloudster.com</a>, a site devoted to resources for sci-fi model builders.</p><p>Ed has very kindly allowed me to use his artwork for this project, which has generated some quite striking visuals:</p></p><a href="http://bp0.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RuPekYS-zbI/AAAAAAAAAHY/8e3dFpX5qX0/s1600-h/enterprise_l.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp0.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RuPekYS-zbI/AAAAAAAAAHY/8e3dFpX5qX0/s400/enterprise_l.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5108171118946995634" /></a></p><p><a href="http://www.panovoyant.com/kml/enterprisencc1701d_sm.kml"><img style="border:0 0 0 0;" src="http://www.google.com/earth/images/google_earth_link.gif" BORDER=0 ALIGN=ABSMIDDLE>View in Google Earth</a></p><p>The overlay actually contains 43 layers, one for every deck, but only half of them are active by default. This should spare those of us with older PCs and graphics cards - those of you with computer power rivalling the Starship Enterprise may like to enable more of the layers!</p><p>The flash video below gives an idea of what it looks like:</p><p><object width="320" height="240" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=7,0,19,0"> <param name="salign" value="lt"> <param name="quality" value="high"> <param name="scale" value="noscale"> <param name="wmode" value="transparent"> <param name="movie" value="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/flvplay.swf"> <param name="FlashVars" value="&streamName=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/enterprise_ge&skinName=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/flvskin&autoPlay=false&autoRewind=true"> <embed width="320" height="240" flashvars="&streamName=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/enterprise_ge&autoPlay=false&autoRewind=true&skinName=http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/flvskin" quality="high" scale="noscale" salign="LT" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" src="http://www.panovoyant.com/flash/flvplay.swf" wmode="transparent"> </embed></object></p><p>I've chosen to place the Enterprise at Point Nemo, which distinguishes itself as the point at sea furthest from any land. I chose that location in the hope that the lack of high resolution ground images would help things along performance-wise. It looks great when navigated with a SpaceNavigator mouse, though is a bit more difficult to view with standard mouse and keyboard controls. I originally had the Enterprise at a much higher altitude, but dropped it much closer to sea level after some feedback from Ed.</p><p>The blueprints used in this are much lower resolution than the originals, which are of much higher quality. Those interested in printed copies of the blueprints should check out the Cloudster link above for details.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-85957695446841939302007-09-03T23:58:00.002+01:002009-05-27T00:33:54.618+01:00Affleck Castle in Stacked Overlays<p>Whilst scouting about for some simple floor plans to experiment with in Google Earth I came across a site about <a href="http://www.monikie.org.uk/affcastl.htm">Affleck Castle</a> in Monikie, Angus. It has an interesting description of the castle complete with a set of floor plans. A little image editing was required and then it was a simple matter to stack the plans.</p><p><a href="http://bp2.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtyTYoS-zZI/AAAAAAAAAGw/qDSH0T2OP3Q/s1600-h/affleckbg50_l.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp2.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtyTYoS-zZI/AAAAAAAAAGw/qDSH0T2OP3Q/s400/affleckbg50_l.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5106118128874474898" /></a></p><p><a href="http://www.panovoyant.com/kml/affleckcastle.kmz"><img style="border:0 0 0 0;" src="http://www.google.com/earth/images/google_earth_link.gif" BORDER=0 ALIGN=ABSMIDDLE>View in Google Earth</a></p><p>The effect is achieved by setting the white areas of the images to 50% transparency and leaving the black areas opaque. I tried several alternatives to this scheme - another that looks pretty good is to make the white areas completely transparent. This remains readable as GE leaves a fine white outline.</p><a href="http://bp1.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtyUYYS-zaI/AAAAAAAAAG4/EOVJWBLEA3o/s1600-h/affleckbg00_l.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp1.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtyUYYS-zaI/AAAAAAAAAG4/EOVJWBLEA3o/s400/affleckbg00_l.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5106119224091135394" /></a><p></p><p><a href="http://www.panovoyant.com/kml/affleckcastle2.kmz"><img style="border:0 0 0 0;" src="http://www.google.com/earth/images/google_earth_link.gif" BORDER=0 ALIGN=ABSMIDDLE>View in Google Earth</a></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Angus, UK56.53854401718722 -2.824441194534301856.538174517187223 -2.8253531945343018 56.538913517187218 -2.8235291945343017tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-2121168050228590622007-09-02T19:36:00.002+01:002009-05-27T00:35:14.226+01:00Eden Project Visitor Guide Overlay<p>Back in 2005 I was trying to accurately geocode a bunch of photos I'd taken at the excellent <a href="http://www.edenproject.com/">Eden Project</a>, but found at the time that the Google Earth imagery of the area showed little more than a quarry. I made a series of overlays from bits of more detailed and more up-to-date maps and finished off by aligning the map images from the guide book. These are a little out of date, but I thought they would be worth sharing.</p><p>The guide book images are used with the kind permission of Mike Petty, the Eden Project Publishing Manager.</p><p><a href="http://bp3.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtsGAIS-zYI/AAAAAAAAAGo/BrdmwxAh5aY/s1600-h/edenproject_l.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp3.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtsGAIS-zYI/AAAAAAAAAGo/BrdmwxAh5aY/s400/edenproject_l.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5105681201851452802" /></a></p><p><a href="http://www.panovoyant.com/kml/edenproject.kmz"><img style="border:0 0 0 0;" src="http://www.google.com/earth/images/google_earth_link.gif" BORDER=0 ALIGN=ABSMIDDLE>View in Google Earth</a></p><p>I've left the two biome images hovering in the air and applied some transparency, which produces a pleasing effect.</p><p>Transparency and altitude offsets seem to be only very rarely used. I'm sure there are plenty of practical and artistic effects that could be generated by them - I think I will have to experiment.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0St Blaise, Cornwall, UK50.36104774801877 -4.74479556083679250.36019224801877 -4.746619560836792 50.36190324801877 -4.7429715608367919tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-41850347584082657642007-09-01T23:46:00.002+01:002009-05-27T00:36:21.510+01:00Poldark Mine Tunnels<p>The <a href="http://www.poldark-mine.co.uk/sitemap.htm">Poldark Mine</a> just outside Helston in Cornwall is well worth a visit, and I can recommend the tour of the mine tunnels to anyone with even a vague interest in geology, mining or industrial history.</p><p>Their website has a <a href="http://www.poldark-mine.co.uk/mine.htm">detailed description</a> of the mine workings, including a number of sketches showing the tunnel layout. To give them some additional context, I've overlaid them on the local landscape in Google Earth.</p><p><a href="http://bp2.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtnuMYS-zXI/AAAAAAAAAGE/vUbI2s5Adyk/s1600-h/poldarkmine_l.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp2.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtnuMYS-zXI/AAAAAAAAAGE/vUbI2s5Adyk/s400/poldarkmine_l.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5105373549049073010" /></a></p><p><a href="http://www.panovoyant.com/kml/poldarkmine.kmz"><img style="border:0 0 0 0;" src="http://www.google.com/earth/images/google_earth_link.gif" BORDER=0 ALIGN=ABSMIDDLE>View in Google Earth</a></p><p>Many thanks to Richard Williams of Poldark Mines for his kind permission to use the map images.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Wendron, Cornwall, UK50.138260872107381 -5.24429798126220750.137401372107384 -5.2461219812622071 50.139120372107378 -5.242473981262207tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3322174697690543348.post-85218113755356922032007-09-01T22:21:00.002+01:002009-05-27T00:43:14.964+01:00The GE-copter and PhotoOverlay Transparency<p>Continuing the theme of messing about with PhotoOverlays in Google Earth, here's the first outing of the panovoyant GE-copter to Canary Wharf.</p><p><a href="http://bp2.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtnY1YS-zVI/AAAAAAAAAF0/qnS-3NwwUhI/s1600-h/gecopter_l.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp2.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtnY1YS-zVI/AAAAAAAAAF0/qnS-3NwwUhI/s400/gecopter_l.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5105350064167898450" /></a></p><p><a href="http://www.panovoyant.com/kml/gecopter.kmz"><img style="border:0 0 0 0;" src="http://www.google.com/earth/images/google_earth_link.gif" BORDER=0 ALIGN=ABSMIDDLE>View in Google Earth</a></p>The cockpit started life as a series of screen grabs from Microsoft Flight Simulator X which were stitched together into a panoramic image with Realviz Stitcher. I cut the windows out in Photoshop, then applied the script that I described in a <a href="http://panovoyant.blogspot.com/2007/08/photoshop-scripts-for-imagepyramid.html">previous post</a> to slice it up into tiles.</p><p><a href="http://bp1.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtnaKIS-zWI/AAAAAAAAAF8/TdwUx5k7L7A/s1600-h/copter_l.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://bp1.blogger.com/_jfzmRnzNdsw/RtnaKIS-zWI/AAAAAAAAAF8/TdwUx5k7L7A/s400/copter_l.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5105351520161811810" /></a></p><p>I reckon it would work with other aircraft too - maybe a microlight or hot air balloon. The back of Pegasus, Gwaihir or a dragon might be an intersting alternative!</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Poplar, Greater London, UK51.503266517253778 -0.01574993133544921951.499927517253781 -0.023045431335449219 51.506605517253774 -0.0084544313354492188