Home → Archives → by subject → Beyond the single photo
Beyond the single photo
:: Category Archives
Beyond the single photo: Immersive panoramas
As close to a personal visit as it gets
Immersive panoramas, also known as spherical panoramas or virtual reality panoramas are 360° x 180° panoramas one can navigate with a QuickTime or Java viewer. I haven't been a fan of this kind of panoramas in the past, but changed my mind recently: in contrast to a video where you have to follow a fixed route through a place, you can actually explore it on your own with spherical panoramas. Have a look at this set of examples of a wind tunnel. Exploring all six panoramas gives a good impression of the topology, the dimension and the "feeling" of that place, probably as close to an actual visit as it gets. (Also note the "French Concrete" exterior style typical for industrial buildings in France and Belgium.) These examples recorded at CERN in Geneva also carry audio tracks, making it an even more exciting experience. Of course it does not stop here. In academic and scientific use, software based analysis of spherical panoramas is where the real fun starts. The website of Metigo Software of Leipzig has some examples.
Permanent link :: 
Tell a friend :: 
Add to del.icio.us
Beyond the single photo: The fourth element
Audio recordings
In the first posting on this subject I mentioned three techniques that in terms of conveying impressions go well beyond a single photo: panorama photography, aerial photography and videography. How could I miss to mention the fourth: audio recordings. One evening I sat in the harbor of a huge steel works, the very place itself most quiet, and rhythmic noise from a variety of sources all around me in its slow and steady pace mixed into a relaxing surround sound symphony. On the other end of the "industrial sounds spectrum", inside the housing of electric arc furnaces, you feel the noise as much as you hear it, most forceful, energetic, crude and deafening - intimidating, frightening to some, glorious to others. Could recordings of this be valuable to my project? Most certainly.
Regarding aerial photography, a local company has a demo gallery with some good examples of the aerial photography's specific language.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
Conveying impressions: Beyond the single photo
Techniques
A picture is worth a thousand words, but when portraying huge plants, even with lots of pictures it can be difficult to convey a sense of its dimensions, its geographic situation, its topology and of how it "feels" to to someone who hasn't personally experienced it.
There are three techniques than can convey such impressions possibly better and in a much shorter period of time than single photographs: panoramic photography, aerial photography and videography which, by the way, might be the medium of choice for documenting living industry anyway.
I recently started to experiment with both panoramic photography and videography. In this series, I will post notes, observations, ideas and first results. This is by no means meant as a tutorial, but should give you starting points for own experiments.
Permanent link :: Tell a friend :: Add to del.icio.us
