My New Gigapan
This one is in the category of neat new toys. Last week I got my very own Gigapan robot, as part of its beta program. Being a beta version, I’m actually obligated to use it. So, in that spirit, here is the first picture I’ve taken with it:
In case you don’t know, the Gigapan is the creation of Illah Nourbakhsh, in the Robotics Institute. Illah does a lot of amazing research in robotics, but in addition to research he has also developed a wide range of interesting technologies, many of which fall into the category of educational robotics and also something he calls “community robotics“. As one example, he has co-developed the Qwerk robot controller, which forms the basis for open-source robotics development. Ordinary people can use and create new “recipes” for building sophisticated robots using this technology.So what is the Gigapan? It is a small robot that has a mount for an ordinary digital camera.
(This is the beta version. The commercial version, set to hit the market this summer, will look nicer.) It is easily set up so that the camera can be fully zoomed in and then the robot pans over a very large region, taking overlapping snapshots as it goes. Stitching software puts it all together into a super-high resolution photo. (Actually, it doesn’t work to make a real jpg or tiff file, because there are usually limits to how big they can be in practice. And so the actual format of the image files is more complicated than that.) Now, if that were all there was to Gigapan, that would be only mildly interesting. What makes it truly interesting is that the images are uploaded and hosted on gigapan.org, which is a social networking site. People can explore the gigapan pictures, zooming in and out, finding interesting things in the scenes, and even taking “snapshots” (i.e., normal resolution photos) and commenting on them. Very cool. Already, a ton of very interesting gigapans have been taken, and with the latest version, there is integration now with Google Earth.
So now I am on the hook to take some gigapans. What should I do? I’m definitely open to suggestions.
Peter Lee @ April 30, 2008
Wow, this is pretty neat. I zoomed in and could clearly read the titles of the books on your bookshelf. Ironically, I was zooming into Theory of Poker by Sklansky and not even realizing it at first.
Other suggestions:
The departmental faceboard.
One of the huge whiteboards on Wean 7 or 8.
Hi Peter,
Congratulations on joining the Beta program! Enjoy the experience.
One thing that really caught my eye in your post was your aside that the commercial version would be available this summer. Could you elaborate on where you heard this. I’d love to be able to tell folks who ask me about this a date to look forward to.
Thanks,
Ron