[Woody1458]

As promised, Russell's segment on the Gigapan:

GigaPan:
The GigaPan originated, apparently as a collaborative effort “sponsored by Google,
Carnegie Mellon University and the NASA Ames Intelligent Robotics Group, the Global
Connection Project.”

Despite this wealth of knowledge, the original GigaPan suffers from an inherent design
flaw – it rotates the camera at the film plane, not at the optical center of the lens, so it will
fail to create panoramic/gigapixel images with near foreground and distant background
subjects with SLR cameras (anything with a lens that protrudes far from the rotation
point). It may be possible to correct some parallax issues through very advanced image
seaming, but true photographers know you shoot your best images in the field – don’t
rely on software of any kind to fix issues you should have compensated for in the field.
More information about this issue, known as parallax, is explained in the Feature
Justification for Panoramic Photography.


It seems that they are now attempting to go commercial with this product, aimed at
consumer level buyers, in partnership with Charmed Labs
(http://www.charmedlabs.com/index.php...sk=view&id=111) but
their “Beta Testing” program closed October 2007.


I was selected for the Beta program but never went through with the evaluation since I
knew the product would not live up to the standards required for my art. If ever fully
developed, the product is rumored to sell for about $200 – I can still purchase as part of
the beta program for $349.

While they show the product with a Canon camera which looks similar to SLR cameras,
last time I spoke with them, they indicated that SLR cameras are not supported –
rendering this a fun hobbyist tool, not a pro photographer workhorse.

The GigaPan group has created software for viewing and sharing such detailed images at
www.gigapan.org. Charmed Labs also used to make a motor control brain product called
the Qwerk, but it’s no longer available on their website – it appears to have been
purchased by Innovation First, the makers of VEX Robotics.

The important part of this piece is in the second paragraph. Due to the device positioning every camera in the same spot regardless of the sensor and lens positioning it does not allow a photographer to take pictures of things in both close and distant range without the magic of the stitching revealing itself.