We have released our own simple solution from our lab using Google Maps – see GMap Image Creator and now Microsoft has taken this a notable step further. The research lab at Microsoft notes that:

HD View was developed with a number of goals in mind. It should:

• allow smooth panning and zooming on large images,
• only download enough data to create the current view (and possibly look ahead to the next), and
• always display the current field of view with an appropriate projection. This means that when zoomed way in you should be presented with a standard perspective projection providing a sense of immersion, and when zoomed out you experience a curved projection so that get a full overview of the scene. In between the projection should smoothly transition.
• Finally, it should be easy to create your own HD View content and present it to the world via the web.

The movie below provides an excellent overview on not only HD View but also the capturing and stitching process in general:

At the moment HD View is an ActiveX® browser component, thus the first time you use it you will be asked to install the component. It also only runs in Internet Explorer® under the Microsoft Windows® operating system.

For working examples see the sites using it so far – we hope to have our own examples online shortly…

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