One way of visualizing the size of a four gigapixel image is to consider a photograph of a regulation football pitch (soccer in USA) which is 90m x 45m. A four gigapixel top-down photograph of the entire field at 1mm per pixel would cover an area of 89.4m x 44.7m, which is 99.38% of the indicated size. This mm-per-pixel scale represents perhaps as many as 100 pixels per blade of grass across an entire pitch captured in a single exposure.

how it works?

These systems (and those like them) work quite simply in concept, but are actually quite complex. What happens is you need to mount the compact (point and shoot) camera inside the camera system. Then, simply put the camera in the position you want (mounted or sitting on the ground, etc) and you set up your shot. Remember that when you do this it is going to be a huge image, so make sure you place the camera to capture a great surrounding that adds to your image and doesn’t detract.
Once you have the camera set up you let the machine go to work, It will take photos as it rotates through a system and course and actually moves the camera into different positions and takes the photographs. Finally after the image is saved and captured you move to the computer to start editing the huge file together. Make sure you have some processing power, as this will produce 200+ images, and my MacBook Pro with 512mb video/4gb RAM gets killed with a 10 image photoshop file.

Gigapixel images allow you to capture amazing details inside an image. This allows you to zoom in and out using software online to view the picture as a whole, or the intimate details of the work. This creates a level of interaction with your images, something that is often lost online. The user can manipulate the image and create a larger or smaller image cropped to their liking to enjoy.

Why not use a digital camera?

Modern frame-exposure professional digital cameras have spatial resolutions ranging of 4-16 megapixels in “35mm D-SLR” formats and up to 22 megapixels for medium format backs. Using such cameras to create gigapixel images requires mosaicing hundreds of individual exposures. Alternatively, strip-sensors can be used to scan the image plane over a few seconds time. Even so, however, large format scanning backs have final image resolutions 1-2 decades below our gigapixel regime and require relatively static scenes, as does the mosaic approach, and are thus generally inappropriate for photos of traffic, people, water, and events. The single-exposure advantage is pronounced in images with crowds of people. The facial expressions of an half a stadium of fans can be captured at passport resolution in a single instant as they react to events on the field.
Using proven techniques allows artists to recreate this effect in many amazing places, from President Obama’s inauguration to the Rocky Mountains, allows for some amazing work to wow you and captivate your imagination.

President Obama’s Inaugural Address

This enormous picture, taken by David Bergman, was stitched together from 220 images taken on a Canon G10 mounted on a Gigapan panoramic imager system.

Death Valley

Gasworks Park, Seatle Washington

Cloud Gate “The Bean “, Chicago

The Magical Water Tour,Peru

Parque de la Reserva, Peru’s capital city with an attraction that other countries around the world also have.
This is the biggest fountain park in the world, there are 13 fountains that are lit with more than 500colourful lights!

“Haus der Presse”,Dresden

The picture was made with the Canon 5D mark II and a 400mm-lens. It consists of 1.665 full format pictures with 21.4 megapixel, which was recorded by a photo-robot in 172 minutes. The converting of 102 GB raw data by a computer with a main memory cache of 48 GB and 16 processors took 94 hours. With a resolution of 297.500 x 87.500 pixel (26 gigapixel) the picture is the largest in the world. (stand December 2009)

Prague from the TV Tower

This is a super high resolution photo. Use your mouse to zoom in and see a startling level of detail. This image is currently (as of 12/2009) the largest spherical panoramic photo in the world. It is 192,000 pixels wide and 96,000 pixels tall. That’s 18.4 billion pixels, or 18.4 gigapixels! When it’s printed, it will be 16 meters (53 feet) long at regular photographic quality (300dpi). It was shot in early October 2009 from the top of the Zizkov TV Tower in Prague, Czech Republic in collaboration with Prague 3 town hall. A digital SLR camera and a 200mm lens were used. Hundreds of shots were shot over a few hours; these shots were then stitched together on a computer over the following few weeks.

Eastern Sierra, Alabama Hills

Huiji Temple Deva-raja in Taipei

This is a super high resolution photo. Use your mouse to zoom in and see a startling level of detail. This image is currently (as of 12/2009) the largest spherical panoramic photo in the world. It is 192,000 pixels wide and 96,000 pixels tall. That’s 18.4 billion pixels, or 18.4 gigapixels! When it’s printed, it will be 16 meters (53 feet) long at regular photographic quality (300dpi). It was shot in early October 2009 from the top of the Zizkov TV Tower in Prague, Czech Republic in collaboration with Prague 3 town hall. A digital SLR camera and a 200mm lens were used. Hundreds of shots were shot over a few hours; these shots were then stitched together on a computer over the following few weeks.

Chaco Canyon, Pueblo Bonito

university park Lima

Named for the house of the Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, the first university in America.

In this park are several monuments and watch a monumental gift to the city by the German Cologne on the occasion of the centennial of the Independence of Peru in 1921. Also the Panteon de los Proceres.

DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES

New York City skyline from downtown Brooklyn

The view from the Brooklyn Marriott Downtown hotel.

5 best Gigapixel Photography by Gerard maynard

Gerard has got five Giga pixel Photography in his website. Those are really stunning and one of them is the biggest giga pixel image ever taken.

Dubai Creek Giga Pixel Photography

Chicago Gigapixel Photography

200+ Giga Pixel Images from 360 Cities

360 Cities has got more than 200+ excellent Giga Pixel photography. You can check the photographs based on country name.

Many times throughout the day you look up to the sky and just see a blue or grey sky without much thought. But on some days, you look out into the distance and see something beautiful, something that captivates the beauty of the sky not seen on a daily basis.

This collection of photography that feature stunning skies, dynamic clouds, and bright colors showcases the beauty that is the sky. The photographers were able to capture something magnificent, a scene that will never occur again, not identically anyway, and is a gem to hold on to and save a piece of time.

Capturing a stunning photo of the sky is actually quite harder than it seems. The sun must be in the right place and patience is a virtue, waiting for the perfect light or clouds can be tiresome but can be well worth it. Learning to master sky photography takes practice, but for now, check out some amazing shots done by some very talented photographers.

I hope that you will definitely love this collection. I have spent much time in collecting some of the best sky photography taken by professional photographers. If you know any other good Natural sky photography , then please let me know in comments. I will add them to this list.

Long exposure photography is one of the coolest ways of taking pictures. It requires a longer shutter speed, anywhere from 1/2 sec up to several minutes or even a hour.

The ability to take long exposures requires a user to use a tripod for optimum results (of course, some people prefer the hand shake look). The use of a tripod is essential because the inability for the human hand to stay still is truly remarkable. No matter how good you get, it will be very hard to hand hold a 1 second shutter release without very noticeable blur. As well as a tripod (or monopod in some cases could work), a photographer should make use of the timed shutter release. This will allow the user to set the shot up, and set a timer to release the shutter. Most cameras have the option of one or more timed shutter releases, for example my Canon 40D has a 2 second and 10 second wait. I usually use the 2 second release as this gives you just enough time to get your hands off the camera to not bump the shot. This is even more important on longer shutter times.

Having a longer shutter speed of a few seconds allows the camera to take in more light to the sensor (or film for the film buffs). This means that the camera can read more “data” from the scene and gather more detail in a low light condition, creating some truly remarkable results as you will see below.

As well as low light conditions, a slow shutter speed allows for creative uses of motion in photographs. Some very cool portraits can be taken using a slower shutter speed, for example someone riding by on a bike creates a blur of the background and the bike, but could create a detailed portrait of the rider’s face if you follow the action. The same goes for a moving car, a fast shutter will catch a car in the exact instance, it could look like it’s not even moving (even at 200 mph with a fast lense). But using a slower shutter and following the path of the car could create a remarkable sense of speed that is tough to mimic and master.

Enjoy the great examples below and get out their and experiment with your camera taking long exposures.

Reader suggested Long exposure Photographs

I would like to add some of the best long exposure photographs suggested by my readers here. So that this post will remain alive for a long time. Will update this post regularly !

10 best Tutorials for creating HDR Images

With the help of Tone Mappnig techniques we can easily produce HDR images. In tone mapping , by combining images taken at different exposures to produce a sinlge HDR image. We can also produce HDR images in photoshop by merging Images. If applied properly then once can produce beautiful pictures with high dynamic range.

Let us see some of the HDR image creation tutorials available :

1. Exposure blending tutorial – HDR Image creation

A little background: HDR is a type of image manipulation. The goal is to blend multiple exposures of the same scene into a single image in order to get a result that has more dynamic range than your camera is capable of recording.

2. Learn how to create awesome HDRs

In this post, you’ll learn the steps you need to take to create cool HDR images. Find out how to select a great scene, and how to properly take the images. Next, we’ll go over what Programs and techniques you can use to assemble the HDR. Only got one RAW file, but you still want an HDR? No problem, we’ll go over that too.

3. Adobe Photoshop CS3 Tutorial – HDR

Photoshop’s Merge to HDR (High Dynamic Range) automated feature has been improved for CS3, but it is still not able to merge exposures where subjects have moved between the separate exposures.

4. HDR Photograph Tool

The Merge to HDR command in Photoshop lets you combine several of the same scene with different exposures into a single HDR 32-bpc (bits-per-channel) image. First, you’ll need to have three images taken at different exposures. Run Photoshop and choose File > Automate > Merge to HDR.

5. The Definitive Guide to Realistic HDR

This tutorial will attempt to demonstrate how to make a realistic HDR, one that is virtually indistinguishable from a single exposure. The biggest goal is producing a tutorial that can stand as a standard by which anyone can learn to create a balanced HDR. Ultimately, the processing choices are yours. These are the building blocks.

6. Photoshop CS2 High Dynamic Range

The latest version of Photoshop, CS2, offers an intriguing new function for creating 32-bit High Dynamic Range (HDR) images. It offers the ability to combine multiple individual images with different exposures into a single 32-bit floating-point image with expanded dynamic range.

7. HDR Tutorial Using Photomatix and Photoshop

Thinsite.net has a neat tutorial on High Dynamic Range
(HDR) photography, from capturing HDR shots properly, merging the bracketted shots into a single HDR exposure using Photomatix and the post processing steps in Photoshop.

8. PhotoShop CS3 HDR photograph Tutorial

In this tutorial we will take a look at HDR photography. HDRI (High Dynamic Range Imaging) was originally used in 3D and is now in full force in photography. Basically it’s the process of taking multiple exposures and merging them together into a single 32 bit image. Let me explain: A camera is capable of capturing a limited amount of tones in a single photo.

9. How to create HDR images using Photomatix

HDR images are generated by taking multiple pictures of the same scene at different exposure settings and combining them digitally on a computer. Generally, the more pictures that are taken at different exposure settings the better the resulting HDR image will be.

10. Merging Photos to an HDR Image in Photoshop

This is an article about Photoshop HDR imaging. The following HDR workflow is explained in detail:

* Merging photos to an HDR image
* Processing the HDR image
* Tone Mapping

60+ Incredible HDR Photographs

With the rising popularity of digital cameras and easy-to-use desktop software, HDR images are becoming more popular. So I have collected 100+ smashing HDR images which will take your breath away.

You might have seen plenty of advertisements on the road sides or when you have flipped over magazines. I hope that you might have just skipped most of them, but there are some cool creative advertisements which would make you look twice. To create Creative advertisements , the designer must be innovative enough to take away the attention of the audience. In this post , I have collected some of the best creative adverts which could make you think. These adverts are from various categories like technology , public services , travel , etc.

Get Them Off Your Dog (Frontline, Flea Spray)

Panasonic: Wide Angle

Your Contribution Can End Child Labour

Act Now to save the Planet

See Both sides of the story

Canon DiGi

RCA Music

Welt Kompakt

Orion Telescopes

Stranger Radio Station

Comcast : High-Speed Internet

Cemex – Fast Drying Concrete

Movistar Print Ad

AIDS Awareness – Ad campaign

Dealer Track – Tools for a competitive advantage

Find More Easily (Google)

Samsung Plasma TV Ads

Green Peace

Snickers

Nivea

Sony Widescreen TV Ads

Detal Creative Ad

WMF knives: Cutting board

Firefox

Sony Xacti Water proof camera

Panasonic: Intelligent Face Detector

Beware of the H1N1 flu

FujiFilm Nobody can resist in front of a Finepix

Symantec Antivirus

Samsung washing Machine

Canon Cyber Shot

Routine sucks (Terra Travel)

You can lose more than your patience

Driving Safe

Super Absorbent Kitchen Towels

Don’t Let Wood Get Old

Lays advertising 2009

If you know some good ones then do let me know via comments.