RSSMirosoft Releases 'PhotoSynth' 3D Tool
By Nate Mook | Published November 9, 2006, 5:47 PM
Microsoft on Thursday released a technology preview of an application it previewed in July, which is capable of taking hundreds of photographs and building a three-dimensional model in which users can "fly" through like a virtual world.
The program, called PhotoSynth, was first announced at SIGGRAPH 2006. Microsoft describes it as "a hybrid of a slide show and a gaming experience that lets the viewer zoom in to see greater detail or zoom out for a more expansive view."
For now, Microsoft is providing the collections of photographs, as a user processing his or her own photos could take hours, or even days. The application also has pretty hefty hardware requirements and will only run on Windows XP SP2 or Windows Vista systems with a capable graphics card.
Photosynth was born out of Microsoft's Live Labs, a group of scientists and engineers that are studying new ways to use the Internet. The group was founded in February 2006 by Dr. Gary Flake, who joined MSN as a distinguished engineer in April of last year.
"Microsoft Live Labs is very much focused on pushing the state of the art of the internet forward and showing what’s possible today. We like to do things quickly and in a very collaborative way," the group says. "Over time you’ll start to see more and more of our technologies work their way into great products across Microsoft, but in the meantime we want to get your feedback on what we’re doing right, and areas where we can improve."
PhotoSynth can be downloaded from the Live Labs Web site.
Awesome stuff.
This is very impressive for slide shows. I can do this in Director, and this demo makes it look so easy.
I have many questions. But some of them are - with the final release of application are we going to expect a new internet plug in, and apart from MS what other companies will be interested in creating/implementing applications for this??? If MS decides to go solo on this (like other times), they will loose again.
I hope MS doesn't let egocentric thoughts destroy this impressive invention.
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I really like this program.I have been awaiting it's showing for some time now.I will be looking forwoard to using a user defined version.
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this is very impressive and I look forward to when I can use my own photos with this...as for the only IE well IE still is the dominant browser and it clearly states we are working with it being able for other browsers...and you can always use the IE tab function in firefox if you are that put off by opening internet explorer
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This is actually pretty damn cool for a public technology preview (no, it isn't anything like a final release).
Yes the bandwidth requirements are massive, but overall the app runs really smoothly and it only takes a few seconds for each image to go from a very low res preview to the higher quality ones as it is downloaded.
For those wondering and can't be arsed to click the link, it is implemented as an ActiveX control and will run only on IE6 and IE7 at the moment.
I wonder how long it is going to take for them to come up with something that can take all those pretty little dots in 3D and turn them into polygons with textures...
Can see this being integrated with maps.live.com as well.
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Uh Oh. Welcome to Big Girl's XXXX Pornsite now in 3D.
Oh my God.
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Does this too require the use of the IE?
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I think the title of this article is a bit misleading. If I'm not wrong, the actual tool isn't available for download yet. What's available is more like a "Photosynth Player" where you can only view existing collections instead of creating your own from scratch.
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Good.
Live Labs seems great!
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holy heck I knew this was going to be good...just gets better and better :)
I need to get my satellite broadband...or move, lol
runs smooth on my fairly average laptop...wonder how much smoother on my conroe e6600 and 512mb x1800xtx
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