Funny how you forget some of the creative venues you used to pursue. One huge one struck me on the head on a recent trip to Chicago. How in the world did I forget about Quicktime VR? I had the perfect opportunity to use it but, didn’t have anything suitable to create it. Dang.

I bought my first digital camera back in 1997 (dang, was it really that long ago?) The Apple Quick Take 200 with a whoping .3 megapixels. I started to get a little nutty and veered off into the world of photo VR courtesy of the Kaiden VR rig.

Ah, then I remembered why I forgot about it. It was a huge pain in the butt. The camera was all but useless and the stiching software was a nightmare. The camera eventually broke and the VR rig ended up in some box somewhere.

Fast forward 9 years and I was kicking myself for not having that rig with me. Funny what 9 years of technology can do. The cameras are wicked easy and I’ve been using them for years but, for some reason it never dawned on me to try the VR rig out again. Heck, even the software has gotten easier. Alot of cameras even ship with stitching software. The things they are doing these days with VR are absolutely stunning. Here’s a few links to some of the better ones. Find any more? Post the links in the comments. Now, if I could just find that Kaiden rig?…

http://www.panoramas.dk/
(click the pull down menu in the upper right corner to go directly to the panoramas. credit to nctrl for pointing this one out.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panoramic_photography
(wikipedia entry. alot of great links at the bottom. Includes description of film based panoramas as well as VR.)

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/technologies/qtvr/
(yup, an Apple plug. Imagine that.)

http://www.panofx.com/gallery.html
(comes in flash and java as well.)