A year or two ago the Gigapan project began to create ultrahigh resolution photographs of notable places and events. Recently the inauguration of Barack Obama was photographed using this technique. As the name suggests the file sizes are huge, so to make this manageable, it isn't necessary to download these photos to view them. Above is Hanauma Bay on the Hawaiian Island of Oahu. At their website (click here) you will find a link to this particular photograph. Yes, you can zoom in to see who on the beach has a navel piercing.
Is that all? No, Microsoft (you remember Microsoft?), has developed new free software called PhotoSynth (Photosynth.net) in which uploaded photos are compared and spatially linked. This allows you to move from one photograph to another across a landscape or around an object which has been photographed from different angles. If you have an expensive product you want to show potential buyers, take a series of photographs from different angles, upload and viola!
This was also done at Obama's Inauguration allowing you to move through the crowd in a variety of directions, jumping from one photograph to another. However, it does require that you download some free software and create an account to view these synched photos. Worth it? Sure. You can even browse through a penguin colony.
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