Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Releases Photosynth
Spy Hunter writes "Photosynth has graduated from a 'tech preview' to a complete service. Now you can upload your own photos and have them automatically transformed into a 'synth': a 3D fly-through reconstruction of your home, your vacation, or anything else you can take pictures of. Learn more about Photosynth at the official blog, see what Walt Mossberg has to say about it, or just go try it out right now." According to Mossberg, Photosynth works on PCs using IE or Firefox, but not yet on Macs. We've been discussing Photosynth since its introduction.
"Unfortunately, we're not cool enough to run on your OS yet."
Those zippy cool mac ads seemed to have hurt Microsoft's ego a little. maybe... maybe it's a ruse... a false modesty sort of thing...
It probably won't without WINE since you're directed to download and run an .exe file for viewing and creating your own.
Maybe you'll need some WINE with that.
Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
It does make them 3D (I remember seeing the video of the first demo last year I think it was). But it's not quite precise enough to be used for level design, or at least it wasn't back then. Still very cool though :)
which is totally what she said
From the site: Only Windows XP (SP2 or SP3) and Windows Vista are supported at this time.
No Linux support? In this day and age? Bah.
Doesn't work on my PC. Not even in FireFox.
Oh, wait, you misspelt 'Windows' as 'PC', an easy mistake to make.
Just in case you hadn't guess it was Windows only. It's from Microsoft and they care about making money, which they do a great job at. Linux and bug fixes do not make allot of cash for them, so don't expect to much support for either and don't whine about it. Thanks, so much. :)
-- Prepared at the direction of, or to be sent to Legal Counsel, in anticipation of litigation. Attorney Client Pri
While navigating a couple galleries... It feels like I'm drunk and forgot how to use a mouse.
Remember kids, set Graphic Acceleration to Full!
Minimum System Requirements
Important: Photosynth makes heavy use of your graphics hardware. If you have an older graphics system, Photosynth may not run. Also, Photosynth requires that your graphics acceleration be set to full.
Operating System: Only Windows XP (SP2 or SP3) and Windows Vista are supported at this time. Running Windows on a Mac? Photosynth runs under Boot Camp only. Parallels and other VM software cannot run the viewer.
Web Browser: Internet Explorer 7, Firefox 2, and Firefox 3
Memory: 256 MB of memory is a bare minimum; 1GB is recommended.
Graphics: Minimum 32MB of graphics memory required, 64MB or more is recommended. Photosynth runs on some DirectX6 capable cards and all DirectX7 cards.
NOTHING can replace Slashdot for that!
A bunch of nerds submitting their pictures of Tera Patrick in 5.. 4.. 3..
Actually. I'm going to go and try that.
Sock Puppets: damn_registrars=pudge_confirmer=jimmy_slimmy=raiigunner=cml4524=a_klavan=red4men=ronpaulisanidiot
So no Linux, probably not for a long time. Anyway, I can't see why things like this need to be a web service, so I'm waiting for the open-source variant.
Who cares if it runs on Linux. Here is the REAL question we want answered: Does it work on porn?
Here's what it does:
Just like a typical panorama stitcher, it identifies similar points, then runs an optimisation algorithm in order to line those points up.
Whereas a panorama stitcher warps the images to match a particular projection, and optimises the points in 2D, PhotoSynth optimises the points in 3D.
The viewer application then lets you view the collection of photographs, as if they were hanging in 3D space -- in the right part of space -- and fade in and out of view as you stand in the right place to see them.
For quite a small number of photos, you get a BIG cloud of control points, and the application lets you view that cloud and hides the photos. Often the result is quite a good 3D model - it's clear that if you were to draw vertices between them you'd get a decent wireframe of the subject.
However, the application does not attempt to turn your photos into a convincing fully rendered 3D model. Rather it provides a spacial model for navigating between photos. It's always explicit that you are looking at one photo, with some other photos, dimmer, around it.
I think that's quite nice - that it doesn't pretend to be more than it is.
The slideshow option is rather neat. It simply steps through all the photos, but the transition between them shows you how they are spacially related.
Actually it doesn't do this at all. Time to at least give Microsoft some credit here, it does a pretty decent job of figuring out the 3D layout of everything and allows you to move around as much as you like.
It's obviously not EXACTLY right (Although I'd bet that with more pictures, it's more accurate) but it's close enough that you could make a pretty good "virtual tour" of just about anywhere with nothing more than a bog-standard digital camera.
It's definitely impressive.
+1 IDisagreeSoHeMustBeATrollOrAnAstroturferOrAShill
I dunno about you guys, but I'm pretty stoked that this technology has come to see the light of day for people to input their own photos. It's like Google Street View, but with anywhere and any camera.
My main concern is that MSFT has stated that they'd love to basically stitch every photo together into a virtual world nearly (not quite, but close). I don't normally have privacy concerns and issues, but this 'could' potentially get a little funny. Do I really want to photosynth my apartment or desk at work and then have that linked locationally to the rest of the world? I'm not so sure.
Tibbon
tibbon.com
Yeah, teenage boys need 3D trips inside the human body...
On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
Sounds ... cheesy...
And if it was a new offering from Google or Apple, people would be posting how cool it is.
Advice: on VPS providers
You assume too much.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft