The WWP event was organized by Don Bain, Director of the Geography Computing Facility at the University of California Berkeley, and Landis Bennett, a Petaluma, California based cartographer and panoramic VR photographer. The event was sponsored by the Geography Computing Facility at the University of California Berkeley and the website is hosted by the Geo-Images Project. It is a non-commercial project, done simply to create enthusiasm for VR photography, and provide an outlet for the collective creativity of VR photographers.

News of the event and the superb results is slowing wending its way around the Internet and the website has been experiencing heavy traffic loads.

VRMAG thought it would be interesting to talk with the two men behind the event – Don Bain and Landis Bennett - and learn a little more about their experience. Don and Landis responded via email.

How did you handle the logistics of acquiring and uploading and organizing all the panos you received?

Landis:
Since we were not quite sure how the site would be hosted in the future, we decided to go the safest route and create a static website (as opposed to a dynamic site generated through PHP/ColdFusion/ASP/etc).

In order to do this I used AppleScript, a customized AppleScript framework, and a FileMaker Pro database. The AppleScript framework I used is called the 'AppleScript Web Publishing System' or AWPS. As far as I know I'm one of the only people in the world using this - whether this is a good thing or not, who knows? I worked with the person who originally developed this framework, but he's since moved on to other things and abandoned it (sorry, can't find any working links). It's a very powerful use of Apple's built-in scripting that allows me to use any AppleScript aware application to store information and then apply that to plain HTML templates. When the database is updated, or a QTVR file is updated, I can run the 'Site Generator' application and update the website.

The panoramas were all uploaded to a production server Don set up at UC Berkeley. Upon upload I then downloaded the QTVR file, the full-screen QTVR file, and a plain text file that the photographer included with their own information. I took that plain text file and copied the information to the FMP database.

One problem we encountered when doing this was properly dealing with special characters and how to render those in HTML. The plain text files tended to lose the proper encoding or change the characters to something else entirely. If this is done again, we will make sure to specify what data we need in HTML ready format, and what needs to be plain text.

After the files were transferred to my computer and the database was updated, I would run the AppleScript application to build the website and then transfer that back to the proper server in Berkeley where Don would make it live.

As an interesting aside, from the time we returned from our trip to Baja until after the site went live, Don's and my only contact was by email and a couple times by telephone. This site was created and assembled with input from the both of us, without a face-to-face meeting.

Don:
This project was done almost entirely in cyberspace. Landis and I planned it and executed it mostly through e-mail (a LOT of e-mail). Publicity and communication was through lists and web sites. We never met most of the participants, and probably never will, given their worldwide distribution. Now the remarkable results of the project are available for almost anyone in the world to enjoy on-line. The only costs were the donated time (especially Landis') and the web server and bandwidth (courtesy of the University of California).

How long did you spend organizing the event, both in the run up to the equinox and time spent as the photos came in?

Landis:
I can say that I spent at least 14 hours a day for about 10 days putting this together after we started getting files in. Most of the time was spent transferring data to the database. Again, if this is done again, we'll probably set up a method that will allow people to input their own data and preview it on the page before it gets put into the site database.

Don:
I spent two full days in late February planning the event, beginning to end, and writing almost all the e-mail announcements. There was another full day spent on the web site, but otherwise for me it was just an hour here, an hour there, most days up to March 17. Then we were traveling in Mexico for two weeks.

It was pretty intense when we returned and the uploads started coming in. I monitored it continuously, and twice a day sent out e-mail to acknowledge receipt and confirm the copyright agreement with each participant. Landis picked the files up directly from the ftp server. He posted new versions of the site every afternoon and we reviewed and corrected them, until the public announcement on April 1st.

What are some of the problems you encountered?

Don:
It really went remarkably smoothly. Landis and I had agreed from the beginning to keep it as simple as possible, and this required continuous vigilance. We had to politely refuse offers of partnership and suggestions for extra features. We had a few problems with garbled files, and numerous requests for changes to individual submissions.

I expected a very heavy server load, and secured departmental approval to purchase a new dual-processor G5 X-Serve. It didn't arrive in time, so we hosted the site on two G4 cubes, which have been handling the load with no problems. The only crisis came six weeks after the site debuted, when a sudden spike in traffic overloaded my local network. In fairness to my colleagues here in the geography department I took the server offline for six hours.

What are your thoughts on VR and how it can be used in specific settings, for example education?

Landis:
I have used VR photography for many different purposes. I think it's ideal to show places that people can't go, or would possibly like to visit. I've used VR panoramas to help commercial client's show off their facilities, help landlords rent their properties, and help owners sell their houses. I've also had VR photographs used as a backdrop for video games and large stitched images put on the wall as art.

Don:
I made a major career change twenty years ago, to pursue my vision of presenting photography on computer networks. It was almost science fiction when I started, but now it has all come true. I had a computer serving color geographic teaching images before the web was born - The Geo-Images Project, which became one of the very first web sites. When I first saw QTVR it opened up huge new possibilities.

I think VR photography is the most effective and objective imagery yet for teaching geography and environmental sciences. When presenting VR panoramas I like to say, "it's not a picture, it's a place". With high-resolution panoramas viewers can truly explore, and each is likely to find something different. Static traditional photography is very focused, you are directed to see what the photographer thought was important. VR photography shows it all. It's a real challenge, finding the perfect place for each node of a VR project.

I would like to see schools using VR imagery to expose students to interesting places, both familiar and unfamiliar. Local scenes are always popular, like family pictures. Students can be led, by gradual stages, from landscapes they recognize, to ones less familiar, to places remote and exotic. The same series of images can be used in different ways - to look at the people, the built environment, and the natural world. Just like a real field trip, students can be asked to watch for particular details, and report on them afterwards. With great archives of VR panoramas available on-line (such as the new Full Screen QTVR site) students can be sent out on their own voyages of discovery.
Another aspect of VR photography in education is its potential value in technology training. The range of valuable skills that can be learned from building a community VR site is tremendous -- geography, photography, image processing, researching and writing the captions and text, VR production and post-production, website authoring. If done right it teaches planning, logical procedure and precision, as well as about the community and environment. I hope to launch some high school-level pilot projects creating community websites built around VR photography in the next year or two.

VR photography resources on the web have great potential for public education. Projects such as Tito Dupret's tour of World Heritage Sites break new ground in presenting educational resources, free for everyone and adaptable to many interests and needs. I have always been a proponent of continuing education (my favorite students are seniors) and I see great virtual travel possibilities, both educational and entertaining. I hope to find the time some day to teach a university extension course (perhaps on the national parks, or a geographic survey of the West) using my VR panoramas. Projected large in a dark room they are irresistible!

I just read the Wired review on World Wide Panorama, what strategy did u used to get the news out about the site?

Landis:
Actually I wrote to a reporter at Wired and asked him to write an article. He called me back, interviewed me, asked for a reference (Mike Quan), and published the article the next day. What strategy? Mostly luck. :)
Read 'WORLD WIDE PANORAMA - A DAY IN THE LIFE OF 180 PHOTOGRAPHERS'.