Top Secret Project Unveiled

[BlueRanger]

Okay, it's far from done, but it's ready for a preview. Now you can visit the TFF any time you want. A few more scenes will be added later, along with a sidebar map so you can see where each scene was shot and click icons to view that location.

http://tours.grandviewvirtual.com/public/vtour/display/12204

[MuskieRandy]

Great pixs! Looks like you had perfect weather for the project! Glad to see Google is getting some competition;) How about 3D? Then I can get some 3D glasses, a 60" flatpanel, a fan, and I never have to go there in person again, hehe

[The Tiny Fisherman]

It was good that you stopped and visit. The pictures look great, keep up the good work.

Have a great day,

[setme31]

Awesome job. This must have taken a lot of effort. I just want to let you know that the people that visit this site appreciate all of the hard work you put into this.

Now, if you could just mark all of the magical smallmouth and muskie spots, this would be perfect. haha.

[George G]

Blue, you have some awesome computer skills, I will enjoy this many times, just got back from a week on the flowage, great fishing wonderful time with friends. Great job.

[luv2brw]

Awesome job Blue!

[DonH]

Hi Blue,

We've had a couple of disagreements on this site over the years, but I have to give you credit, this is an awesome piece and I thank you for it.

I can see myself visiting this many, many times in the future. You really captured the beauty of the TFF.

[LundAngler]

That is really great! I watched you take the shot from the canoe portage area by the dam the other day. I thought to myself "what the heck is he doing?" Now I know.....next time I will have to say "hello".

[bupa]

great job-the island you filmed from is just yards away from my son-in -laws brothers place-the old Hiawatha Resort!Was just up there from 5/27-6/2.Love the TFF this will make me miss it more.Now i can look at it and dream of my next visit. God Bless, Bob Schwartz,Hartford Wi.

[BlueRanger]

Glad everybody likes it. George - the one with no initial - sent me a link to some cool panoramas of the Utah desert about 6 months ago. That's what got me interested in researching the process and equipment for doing this, and ultimately lead to my decision to start a part-time business to do virtual tour photography. I don't consider myself particularly artistic when it comes to things like composition - I just wind up with a fair number of good photos because I carry the camera everywhere and shoot like crazy - I took 1400 pictures of my friends' band this weekend to give them about 275 shots that were decent and let them pick the ones they liked from those, and that's always interesting because some of the ones they end up using aren't always my favorites. But the virtual tours rely mostly on having the right equipment and software, picking good days to shoot, and getting the technical aspects like exposure and color balance settings correct. That's pretty easy to develop through practice and experimentation.

Down the road, this TFF tour will link to my business website and hopefully some of the local tourism businesses, but I wanted to give all the board visitors a chance to enjoy it and give some feedback first. I'm still playing with some of the settings - I think I can bump the image quality up a little more, but there's a direct tradeoff between that and download time. I may post a few comparison test scenes this weekend and ask for comments.

Just a little info about the process - it looks like video, but I actually shoot 12 overlapping still photos in a circle with the camera mounted and carefully leveled on a tripod with a special panoramic head that has click-stops every 30 degrees and aligns the camera so that it revolves around the precise optical center of the lens. Then the pictures go into panorama software that stitches them into a seamless 360 degree image and warps it to give the perspective that you're actually looking around in a circle . The original resulting image is about 45 megapixels, but what you're seeing has been reduced to around 6MP if you're looking at the fullscreen version.

[Flambeau Riverman]

Blue,
Great work heading north tommorow can't wait till we get out on the TFF
I already feel like I'm there.
Don't know the tech stuff but when you shoot these pic's are you shooting
in HDS the 16:9 ratio when we get back going to hook the laptop up to the
Big Screen TV either way it's going to be amazing!!!
Thanks again Blue

[BlueRanger]

The actual images are much wider than that, about 5500x1050. The player supposedly scales to fill whatever screen format you're viewing it on. Let me know how that works - sounds like a cool idea.

[Flambeau dreamer]

I first heard about this idea of yours May 22nd, fishing with a friend of ours for smallies. I thought it sounded pretty cool then, but I had no idea what splendor and beauty it would reveal. Great Job!
Thank you for sharing it with us.
Can I request a spot? lol!
Thanks Again,
Chris

[Jim Kohl]

Impressive!!! Very Well Done Blue Ranger!!! Thank You!!! Jim Kohl

[ski2313]

awesome. Nicely done!

[BlueRanger]

Must be a lot of lurkers on this board - just checked the tour stats and it's had 506 unique visitors since I posted the link last week. More than 20% have been back for a second look, and the average person looked at just over 11 scenes. The initial scenes have been viewed the most, but the ones over in the Bastine area and the Merkle/Big Island Bridge are also getting a lot of views. Much less interest in the Murrays/Bonies Mound area of the Flowage. Also starting to see more visitors coming from various email sites, so thanks to anybody who's been passing it along - share all you want, I don't have any extra costs for traffic.

I'm currently researching terms of use on various sources of map and/or aerial image graphics so I can add a graphical menu that lets you pick scenes by clicking icons on a map. Hopefully that will get done this weekend. Next time up, I'm planning to hit most of the remaining areas so that every part of the Flowage has at least some coverage. Later on, I'll throw in some fall colors and winter views.

[BlueRanger]

It now has an aerial image with most of the scene locations indicated by icons so you can click a dot and see that scene. You can zoom in or out and adjust how much of the screen it uses or click it on/off. I had some issues with accurately positioning the icons, but I'm working on that with the company that provides the tour viewer hosting and hopefully they'll be able to do something.

Well over 700 unique visitors as of today! I'm glad people are enjoying it.

http://tours.grandviewvirtual.com/12204

[Hot Runr Guy]

Blue,
You've done a great job with this project, for those of us that can only get to the TFF once a year, your efforts are much appreciated. I'm most familiar with the Big water/dam/powerlines/pink rock regions, your panoramic of the powerlines must have been taken late last year, when the water level was even lower than it is now? We fish that bay and northern shoreline just east/SE of there, I can't ever remember seeing that much "beach". WOW!
Thanks, HRG

[George]

Thanks for all your efforts Blue. These are just awesome!

[BlueRanger]

These are the panoramas George sent this winter that got me interested in doing this:

http://www.utah3d.net

HRG, I shot all the scenes this spring. Springstead Landing and a couple others were taken opening weekend. When I was up the third week of May, I took one afternoon and drove around and did all the other landings, the falls and the scenes off Popkos Circle road, and I shot all the scenes north and east of Baraboo while I was fishing that week. I did the ones from Baraboo to Bastine on Memorial Day weekend. I still need a few from the south end and the area east of Big Island.

[Ruff Fish]

Wow! Blue....

That is awesome! Some of my favorite places in the world you've got there. :)

I just bought the Haven by the Falls, so I'm too busy working to get to see all of my favorite spots....so I enjoy this even more than I would have in the past.

Thanks!