3 ms·

very impressive! zero obfuscation though... How long until technology gets to the point where this can all be done in real time, giving powers that be absolute

• jacobolus 17y ago
  This resolution isn’t coming in real time any time soon (i.e. within the next 10 or 15 years), until we have cameras based on a different optical principle than a flat sensor with a set of glass lenses in front of it: Using the sizes of sensors we can currently manufacture for any reasonable kind of price, we can take a picture of this resolution with each exposure having about a maximum of about a 20 degree field of view. And since current sensors are not all that far off of saturating the detail that lenses can resolve, the only way to improve this will be either to make larger sensors, use arrays of cameras (or turn the cameras around very quickly), or use some other kind of optical system. In not too long, I suppose we might be able to capture data continuously, as a video, and then use software (computationally expensive fancy math) to increase the resolution beyond that in any particular frame. But that's still not going to get us close to 18 gigapixel spherical panoramas.
  • Semiapies 17y ago
    Especially considering something like this takes lots of time just to take the stills. (For instance, on the Dresden panorama linked elsewhere on this page, if you look along the bridge on the left side, you can see two different appearances by the same woman cycling.) Real-time at this quality is a very long way away.