Some smart folks over at the University of Washington (go Huskies!) have figured out how to recognize, interpolate and stitch together 3D scenery from the large body of on-line photos that we all post. The system can identify the vantage points of photos, and integrate them into a 3D walk through animation of a scene.
So in the video below, all those tourist photos of the Pantheon in Rome are stitched together to show you external views from in front of the building, then they take you
through the door, and spin around 360 degrees inside of the building. All with pre-shot photos from many different sources.
This is truly amazing to watch, and it somehow makes all those Flickr photo albums suddenly seem...so useful.
[youtube]gLLzV5qeKyk[/youtube]
I'm not sure if this is directly related to the
Photosynth project, but the U did work with Microsoft Research on this.
I imagine this will all someday be integrated into Virtual Earth and Google Maps. You'll be able tour the Vatican on your mobile phone from your bed in a hotel room in Rome. Why fight the crowds?
