30 July 2010

A Smoother Street View

New street-level imaging software developed by Microsoft could help people find locations more quickly on the Web. The software could also leave new space for online advertising. Services like Google Street View and Bing Streetside instantly teleport Web surfers to any street corner from Tucson to Tokyo. However, the panoramic photos these services offer provide only a limited perspective. You can't travel smoothly down a street.

Instead, you have to jump from one panoramic ‘bubble’ to the next--not the ideal way to identify a specific address or explore a new neighborhood. Microsoft researchers have come up with a refinement to Bing Streetside called Street Slide. It combines slices from multiple panoramas captured along a stretch of road into one continuous view. This can be viewed from a distance, or ‘smooth scrolled’ sideways.

More information:

http://www.technologyreview.com/web/25880/