Whether the uncanny valley is the right metaphor, or seeing a dog walking, something still feels weird about seeing store interiors on Google Street View. I’m sure that’ll change, and one day we’ll all be holoshopping without ever leaving our pods, our purchases delivered by robot Google vans, and people will struggle to remember the last time they even looked at the Street View part of Street View, much less actually went anywhere.
But that day is not yet. And the workings of Store View are still odd and/or unknown, and thus interesting. For example, here is the Levi’s store on West 34th St, tweeted by @ManBartlett.
Maybe the making of is interesting only in contrast to the entire concept of a surfable depopulated chain store filled with mountains of indistinguishable jeans. Or is it just me? Can you barely contain your excitement for the day when you can virtually fall into all 5,000 Gaps?
Anyway, let’s look around. They have image date now [Feb. 2012]. Is that new? Obviously, with high merchandise turnover, you’d want to keep that relatively fresh. Store View will become just one more monthly/seasonal expense for a retailer. I see they don’t blur the faces of either the models or the mannequins. It’d be kind of cooler if they did. Even ironically?
Or better if the Street View blur turned up in someone’s IRL in-store/ad campaign. Oh, damn, there’s your pitch right there, creative director: some street style photoblogger is “captured” at work by the GSV car. A Street [View] style blog. BAM. Embed those shoots all over town. A viral bonanza.
Look at me, revolutionizing advertising when I’m supposed to be reviewing pano stitching algorithms. These panos sure are distortion-free. A major advance? The benefit of shooting undisturbed in ideal conditions? Hey, what’s that at the bottom of the picture up there? A tripod leg.
And here’s the whole, stitched thing. That is very nice. Here it is again, this time with a shadow.
This is not a camera on wheels. It’s on the tripod, single vantage point for every pano, operator out of the way. That’s why there are no distortions. And the only evidence of the process is the legs.
Which, again, are rather nice. Kind of kaleidoscopic, with a blend of in-focus tips and blurry legs. Soon enough, these Matrix deja vu cat-level distortions will disappear, and the differences between real and virtual will be mistaken for mist, or heat waves rising from the sidewalk.
Zooming right into Grotjahn country here. This is sweet. Looks like this pano sphere has maybe 48 slices, each 7.5 degrees? In satelloonmaking, they’re called gores. What do they call them in panoramic photos?
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the making of, by greg allen