
What a 600,000-megapixel-wide picture looks like - lukedeering
http://www.oddly-even.com/2013/07/31/the-largest-photo-ever-taken-of-tokyo-is-zoomable-and-it-is-glorious/
======
lukashed
I know this is evil and you should not do it, but just for the doability,
here's a JavaScript that removes the censorings (like
[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-154....](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-154.2,18.4,1)):

javascript:$("*").filter(function(){if(this.currentStyle)return
this.currentStyle["backgroundImage"]==="url([http://360gigapixels.com/black.png)";else](http://360gigapixels.com/black.png\)";else)
if(window.getComputedStyle)return
document.defaultView.getComputedStyle(this,null).getPropertyValue("background-
image")==="url([http://360gigapixels.com/black.png)"}](http://360gigapixels.com/black.png\)"})).remove()

~~~
lukashed
Oh and btw, they even show us where the censored parts are:
[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/tokyo.xm...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/tokyo.xml) (four nodes of type hotspot)

~~~
deanclatworthy
It seems odd they'd take this approach as opposed to manual processing of the
output tiles.

------
taspeotis
Honestly I thought I was going to see some visualisation of a 1px high image
vs. various other long things. E.g. " At a pixel density of 330ppi this image
would be longer than 1000 Starship Enterprises* ". Alas, no.

> What a 600,000 megapixels wide picture looks like (oddly-even.com) 23 points
> by lukedeering 1 hour ago | flag | 12 comments

Megapixel: I do not think it means what you think it means.

> A megapixel (MP or Mpx) is one million pixels [1]

600,000 * 1,000,000 = 600,000,000,000

> The largest photo ever taken of Tokyo is ... 600,000 pixels wide [2]

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixel#Megapixel](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixel#Megapixel)

[2] [http://www.oddly-even.com/2013/07/31/the-largest-photo-
ever-...](http://www.oddly-even.com/2013/07/31/the-largest-photo-ever-taken-
of-tokyo-is-zoomable-and-it-is-glorious/)

*I wouldn't mind knowing how many Starship Enterprises a 600,000 megapixel wide picture would be if viewed at a pixel density of 330ppi.

~~~
anonymouz
We have 600 * 10^9 pixels, at 330ppi resolution this would correspond to 1.828
* 10^9 inches, or 4.618 * 10^7m, i.e., about 46200km.

Now, there are different Starship Enterprises of somewhat varying lengths, but
let's take NCC 1701-D, because that's the first one I found data on. Wikipedia
puts its length at 642.5m [1]. Thus, it ould be about 71880 Starship
enterprises for the given length (not accounting for any other dimensions of
course).

More interesting, it's a bit more than the circumference of Earth (~40000km).

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Enterprise_%28NCC-1701-D%2...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Enterprise_%28NCC-1701-D%29)

~~~
skrebbel
I'm really interested as to why you two consider a _fictional space ship_ a
good "underbelly feeling" measure of size. I like Star Trek, but I have
absolutely no feeling for the size of the Enterprise. I'd believe it if you
said it was 3km long, but also if you said that it was 400m long.

Not meant as a harsh criticism though, I like the math and the geekiness :)

~~~
incision
Different spatial intelligence?

Personally, I'd say I have a better feeling for "starship enterprises" or
"battroids" [0] in terms of length or height than the ubiquitous "football
fields" or "empire state buildings".

Both those fictional measures are things I've visualized being inside of or
next to countless times. I can't say the same about the other two.

0:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VF-1_Valkyrie#Battroid_mode](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VF-1_Valkyrie#Battroid_mode)

------
deletes
A similar thing done with London.
[http://btlondon2012.co.uk/pano.html](http://btlondon2012.co.uk/pano.html)

Also funny:[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=60.1,...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=60.1,24.8,1)

Playing a table-top game:[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=66.3,...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=66.3,31.3,1)

Baseball:[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=89.1,...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=89.1,21.2,1)

~~~
boyter
Heh, I was going to post the Thomas the tank engine shot.

[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=60.3,...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=60.3,27.5,1)

There is another train on the track.

[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-127....](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-127.6,14.9,1)

Here is a Ferrari (California I think) for anyone interested. The amount of
details you can pick up is pretty amazing.

------
aquarin
Hum, a lonely head :) [http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-0.5,...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-0.5,27.1,1)

------
emhart
DON'T you! Forget about me!

[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-.4,2...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-.4,24,1)

DON'T DON'T DON'T DON'T!

------
nakedrobot2
Hi, I'm the photographer who made this image.

Thank you for all the attention :-) Let me try to answer some of your
questions, in no particular order:

1) Here is the original page: [http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-photo/) also here is a
youtube screen capture showing a few highlights, if you are feeling lazy ;)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NboCijiLwmI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NboCijiLwmI)

2) it is not 600,000 megapixels. It is 600,000 pixels wide. If you are
calculating it as a full sphere, then it's 180 gigapixels. But there is a
black space on the bottom so we are calling it 150 gigapixels.

3) Yes we have censored a few things in the image which might be embarrassing
to those people involved. Most of those things would not be embarrassing in
other cultures (I think) such as a woman hanging laundry, but Japan is
"different". Per the request of journalists at Asahi Shimbun who published a
story about it there, we covered up a few bits in the photo. Oh, and the guy
sleeping on the ground? Well that's embarrassing anywhere. Poor fellow
probably did not expect to be famous on the internet as he lay down on the
bench to sleep, fell off the bench, and kept on sleeping. (Side note:
apparently in Tokyo it is fully acceptable to sleep it off on the street or in
a park - it is a _safe_ place! Well, if you're male...)

4) Yes you can use your geek powers to uncover the censored bits and there are
already screenshots out there. Oh well. I did not actually see the whole image
before publishing it. It is just so big :)

5) Yes, I used a Canon 7D (best pixel density) and a 400mm L f/5.6 lens,
because that lens is great, sharp, and fit in my carryon - can't check camera
gear on the plane now, can we.

6) I used a Clauss Rodeon gigapixel robot to control the camera. It is still a
lot of work to set the speed and so on, don't think that this is a "set it and
forget it" kind of thing. The robot is moving continuously, and the camera is
focusing and shooting while moving. This is technologically amazing stuff, but
it takes a lot of tweaking to get it to work. In this case I was not
completely familiar with the equipment, and I made some mistakes. One section
of the image was stitched together from two entire sets of images shot on two
different days, in order to get a good alignment.

7) panning mode: we use the "original QTVR style" of navigation, which also
used in first-person games. This lets you hold the mouse button down and
"glide around". I find this vastly preferable to the click-drag-click-drag-
click-drag google style. On touch screens, the movement follows your finger
which is more intuitive generally. I've seen a five year old navigate these
panoramas on an ipad with no problem. On the PC with a mouse there is not
really "one right way".

8) Yes, I also made the "London 320 gigapixel" image, which is larger in terms
of pixels, but this one is FAR more interesting in my opinion, and overall
much better quality. If you're interested in seeing some of my other large
images, check these: Tokyo Roppongi Hills Mori Tower (shot the same week as
this one here) [http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-gigapixel-roppongi-hills-
mori...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-gigapixel-roppongi-hills-mori-tower/)
[http://360cities.net/library](http://360cities.net/library) Strahov Library
interior, 40 gigapixels. [http://360gigapixels.com/petrin-prague-
photo](http://360gigapixels.com/petrin-prague-photo) Prague from petrin tower,
34 gigapixels [http://360cities.net/london](http://360cities.net/london)
London 80 gigapixels

If anyone has any other questions, I'm here, and happy to answer them. I'll
try to check back often for the next hours. Cheers!

~~~
replax
Hi! Thanks a lot for makeing the Image, truly a great piece!

I have a question, actually concerning the mori tower building: Where did you
take it from? From the very top where you can go outside? Problem would be,
that you couldn't go to the very edge of the building, or were you somehow
able to?

And, do you maybe have a "behind the scenes" video of some sort, or just a few
shots showing how you are working :D?

Thanks

~~~
nakedrobot2
On the mori tower, I shot it from 4 points around the tower. Another commenter
sent a link to a panorama where I'm shooting one of the sections. I shot the
same on the other sie, and the other two sections were shot from the ends of
the building.

------
xj
Have a look at these two: fish-eye and reverse fish-eye views:

[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=108.9...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=108.9,90.0,94) [http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=108.9...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=108.9,-90.0,101)

------
julianpye
I love the fact that he has taken the photos with the 400mm/5.6, which is a
very affordable, lightweight, quite old lens that is supersharp.

------
gambiting
Is this a mini cemetery? Squished between tall buildings?

[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-296....](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-296.5,19.1,1)

~~~
knowaveragejoe
Indeed, they're quite common in Japanese cities.

------
OldSchool
First of all, this effort and its result are fanastic!

Question: how close are sensor densities getting to present capabilities of
glass in smartphones?

For example, if a 10 gigapixel (100000x100000) sensor existed that would fit
behind an iDevice's lens, how much digital zoom cropping would we really be
able to enjoy before we hit details that are bigger than pixels but smaller
than the tiny lens can pass clearly?

~~~
nakedrobot2
Hi OldSchool,

Thank you very much.

In terms of pixel density: You may have noticed that the "megapixel wars" have
pretty much stopped. And even the sensor that I've been using for nearly all
of my "world record sized" is the 18-megapixel APS-c (1.6X "crop") Canon
sensor (550D, 7D). The 7D is nearly 4 years old! Only in recent months has
Canon released a camera with smaller pixels (the 20 megapixel 70D). Why?

One major reason is that lenses can't resolve much more than this. Your 10
year old lens that was built for film might not yield any detail at 100% zoom.

Another reason is that they are hitting limits with the wavelength of light.
Correcting "chromatic aberration" on the sensor at this resolution is becoming
a major issue. Each RGB sensor on the camera responds to a range of
wavelengths, each one of which gets distorted differently. These all get mixed
together and it's definitely not possible to disentangle them. So, to some
degree, CA is impossible to fix completely.

These are large sensors and large, expensive lenses we are talking about here.
With smaller phone sensors and their tiny lenses, the problem is worse.
Looking at all phone photos, there isn't really anything interesting at 100%
zoom, I think you won't lose any detail at all if you make the photo 70% of
its original size.

To answer your question - it will take a great number of breakthroughs before
there is anything like a 10 gigapixel sensor, with a lens that can resolve
details for such a sensor.

~~~
cclogg
That is one of the cool things about 'film' I should add... large format film
has a crazy large megapixel equivalent.

This guy's blog post has some interesting information about it:
[http://genotypewritings.blogspot.com.au/2012/10/digital-
reso...](http://genotypewritings.blogspot.com.au/2012/10/digital-resolution-
is-higher-than-film.html)

------
cespare
These controls are obnoxious.

~~~
huhtenberg
It's the exact opposite on a touch device.

------
panic
This is a very sad-looking man: [http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-
panorama-photo/?v=-82.7...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-82.7,23.8,1)

Or maybe he's just sneezing?

~~~
deletes
Also sad: [http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=233.3...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=233.3,34.6,1)

------
aram
This is completely crazy; all these giga-pixel panoramas stun me with the
level of details.

Does anyone know any details about taking shots with such cameras? How much
time do they actually need to capture photos with such quality?

~~~
archivator
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5258896](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5258896)
is a comment from the creator of the BT London panorama.

~~~
aram
Thanks for the link

------
mischanix
A censored hotel bathroom: [http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-154....](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-154.2,18.4,1)

~~~
huhtenberg
Censored with a <div> overlay ;)

~~~
MojoJolo
Good catch right there. Removed the overlay and saw a man washing his hands in
a sink, and a woman sleeping.

------
jpalomaki
Sometimes in art galleries you see these very large photographs. I'm always
annoyed that these don't have all the details. If you look from far enough
they look nice, but once you go closer you see just the rasterization pattern.

I would like to see posters made out of these gigapixel images and printed
with such high quality that you could actually take a closer look and it would
reveal something new.

~~~
jdpage
> ... printed with such high quality that you could actually take a closer
> look and it would reveal something new.

Last time I was at the NC Museum of Art, they had on display a wall-sized
aerial composite photo of the grounds. Next to it was a box full of magnifying
glasses and a plaque inviting you to do exactly that.

------
ipodize
This guy seems to be taking a pic of his friend in fromt of the gigapixel rig:
[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=151.1...](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=151.1,19.0,1)

Really awesome panorama, makes you feel like some kind of government agent...

------
andreiursan
I expected to see more people in the picture. I hardly can find one. Maybe
they were edited out.

~~~
nakedrobot2
Nope, didn't edit anyone out.

There are actually lots of peoople in this one compared to other ones I've
done....

------
nkuttler
Years ago I built a site with iipimage,
[http://iipimage.sourceforge.net/demo/](http://iipimage.sourceforge.net/demo/).
I'm wondering if there are other tools around somebody here uses?

------
alternize
quite a few windows have a red triangle in them, f.e.
[http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-154....](http://360gigapixels.com/tokyo-tower-panorama-
photo/?v=-154.2,18.4,1)

what do they mean?

~~~
harisenbon
Emergency entrances for fire / rescue. You are not allowed to put anything in
front of those windows, so that firefighers know they can break those windows
to easily gain access to a building. They can then be used to help people
escape, or get more firefighers into the building.

~~~
alternize
i see, makes sense. thanks!

------
kordless
I'm amazed at how clean everything seems to be. Even the rooftops and gutters.

------
lukashed
I wouldn't be surprised if the NSA had this in live and for every major city.

------
dakrisht
Pretty cool. Now imagine the tools the NSA has, live satellite feeds and hi-
res cameras all over the US and the world with a bunch of Diet Coke drinking
zombies clicking, zooming and panning all day long.

~~~
shubb
Working with satellite data I can tell you that the maximum resolution data
you are likely to get from a satellite is 0.25m resolution (i.e. a pixel is
the size of a car wheel).

And that's talking about likely military satellites - the public are lucky to
get hold of 0.5m resolution.

Also, clouds get in the way. A lot.

For super high resolution imaginary like you are talking about, you need
something like the ARGOS system [1].

This image was made by a slowly automatically rotating camera, but the ARGOS
system seems to use a whole bunch of high resolution cameras, like a insects
eye.

The interesting thing about the ARGOS demo on NPR was the automatic object
tracking. The system can track cars, and people, as they move around. You
could go back through the data to follow a guy back to his house after he is
identified as planting a bomb. Or more HN, posting something from an internet
cafe.

I really think that, as technology makes pervasive surveillance possible, we
need laws to explicitly limit what the state or companies can do, at least
domestically.

It supprises me that people are so much more upset about the NSA gathering
data, given that they willingly gave it to ad networks that want to use it to
make bad decisions. The highest cost google ads are for loans, insurance, and
other services where the provider makes more money if the user makes an
inappropriate choice. Imagine if google put a googleX ARGOS on it's Loon
baloons, and found some way to monetize it. We really need laws in place to
stop anyone doing that.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGxNyaXfJsA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGxNyaXfJsA)
<\- skip to about 1:30

~~~
tomjen3
I assume that the government has better than normal classified satelite tech,
so how do you know what kinds of resolutions are possible?

~~~
maaku
Atmospheric effects. Atmospheric refraction adds significant noise, fully
obscuring features smaller than about 0.25 m.

Yes, ground telescopes have ways of cancelling out atmospheric effects, but
the required calibration and long exposure is impossible with the orbit of spy
satellites.

~~~
Someone
I don't think it takes long exposure. Ground-based telescopes can make the
simplifying assumption that they are looking at static point sources. That
makes it easier to correct for camera movement and for optical defects from
the lense and the atmosphere.

On the other hand, looking down is a bit easier than looking up because the
atmosphere will converge rays looking down, but diverge them looking up. See
[http://what-if.xkcd.com/32/](http://what-if.xkcd.com/32/).

That site also claims that others say Hubble is about as good as the best spy
satellites, resolution-wise.

~~~
maaku
Adaptive optics is far too complex to summarize in a HN comment:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_optics](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_optics)

Hubble _is_ of the best spy satellites. It was built by the same team that
builds spy satellites, using all the same parts and equipment, tested in the
same facilities, etc. It just has a slightly different secondary mirror setup
and a very different set of instruments and control mechanisms, since it's
meant to point at galaxies and do astronomy, not at the Earth doing
surveillance.

Seriously, one of the hardest parts of the Hubble program was figuring out how
to do it in the view of the public without revealing the underlying
surveillance programme.

------
gearoidoc
This is simply awesome.

------
Chucero
So enormous zoom technology, which is shown in all the movies, actually exist.
We just have to wait a little for 100GB+ machines to become mainstream.

------
doctorstupid
There must be someone spooky in that massive city who's looking directly at
the camera.

------
RogerL
Wow, everyone is wearing a white shirt and black pants. The iconoclasts wear
white pants.

------
porterhaney
Roof top smoking - [http://pandodaily.com/2013/08/02/why-slow-and-steady-is-
bett...](http://pandodaily.com/2013/08/02/why-slow-and-steady-is-better-for-a-
startup-than-growing-fast/)

~~~
cocoflunchy
I don't think that's the link you wanted to share ;)

------
visarga
There is varying resolution depending on depth in each point.

------
itissid
Now this would make for a very long find waldo game.

~~~
nakedrobot2
We did a number of licensing deals with pictures like this, involving a
"where's waldo"-type treasure hunt :)

------
Sami_Lehtinen
Strange, it crashes my FF every time.

~~~
cpeterso
Which Firefox version are you using? The website loads fine for me (on OS X)
in Firefox 24.0a2 (Aurora), but hangs Firefox 25.0a1 (Nightly). I filed a bug
here: [https://bugzil.la/901306](https://bugzil.la/901306)

------
JeroenRansijn
Absolutely mind boggling!

------
mtgx
Looks like a photosphere.

------
mikaelf
Almost like the Lumia 1020 :)

------
lukedeering
crazy

