Happy December!
We are happy to start this month by featuring an impressive virtual tour built by Lauri Veerde for Tallinn University in Estonia.
Once you step inside you are greeted with a beautiful aerial shot of the campus. The interface (skin) is minimal and the custom hotspots are brilliant. Hovering over them will fill the hotspot with an image and title of where that hotspot is pointing.
I reached out to Lauri to ask him to provide a little info about the project:
The virtual tour of Tallinn University consists of 30 equirectangular panoramas. 1 panorama is shot using a drone. 4 panoramas are shot using a monopod. In 4 panoramas you can see pinned and aligned video (movement inside the photo).
The opening aerial view was shot using a DJI Inspire 1 (with Zenmuse X3) with a total of 21 exposure bracketed images.
You can also see excellent examples of aligned video, too, of which Lauri explains:
From a technical point of view the most challenging part in creating this tour was the pinned and aligned videos - simply because I had not used this technique before. I did not make any tests implementing the video inside panoramas - I just hoped my experience would not fail me. Well it almost did, because later I found out that the movements did not loop so well and the videos were shot with an angle that was almost too wide to stitch. So next time I shoot videos for this kind of work, I will remember to carefully plan the movements of people so the video will be perfectly loop-able.
Lauri brought up a few good points here — to remember to plan the videos for looping and that aligning video can be challenging. So, if you’re looking to include aligned video in your tours, take the time to test it out.
One panorama, The Sound Studio, uses pinned video, aligned video and directional sound.
Another example of aligned video is found in the Ground Floor of the Silva building.
When asked what is his favorite panorama in the tour he mentioned the Ceremonial Hall:
One my favourite panoramas in this tour is the Ceremonial hall because of the captured moment when the graduate, holding a yellow flower, photographed his friend. I have found it is more satisfying for me not to arrange the shoots but to wait for things to happen naturally and try to capture this perfect moment.
We hope you will take the time to check out Lauri’s project and will find some inspiration. You will find more of his work on his website: http://www.tuur.ee.