Thursday, September 24, 2009
On May 20, 2009, former NASA astronaut and Ames Research
Center employee Scott Parazynski
became the first person to have been to space and to climb to the summit of Mount Everest. On his way to the summit Parazynski was
able to capture several photographic panoramas from record-setting heights.
An avid climber, Parazynski's main goal was to scale the
majestic mountain. However, on his way up, Parazynski also captured two GigaPan
panoramic images. He used a GigaPan Epic, a precision robotic camera mount that
allows a series of finely coordinated high-resolution images to be taken of a
large expanse of scenery. After the images were taken, special software
stitched them together to form one dynamic panoramic image containing millions
of pixels in breathtaking detail. To see these images, visit: http://www.gigapan.org.
GigaPan Imager taking a panorama at Camp II on Mt. Everest. Credit: Scott Parazynski
Keith Cowing was stationed at Everest Base Camp for a month
so as to collect and relay Parazynski's progress to friends and followers.
Cowing and Parazynski are both members of the Board of Directors of the Challenger Center
for Space Science Education (http://www.challenger.org)
headquartered in Alexandria,
Va. To read more about their
expedition, visit: http://www.onorbit.com/everest.
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GigaPan cameras stitch together many high-resolution images to create a dense panorama that can be explored by zooming in on an area of interest.Go here to see the GigaPan image.
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GigaPan was developed by Carnegie
Mellon University
in collaboration with the NASA
Ames Research
Center's Intelligent
Robotics Group, with support from Google, to create high-resolution panoramic
images. GigaPan Systems was established in 2008 to bring this powerful,
high-resolution imaging capability to a broad audience as a commercial spin-off.
Original
article with interactive GigaPan images at Everest
SOURCE: NASA
