Drew Steedly and Joshua Podolak on Photosynth

Posted By: Dan Fernandez | Sep 2nd, 2008 @ 9:41 AM | 53,375 Views | 3 Comments

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PhotoSynth is a technology that automatically combines 2D photos into an immersive 3D environment.

In this interview, we talk to Drew Steedly and Joshua Podolak.

Drew helped develop the "synther" which takes hundreds of images and combines them into a synth. He walks through how they use parallelism and sparse solver equations to optimize synths.

Joshua helped develop the "viewer", the client application that you use to navigate a Photosynth. He discusses how they use JSON for metadata, how they use the synther point cloud to do random sampling to project images in a 3D plane and how the goal of the viewer is to provide an intuitive UX for end users.

Tag: PhotoSynth

Rating:

Bas
It finds lightbulbs.

Is it just me, or is it next to impossible to hear what Drew is saying?

Dan

In reply to Bas

#Sep 3rd, 2008 @ 2:58 PM

Yeah, for some reason, the audio on this came out really bad. I think perhaps Drew's mic had died in-between the other interviews on Photosynth.

JoshRoss
JoshRoss

The camera also seems to focus on the chalkboard. Here is a tip, turn off autofocus and zoom in on your subject. When you have them in frame, set your focus. After it is set you can zoom out and it will stay in focus.

And, if you guys are going to use the surface computer as an ottoman, I'll trade you for it.