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Apple's forgotten virtual-reality project QuickTime VR

businessinsider.com

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Re: Apple's forgotten virtual-reality project QuickTime VR

#31

Post by Adaptive »

In 1996-97 I was working at an anthropology center in Thailand. I was using quicktime VR to capture the interiors Thai temples and cultural heritage objects in 3d. We used a gigantic pivoting rig for the large objects.

This was all on film cameras (nikons). We had film scanners (and film printers for creating presentations), the works (a special tripod head was used for the interior shots).

This was back when you had to use MPW (mac programmers workbench) to do the actual stitching.

I'm sure all those photos are sitting in some government office still (or maybe in that center) and could even be reprocessed today, in a MUCH easier manner.

Re: Apple's forgotten virtual-reality project QuickTime VR

#32

Post by azinman2 »

micheljansen wrote: post #6
dingo_bat wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that true? I've always associated Quicktime with lag and bugs. Also, one of the rare instances of non-driver software causing BSODs, which is quite a mean feat.

On Windows it's always been terrible. The Mac frameworks are pretty solid.

Guessing you never directly programmed such frameworks. Back in the day, writing multimedia for Windows was a nightmare... especially if you wanted to do things like play multiple videos in sync with a common master clock. QuickTime was the only way to do it reasonably.

Re: Apple's forgotten virtual-reality project QuickTime VR

#34

Post by modfodder »

dingo_bat wrote: post #13
shiggerino wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't even remember ever being able to seek in a Windows Media file without breaking the entire playback. Never had any problems like that with QuickTime.

>I can't even remember ever being able to seek in a Windows Media file without breaking the entire playback. What's that got to do with Quicktime?

I believe he is implying that Quicktime was the only app/codec/container that allowed the user to stop, rewind, fast forward, jump around in the clip without the app completely failing. As a video editor for the past 26 years, that has been my experience. Every other video playback app/container that I've used (on both Windows and Mac) failed at treating a clip in a non-linear manner. My current preference is still for Quicktime 7, the utility knife for video playback (even more so than VLC in my experience).

Re: Apple's forgotten virtual-reality project QuickTime VR

#36

Post by zcmncbv »

yardie wrote: post #26
panglott wrote: post #22

Played around with panoramic QuickTime circa 2001-2002, after I got my first iBook. QuickTime was great on Mac, but man, (perhaps unless you spent a lot of money on photo-editing software) stitching those photos together was a bear.

$50 would have gotten you GraphicConverter, the utility knife of anything related to images. I used it to stitch photos together way back in the 90s. To most people $800 Photoshop was the only hammer they knew.

oh man GraphicConverter was awesome!

Re: Apple's forgotten virtual-reality project QuickTime VR

#38

Post by aaronwidd »

There was a brief time when QuickTime VR and photo stitching were considered essential skills for anyone getting into digital media.

The use cases for it in web projects turned out pretty limited after the novelty wore off though. Quickly narrowed down to mostly real estate and automotive demos. But some companies in manufacturing and science I think really relied on the tech in their digital sales materials for a long time.

Re: Apple's forgotten virtual-reality project QuickTime VR

#39

Post by Keyframe »

buttcoin wrote: post #23
Keyframe wrote: post #8

Quicktime VR found its niche later on. There were camera attachments for 360 lens "simulations" where you could shoot a scene and have it in QTVR. There were postcards (physical with CDs) with those. I remember this though https://vimeo.com/97806117 which was more of a VR. We even had stereo glasses on workstations. There was also IO Glasses, later on, for PCs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbNUIwi5F6g This was mor…

I spent a lot of time in late 99-2001 playing around with some of the prototypes IPIX was working on at the time. They had some of the best 360 stitched photography i'd ever seen, they'd built a quasi in-expensive adaptor for the Nikon cameras (The model that twisted in the middle), and were prototyping some really awesome 360 video tech. I think the best video I saw was a prototype helmet they'd put on users, allowi…

I presume people from those companies, for the most part, went on to build (together) similar stuff in bigger companies like Google once their initial companies folded.

Re: Apple's forgotten virtual-reality project QuickTime VR

#40

Post by vitd »

aaronwidd wrote: post #38

There was a brief time when QuickTime VR and photo stitching were considered essential skills for anyone getting into digital media. The use cases for it in web projects turned out pretty limited after the novelty wore off though. Quickly narrowed down to mostly real estate and automotive demos. But some companies in manufacturing and science I think really relied on the tech in their digital sales materials for a lo…

There were some interesting games that used it. I think the 3rd Journeyman Project used either QTVR or some other similar technology. And didn't the Myst series eventually switch to something like that in later games?
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