I’d like to add to this discussion. I’ve been using Panox v2 on Google Maps for a while now, and I’ve recently been uploading the same 360 streetview videos at 1 or 2 fps to Mapillary.
I upload the videos without any major problems, but Mapillary, unlike Google, I believe isn’t capable of, or doesn’t have the technology, smoothing videos with gyroscope data.
So I’m wondering, and I’m asking you, is there a way to externally smooth videos before uploading them to Mapillary to avoid seasickness for viewers?
PS. I noticed that Mapillary has an interesting feature: the play button to activate automatic navigation. It would be great if it could be activated for both forward and backward navigation. Currently, it only moves forward based on the direction the camera is recording. Let me explain: if you’re recording downhill on a trail, you can’t automatically see it going uphill. The play function only works from the beginning of the video, not from the end, for example.
Thanks for sharing this! Can you explain more about what you mean by “seasickness” - looking at that capture it looks pretty good. Maybe you can share the Google version for comparison?
In terms of the play button, you’re right that it only works going forward at the moment (however it does work from any point in the capture, not just from the beginning)
It works both ways. Just press Shift+D (when the image window is in focus). For D as in direction.
Press <space> to play. You can also frame-step with Alt+↑ and Alt+↓.
Btw, technically the does not navigate, it traverses or plays a sequence.
This feature is called “horizon leveling”. GoPro MAX and MAX2 cameras support it in software using data from the inertial measurement unit (basically an accelerometer and gyroscope in one). If your camera does not support horizon leveling there is another, more traditional way, to achieve the same effect: use a mechanical or electric gimbal. Mechanical gimbals usually work best because they do not rely on batteries and do not suffer from latency effects. On the other hand, electric gimbals enable users to setup and lock a specific camera pose or can enable automatic subject tracking if needed.
Digital horizon leveling works but it suffers from huge image information (or quality) losses. For best results, use a mechanical gimbal.
Horizon leveling in‑post without IMU data is very difficult to do because you have to analyze the image content to find out where the horizon is. Furthermore, IMU metadata in videos has not been standardized. Hence, mapping platforms would need to implement camera vendor specific code paths to enable horizon leveling for every possible camera. This is a tradeoff of economy. Exif 2.31 has added the CameraElevationAngle tag that together with the GPSImgDirection tag (and provided that they are almost perfectly correct) could indeed enable simple horizon leveling in‑post. However, very few cameras actually write these Exif tags. If you really care about horizon leveling in your imagery then it is recommended that you use a gimbal.
does not navigate, it traverses or plays a sequence.