PhotoSynth - The Landscape of Photography is about to Change

Two years ago, I was blown away by the demonstration I saw during a visit to the Microsoft campus of the PhotoSynth application. I wanted so much to get my hands on it.

Then, when speaking this past July at the Microsoft Pro Photo Summit, they announced it would be coming out this Fall. I was SO excited to get my hands on it.

Now, they've announced its' available immediately for you to use with your own images.

So, what do their Terms of Use say?

(Continued after the Jump)

In relevant part to rights:

Except for material that we license to you, we do not claim ownership of the materials you post or provide on the service, and you reserve all other rights (including copyrights) in your materials. However, with respect to content you post or provide you grant to those members of the public to whom you have granted access (for content posted on shared and private areas of the service) or to the public (for content posted on public areas of the service) free, unlimited, worldwide, and nonexclusive permission to:

use, modify, copy, distribute and display the content solely in connection with the service;
publish your name in connection with the content; and
grant these rights to others.
These rights do not allow Microsoft or anyone else to use your materials separate from the service. The service may enable you to include licenses that allow Microsoft or third parties to use your materials separate from the service, but such licenses are not applicable to use of your materials in connection with the service. Microsoft is not responsible for third parties violating the license you provide.

All rights granted herein terminate when you remove your content from the service.

Whew! That last sentence is especially positive. It's clear here that Microsoft wants to share whatever you create on PhotoSynth, but not trample on your rights.

Sadly, I am stuck for the next few days in the Baltics, with a very slow internet connection, or I'd be uploading images right now. They've got a blog here, and you can begin to set up an account and work with it here.

I had expected I could download an application, and synth the photos locally, but that's not the case. I hope that will the case in the future. Speaking of the future, If you saw Blade Runner, this technology might look familiar - Deckard used something very similar in the movie - hit this link to see the segment that's on YouTube about it. Strange to see movies predict the future, except that PhotoSynth is so much more!

The application requires Windows, and, thanks to my trusty Parallelsapplication, I can use it within a window on my Mac.

Since July, I've been dreaming of ways to use this application to serve my clients with an immersive experience either of what I do, or what their product or service does for the public. I see the landscape of photography and its' experiential nature changing as a result of PhotoSynth - photography will be much more interactive, and this will give viewers/users an experience that video cannot, because the user can explore within the scene - a radical new concept.

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