When an astonishing Gigapan image shot atop the Freedom Tower at One World Trade Center hit the Internet recently, few probably realized the massive undertaking that was required to capture this suddenly iconic image.
In a remarkable making-of video Time's Senior Editor of Photo & Interactive, Jonathan D. Woods explains how the partnership between Time and Gigapan started with sketches on bar napkins and soon grew into a multi-state engineering challenge focused on capturing a panoramic image despite the physical and meteorological challenges present at the top of the building's spire.
He also explains how the image took its inspiration from a famous photograph by Joe McNally that featured a worker at dusk changing the light bulb on the Empire State Building while the Twin Towers stood in the background.
The effort to create the image could have been all for naught, as Woods explained that the team’s first real-world test atop a bridge in Portland failed to capture any images.
Luckily the bugs were worked out of the system in time for the scheduled shoot and the crews took to the spire — a climb that induces vertigo even from watching the video — in favorable weather and captured what is likely to remain for some time as the most detailed photograph from the top of One World Trade Center.
Over the course of five hours a Canon 5D Mark II with 100mm lens captured 567 photos that were stitched together to produce the final image.
Time's "The Top of America" site includes a look at the ironworkers (many of whom are the children of those that constructed the Twin Towers) and includes a documentary on their efforts and more background on the meaning and emotions behind the contraction of the Freedom Tower.
See the image and read the full story on Time.com.
Frankly, I do not understand the big deal here...seems like the shots around and of the tower are more interesting than the the footage from the tower itself, IMO!
Amateur Hour Central? I mean.... these folks spend a fortune on making some super-duper crane rig, take it atop a bridge in Portland, Oregon, take maybe hundreds of digital photographs to the flash card -- only to find out AFTER they had climbed back down that they had gotten a bum card and recorded absolutely nothing?
Quick, isn't one of the great things in shooting DIGITAL is that you can see what you had just shot in an instant? Without having to send the stuff to the lab and all that?
A classic case of the gear outsmarting the people who are trying to reign it in. Should have kept it simple and you would have gotten your pix first time out, huh?
I've taken 1000+ shot Gigapans and it didn't take 5 hours. I think the 5 hour shot the article was referring to was the one taken on the Oregon bridge. 560 images should have just taken about 75 minutes or so, not including moving the rig.
Incredible., 99,999999999% of us all here will never, NEVER make such a photo in their life.
This is so difficult to make that everyone who never made a gigapano must only look at it in absolute adoration. The result is marvelous, great.
Only one thing puzzles me; after so much preparation i should have taken a high resolutiuon camera like a a Nikon D800, it would have even been sharper.
I thought the same thing about the camera choice, but the proof is in the pudding, as they say. The Gigapan speaks volumes on the quality of the equipment. The Canon is 21 MP so there's not THAT MUCH of a difference between 21 and 36 MP. I was thinking maybe he should have used a 200mm lens instead though. It probably would have taken too long though and the lighting would have changed too much.
How refreshing to read comments pages on DPR where just about everyone is positive and no endless bickering technoposts. Obviously this image was such an achievement it is beyond critique. Marvellous work.
Critic isn't negative but purely positive by its content, but it isn't hyping or praising by default, but neither it isn't bashing or pointing weaknesses or comparing to others.
Giving critic is much harder than what most people even imagine, why people falsely believe critic is negative by its core and element, but today on era (lasted decades) negativity sell and people starts thinking first negatively and expect negativity from critic.
Why is it "Top of the World" and not "Top of Western Hemisphere"? It's by far not the tallest building on earth.
Everyday I see 1WTC from my home across Hudson and it still amazes me how they managed to commemorate such a tragedy with such a bland, ungraceful and uninspiring slab of modern architecture that also inexplicably looks unfinished because of an abrupt top. And it took them more than 10 years to design and build it. One only needs to check modern Shanghai and Dubai skyline to see how unoriginal and disappointing this building is. And that in the city graced with Chrysler building and other Art Deco needles. Heck, if you want modern just near by there's an amazing New York By Gehry residential tower (http://img.streeteasy.com/nyc/image/66/70473966.jpg).
I do agree with some of your opinions - and they are fair game given the context - but I think most of the emphasis might be better placed in criticism addressing the photograph(s).
As you said: GRACED Against: ERECTED. Technology has replaced taste. I was on the phone with my good old friend Kong. He wants his next movie to be shot either at Dubai, Kuala Lumpur or Shanghai.
Maybe part of the design has to do with the likelihood that a lot of security has been built into the structure, since it is a top target for terrorists.
The irony is that Americans actually believe they have freedom... "One World", yeah right, this building is a great way to stick it in the face of the rest of the world that the Wall Street bankers enslave the world via the One Bank.
Every monument encodes a trope of symbolism; many great Christian European structures might well be parsed based upon politics (injustice, oppression, etc.), yet we, as humans, are able to appreciate such structures multiple-dimensionally, not limited to a moral judgements. Assuming one might agree with your criticism as to this construction, that certainly does not invalidate unrelated dimensions of appreciation. Scale, as a prominent characteristic, may inspire wonder in the general scope of human ambition and technological possibilities. This can be appreciated in the absence of oppressive symbolism.
Sure but they could have chosen a better location for a building purportedly celebrating "freedom" than ground zero for the global debt slavery racketeering cartel, which is now much more powerful than it was in 2001.
It's "One World Trade Center", as in the primary building of a complex proposed in the 40s, originally built in the 60s and 70s, and recently rebuilt. But go ahead and intentionally misinterpret the name.
The bankers took over in 1913 when the Federal Reserve was created. That's what the bankers want, "One World" to enslave.
America is not a democracy, that is a facade to present the appearance that you actually have some choice in how your country is managed. You have a 2 party dictatorship. You do have some local municipal democracy though.
I always get a kick out of people trying to defend their slavery and telling themselves that they live in democracy. It's kind of like the Stockholm Syndrome.
Crazy this only has only 30-something comments after 12 hours while a new camera can have thousands. Shows we care far more about gear than photography on this site. This is an amazing piece of work and something none of us could ever hope to photograph. Sad more people don't appreciate it on a site that is frequented by photographers.
This really is a nice gigapan. Makes my 90mpxl images stitched from my old FZ20 look a little cheezy in comparison. ;^)
For those wondering why they used X camera instead of a possibly better & camera, I'm guessing it was dependent on compatibility of accessories and applications needed to accomplish the task efficiently.
I spend hours looked at the one from the top of Tokyo Tower. In comparison, this one look very noisy. Doesn't look like anything from a 5D Mk2 at all! Why?
The quality of this image is far superior to that Tokyo image. The Tokyo image was plagued with stitching errors that you did not have to zoom in on. I found one in this image and it appeared to be different exposures and time of the day. Nice image and good work. This photographer spent time on this image to make sure it was done correctly.
Incredible. Seeing the on the spire and sitting on the edge, I was feeling physically ill. I was more tense than during a big quake, and that's just viewing the footage. Don't think heights are my thing, terrifying. They did a terrific job, and the outcome is certainly something to be seen.
See Genesis 11:1-9. Lo and behold, the contractors, sponsors, and martyrs squabble over their "cut." The duped taxpayers will pick up the tab for office space that can't be rented at rates that cover the costs. But maybe some nice gorilla will come along and build a nest at the top.
I don't understand why people are talking about a Nikon D800 as a much higher resolution. Why not a medium format camera? That would be far more detail per image. The Hasselblad H5D-200MS is 50 MP and has a 3.7 x 4.9 cm sensor. If you're going through all the effort to get up there with a camera rig, why not go all the way. And if you're going to use a Canon 5D, why not use the Mark III?
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