Illiastra Panoramic Camera System

Today I am going to cover a new fun and innovative HUD but before I do that, I just wanted to mention that the location that I chose to take today’s 360 Panoramic picture at is the beautiful sim, It All Starts with a Smile by Kaelyn Alecto. If you decide to visit the sim, please know that there is a sim contest going on for Autumn with all sorts of prizes so don’t forget to enter it! You’ll find all of the details on Kaelyn’s flickr.

Now on to the reason for this post. I wanted to talk to you guys about Panoramic 360 Photos and Videos. Draxtor Despres is about to release a video next week that will be a 360 panoramic video on youtube. Youtube has had these kinds of videos since 2015. Basically it means we can use our phones or the mouse on our computers to scroll or slide through the video in order to see the whole scene.

Now in June of 2016, Facebook introduced 360 images on their site, which I’m sure you’ve seen your friends posting. It’s pretty much the same idea, giving your friends the options to scroll or slide through your image so they can get a look at your whole scene.

Since this have been so popular in the real world, now it’s being brought into Second Life. I will discuss how to do videos once Draxtor gets his video up and I do a detailed blog post about that. Today I’m going to show you how you can create your own 360 Panoramic photos in Second Life and then upload them to Facebook to share with your friends with a new HUD that’s hit the grid called the Panoramic Camera System by Illiastra.

You can watch my video on youtube where I show you how to use this HUD and upload your panoramic picture to facebook, but I will also type out the instructions below the video: https://youtu.be/0tl1wVQhkeA

Illiastra also has a detailed playlist of youtube videos that show you how to do this same process and even more with better details so you might also want to watch that.

The first part of using this HUD is taking the pictures within Second Life. Here are the steps to do that:

1. You need to remove all of your attachments and wear the alpha body mask it comes with so you are completely invisible.
2. If you have a windlight with moving clouds, make sure to freeze the clouds by locking the scroll.
3. Attach the Panoramic Camera System HUD and click the start 360 button to start the capture process and you will now see on your screen what the panoramic camera is seeing.
4. Now you can start taking the pictures. You need to press Ctrl-tilde to take the snapshots. So press the control button and hold it down while you press the tilde button which you should be able to find right underneath your escape key on your keyboard.
5. Once you’ve captured the first image, press the right arrow on the HUD and click over and take the next image. You do this 8 times.
6. Once you’ve taken all 8 images and come back all the way around, you’re done with the capture process and you just click the stop 360 button on the HUD.

The second part of creating a Second Life Panoramic picture is stitching the pictures you took together. There are different softwares that you can download to help you do that, but I am going to be using Photoshop. If you don’t have Photoshop, check out Illiastra’s youtube playlist to learn which other software you can use and how to use it.

Here is what you do in Photoshop:

1. In the Photoshop menus, go to File > Automate > Photomerge
2. In the Photomerge popup, go to Browse and find the 8 snapshots you saved and load them into Photomerge in Photoshop. Then press ok and wait and let it do it’s thing.
3. Save the picture as a jpg once it’s done.

Next part is to download the Facebook 360 Panoramic Template and use it in Photoshop.

1. Download the Panoramic Template from this page.
2. Open the template in photoshop.
3. Create a new layer and fill it with Black.
4. Now delete the layer with all the text.
5. Open your Panoramic Image and copy paste it on the template.
6. Use transform selection to make it fit within the template if it doesn’t fit.
7. Save the template you’ve made as a JPG with the highest quality setting.

The final step is to upload the image to facebook. Now you have a 360 panoramic image of a beautiful sim in Second Life to share with your facebook friends!

I hope you like using the HUD, it’s definitely fun. I’m looking forward to all your panoramic images. If you do decide to do this, link your facebook image in the comments below so we can come check it out!

I uploaded this on my Facebook page now as well, so you can check it out at this link. While you’re there, don’t forget to hit like and leave a comment! I’m also going to try and embed it below.

Please note that when I uploaded my image to Facebook, there was a seam in it. I am not sure where I messed up but I probably missed something while talking and doing it at the same time. I did try this out last week and uploaded it privately on facebook and it worked smoothly without a seam so make sure to watch Illiastra’s videos as well for more detailed explanations.

What I’m wearing in the video and image:
Shape: StrawberrySingh.com Zara Shape by Strawberry Singh
*Mesh Body: Maitreya Mesh Body – Lara V3.5 by Onyx LeShelle
*Mesh Head: CATWA HEAD AnnaGrey V4.10 by Catwa Clip
*Skin Applier: Bold & Beauty :: Megan by JourdanMcMillan (@ Uber)
*Lipstick: Amara Beauty by Shantia Soulstar
*Eyes: IKON Charm Eyes – Apex by Ikon Innovia
*Hair: TRUTH HAIR Tyne by Truth Hawks (@ Uber)
*Outfit: neve outfit – off-kilter plaid by coldLogic
*Shoes: REIGN.- MILLANI CHUNKY HEELS by KenadeeCole
Location: It all Starts with a Smile by Kaelyn Alecto (Enter the Contest!)
*Photo HUD: Panoramic Camera System by Illiastra