High-res HTML5 panos for iPad and PC/Mac Safari

Q&A about the latest versions
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erik leeman
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Joined: Sat Sep 09, 2006 10:51 am
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Hi all,

I've made some HTML5-versions of recent panos to see what kind of image quality I could squeeze out of my newly-bought iPad.
One thing that puzzles me is that exactly the same pano looks considerably worse on the iPad than on a regular computer screen.
However, I see no mention of this anywhere, so I am wondering if I'm the only one who sees this difference.
A reason could be that for the iPad pano quality was deliberately traded for speed, its processor isn't much of a powerhouse after all.
Or is it something Mobile Safari does automatically to reduce memory consumption?
If so, can we switch that mechanism off?

Here are links to some examples:
http://tinyurl.com/iPad-Kamenicky01 (3.2MB)
http://tinyurl.com/iPad-Plymouth (5.6MB)
http://tinyurl.com/iPad-HaytorRocks (4.2MB)
http://tinyurl.com/iPad-Lizardpoint-01 (3.6MB)

Cube faces are 1930x1930, I made them using PTGui and Photoshop, not Pano2VR, so I had full control over their quality.
Again, file size doesn't interest me in this case, this test is about image quality.

Cheers!

Erik
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Hopki
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Hi Erik
I only have my little IPod Touch so I can not help, I did try and open one, POP GOES THE IPOD, well it resets it.
Martin :lol:
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erik leeman
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Joined: Sat Sep 09, 2006 10:51 am
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Well, I did mention they were for iPad or 'larger' didn't I ; )
I'm not sure if screens as small as the iPod's really are worthwhile making panos for.

Here's another big one:
http://tinyurl.com/iPad-Lindava-01 (4.42MB)

Erik
erik leeman
Posts: 470
Joined: Sat Sep 09, 2006 10:51 am
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I've done some 1 on 1 comparisons on the iPad, using 1930x1930 and 1066x1066 cube faces of the same pano.
The 1930x1930 set was 5.37MB, the 1066x1066 set was 1.80MB in size.
That's a substantial difference in MegaBytes, considering both were compressed at the same quality setting.

What I found:
a. The difference in image quality of the resulting Webkit CSS3/JavaScript panos as displayed by Safari on my 1920x1200 PC-screen is quite dramatic.

b. On the iPad the difference in image quality is negligible, but both look considerably worse than the original cube faces!

Apparently the iPad (and/or pano2vr_player.js?) does strange things with those cube faces, which is a pity.

Screenshots of this test can be found on my Flickr pages, here are direct links to the 1024x768 versions:

iPad screenshot 1066x1066 pano (@ vFoV 50degrees) vs 100% crop of an original 1066x1066 cubeface
http://www.flickr.com/photos/erik-nl/51 ... 1/sizes/o/

iPad screenshot 1930x1930 pano (@ vFoV 50degrees) vs 100% crop of an original 1930x1930 cubeface
http://www.flickr.com/photos/erik-nl/51 ... 3/sizes/o/

iPad screenshot 1066x1066 pano vs iPad screenshot 1930x1930 pano (both @ vFoV 50degrees)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/erik-nl/51 ... 1/sizes/o/

Note:
At the same vFoV of 50 degrees the 1930 version is displayed a bit smaller than its original size, but the 1066 version needs to be made larger than it actually is by pano2vr_player.js!

Erik
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alabwab
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Hi Eric,
Have You already found out something new concerning tile sizes, output restrictions for iDevices, and optimization for html5 output in general?
Do You have any recommendations?

Greetings from Alois
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