2016 promises to be an exciting year for VR enthusiasts, but the high cost means most headsets will remain out of reach of the public. For the rest of us, there’s always Google’s ultra-cheap Cardboard headphones. But while more expensive headsets have apps for games and movies, the content available with the Cardboard is a bit limited.
Google’s Street View offers some great content for VR – you can travel around the world and feel truly transported. However, Street View is not available in all countries and it is not available in most parts of India. Although Google announced that Street View is coming to Hyderabad, it has faced regulatory hurdles in the past. In addition to this, Google also has 360-degree images of heritage sites.
However, any user can upload PhotoSphere panoramas to Google Street View, and if you put your phone into Cardboard, this can be a great way to find really cool new PhotoSphere panoramas. To do this, simply launch the Google Street View app on Android or iOS and find the photo you want to view on the map. Uploading PhotoSphere photos is also a very quick and easy process that won’t take you more than a few minutes. If you want to upload VR photos to Google Street View, here’s what you need to do.
1) Launch the Google Street View app on your phone – it’s available for free on both Android and iOS.
2) Click large + button in the lower right corner.
3) Click camera
4) Okay, now you have to photograph your photosphere. To do this, you will take multiple photos and stitch them together. This sounds complicated, but it actually works automatically. The user interface displays a white circle and an arrow pointing to it. Just point your camera at the circle and it will automatically click a photo.
Next, you can move your phone to either side or up or down, and you’ll see more white circles to point to. Keep repeating this process until you have completed all the empty spots in the sphere – this may take a while – about 30 photos – but each photo is taken very quickly so it won’t take you more than a few minutes.
5) Once completed, a green checkmark will appear at the bottom of the screen. Click this button and the app will process the pictures and stitch them together.
6) Once completed, you will see a card titled “Ready to Publish.” tap choose Select the image you want to upload and press up arrow icon Upload the image to Google Maps.
7) Click location icon (it looks a bit like a pointer pointing down) and set the position of the image so that people can see it on the Google Street View app or Google Maps.
That’s it, you’re done. The resulting image can be shared with people via an app so they can see it on their phone or computer. This looks best if people are viewing it on their phone, where they can simply put on a Cardboard headset to experience the image in virtual reality, although you can even look around the image on a desktop, as you can see in the technology shout office view.
The upload is also public, so once completed, people will be able to find your panorama through the Google Street View app or Google Maps in the browser.
What else do you use Cardboard headphones for? Tell us in the comments.
