!!!Gigapanorama of Moscow from the Ostankino Tower

Text and photo by Dmitry Chistoprudov,
member of the [AirPano Team|Geography/About/Consortium/AirPano,_Team] that is a member of the [global-geography Consortium|Geography/About/Consortium]. \\

29 October 2014

with kind permission of [AirPano|http://www.AirPano.com]

Gigapanorama of Moscow from the Ostankino Tower

Our friend and associate, Dmitry Chistoprudov, took a spherical
gigapanoramic photo of Moscow from the Ostankino Tower in the summer of
2014, which we are now bringing to your attention. Soon a printed
version of this panorama will be displayed in a 360-degree circle on the
observation deck of the tower. The initial panorama was 72,000 pixels in
size; however, our web site presents a reduced version of 50,000 pixels.

The easiest part of this photo shoot was its organization. Everything
else was more difficult. In the eyes of an inexperienced novice, the
process might seem simple, but after even one attempt the difficulty
becomes apparent...

The only convenient way to shoot with a long-focus lens from the
340-meter level on the Ostankino Tower is to shoot without a tripod.
Safety bars created for spectators, who like to sit with their feet
dangling over the edge, are major obstacles not only for the suicidal
but also for the average photographer. I photographed the small sections
at 20-30 degree angles, gradually turning my camera until my lens hit
against the next bar. I was periodically pushed and shoved by tourists
who poured out on to the observation deck in large, unruly groups,
making loud noises, taking their own snap shots and making my photo
shoot difficult at times.

From time to time, I was asked to take pictures of lovebirds with their
cell phones; I ignored their requests, trying to remember what point I
had been at before I was distracted. After shooting the next angle, I
checked all the finished shots for sharpness and clarity. One small
mistake could be extremely costly.

However, all these problems were nothing in comparison to the clouds.
That day the clouds, at a height of 1 — 1.5 km, flew at a rapid pace,
constantly changing the lighting of the city. It was not as sunny as I
thought it would be in the end. I ran in circles on the observation deck
trying to catch areas of the city where there was good lighting. It was
not a consecutive shooting of one segment after another; it was a rather
chaotic and hectic work. Finally I was completely confused and lost
track of what I had shot and what still needed to be completed, so I had
to start from the beginning. As a result, I spent 1.5 hours on the
entire photo shoot. I happened to take photos of the same sites 2 or 3
times, but the most important thing was that I had managed to cover
everything.

Later that night, in the peaceful atmosphere of my home, I spent about
four more hours assembling the final version, removing parallax, and
putting different shots together according to the lighting conditions...

There is a fragment, marked out by red color, to show the scale of
reduced gigapanorama. Below uou will find the fragment in the real size.

[{Image src='01_Ostankino.jpg' caption='Gigapanorama of Moscow from the Ostankino Tower\\© [AirPano|https://www.AirPano.com]' alt='' width='900' popup='false' height='127'}]

[{Image src='02_Ostankino.jpg' caption='Fragment\\© [AirPano|https://www.AirPano.com]' alt='' width='900' popup='false' height='601'}]

\\ \\
[Panoramas of Moscow from the Ostankino Tower|Geography/Asia/Russia/Pictures/Panoramas_of_Gigapanorama_of_Moscow_from_the_Ostankino_Tower]

[{SET customtitle='Panoramas of Moscow from the Ostankino Tower (AP)'}]












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