26-Gigapixel Photo Breaks New Record

Zoltan Arva-Toth | Digital | December 18, 2009 | 24 Comments |

A new, 26-gigapixel panoramic image of Dresden, Germany, is now the world’s largest-resolution photograph. Taken from the rooftop of the “Haus der Presse” building, the giant panorama is made up of 1,665 individual shots captured with a Canon EOS 5D Mark II camera and a 400mm lens. This massive number of shots were taken with the help of a photo-robot, in the course of less than three hours, but the processing took 94 hours using a computer with 16 processors and a main memory cache of 48 Gigabytes.

Website: Gigapixel-Dresden.de

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24 Comments so far | Newest Oldest first | Post a comment

#1 Mark

I'm sure the 600 or so photos it took of that plain blue sky were well worth it. Surely they could have found something more worthy of such a detailed photo. So much of it is dead space or sky.

11:43 am - Friday, December 18, 2009

#2 Marty

@Mark. Totally Agree. Impressive feat thats 50% Nothing.

12:55 pm - Friday, December 18, 2009

#3 Fazal Majid

There is very distracting banding in the sky.

4:28 pm - Friday, December 18, 2009

#4 AA

We still did not land on the moon.

5:19 pm - Friday, December 18, 2009

#5 Agenzia Fotografica

Faboolous defintion, really nice and exagerated.

8:49 am - Saturday, December 19, 2009

#6 dsi r4

Hi,

Thanks for sharing nice blog.i really enjoy this one.keep it up...

9:23 am - Saturday, December 19, 2009

#7 Roberto Suriguez

Great work

10:58 am - Saturday, December 19, 2009

#8 David

Finally, a photographic record that's *not* made by the porn industry.

11:24 am - Saturday, December 19, 2009

#9 ropes

I totally agree with you David, I think that the Porn industry cannot Break Such Record even If they tried so hard.

12:59 pm - Saturday, December 19, 2009

#10 steve

Where the story, detail what's the purpose??? so many gigapixels wasted what is there to explore? is it artistic?

3:25 am - Sunday, December 20, 2009

#11 Thomas

For sure there are more interesting objects in Dresden like the Frauenkirche or the Semperoper. This picture is, excuse me, pretty boring.

10:21 pm - Sunday, December 20, 2009

#12 r4i

Hello Guy's,
Surely they could have found something more worthy of such a detailed photo. So much of it is dead space or sky.

6:14 am - Monday, December 21, 2009

#13 Sean

Surely this is the same thing as Google Earth? Looks like stitched together photographs to me, in which case I am sure Google Earth would trump this.

5:28 am - Thursday, December 24, 2009

#14 future2000

what a complete waste of time. At least they could have gone somewhere interesting and taken a nice picture. The drab skyline of Dresden makes this picture a complete bore!

10:59 am - Thursday, December 24, 2009

#15 Todd

If there was ever a world record there is always someone who is destined to top it.

2:38 am - Monday, December 28, 2009

#16 Eastendguy

What a negative lot of comments.
Of course, I have to agree that the subject matter is not inspiring, but is that really what this is all about. These guys have acheived a remarkable image, with a stunning amount of detail. It was an experiment, wasn't it? In my opinion it was a huge success. Congratulations.

3:38 pm - Tuesday, January 5, 2010

#17 rob

Certainly, this panorama has not been meant as a work of art but as a technical exercise. In that capacity, it is an undeniable achievement.

10:29 pm - Tuesday, January 12, 2010

#18 Ricky

Gigapixel images even larger than this one are very useful in pathology. The combination of a scanner, a microscope and intelligent tiling software similar to google maps leeds to incredible images. You can check some of them at: http://dotslide.olympus-sis.com/

8:26 am - Wednesday, January 13, 2010

#19 Art Courses

Wow!!!
Technology really has expanded greatly and fabulously.

12:24 am - Friday, February 5, 2010

#20 digital photography

I cannot believe, so much detail is visible!!

11:59 am - Monday, February 8, 2010

#21 Shamima Sultana

Its really great...technology upgrade us as day by day

8:44 am - Tuesday, February 9, 2010

#22 ghunk

awsome
nice work

1:08 pm - Wednesday, March 3, 2010

#23 umpa

Make a 26 gigapixel porn photo!!

6:35 pm - Monday, May 24, 2010

#24 ds r4

I think that there are many legitimate uses for images even greater than this. Both for personal and for professional photography, especially in the fields of science and health.

1:33 am - Friday, June 4, 2010