On the way back from taking my tire down to the bike shop at lunch, I went by the 7-Eleven to get a Coke Slurpee. But they had something better: Diet-Pepsi Slurpee!

Big!

Cold!

Caffeinated!

Calorie-Free!

Yum!




And yes, the Panoscan system is everything I dream about. They demonstrated it for me for an hour yesterday, and it's just amazing. But I cannot justify buying it without trying a still camera with a fisheye lens.

So I ordered a new Coolpix 5700 5MP digital camera and a true fisheye lens for it and will try it out as soon as possible. Making spherical panoramas with it can be done with only two or three images, rather than the 20 my current camera takes. Thus time spent stitching individual images will be minimized, and I'll be able to work in very tight spaces.

I suspect that the still camera will do a decent job. I'm hoping that it is at least "good enough" for my initial projects, so that I could get some of my ideas to market and see whether they fly.

The new camera and lens should be here Friday, so this weekend will be devoted to working with the new system.