Click to view featured hotel virtual tour

How long does it take for a hotel virtual tour to be completed? It depends on the scope of work. For a comprehensive hotel/resort virtual tour, we need approximately 2 week from image capture to virtual tours going live on a site. For a smaller project, virtual tours can be put online within 2-4 days. Why does PanaViz host its virtual tours in its own servers? The images we serve for full screen virtual tours are very large. We have very fast servers that can feed these tours to your clients quickly. Internet technologies change very quickly, and we upgrade the technology on the virtual tours as operating systems, browsers, security suites change to keep your virtual tours running. We can also update your tours as you renovate and change your hotel, suites, etc.

How is a full-screen virtual tour different from dial-up virtual tours?

Unlike a television, where everyone sees the same thing regardless of the physical screen size, a computer monitor allows the user to control how much is seen on the screen. Current statistics show that over 90% of computer users have their monitors set at either 800 X 600 pixels, or 1024 X 768 pixels. Here's how our virtual tours appear at different resolutions:

Dialup Virtual Tour	vs.	Broadband (fullscreen) Virtual Tour
	vs.
PanaViz dialup tour on a 800 X 600 screen		PanaViz fullscreen tour on a 800 X 600 screen

	vs.
PanaViz dialup tour on a 1024 X 768 screen		PanaViz fullscreen tour on a 1024 X 768 screen

	vs.
PanaViz dialup tour on a 1600 X 1200 screen		PanaViz fullscreen tour on a 1600 X 1200 screen

Why should we choose fullscreen virtual tours

Broadband (high speed) Internet is capable of delivering large, high-resolution panoramic images, making for a very compelling virtual tour. And while it is important to include dialup virtual tours, it is also becoming increasingly important to cater to users of broadband internet connections.

Broadband Growth

As of August 2005 broadband use in US homes surpassed 60%. The chart below demonstrates this trend.

Corporate networks almost exclusively have broadband connections. People planning their next vacation are increasingly looking at hotels online and demand rich media to reach their decisions.

How big in file size are the Panaviz images (i.e., how fast will they download)?

Panaviz combines image optimization & fast internet server equipment which allows our images download extremely fast for what they are -- complete 360° panoramic images are ±90k. With a 56K modem, customers typically see the images within 10 seconds. With "broadband" connections (typically cable or dsl), the images appear in seconds.

What kind of equipment does Panaviz use?

Our images are shot with high-end digital cameras, whereas other panoramic tours are often filmed with a video camera. Video cameras are no match for digital still cameras in picture quality. We use proprietary equipment designed specially for us, that allows us to capture and process very high quality images. We typically take 6-8 sequential images per panorama. The images are later "stitched" using special software.

Some virtual tours I have seen show panoramic images that are fuzzy, or load slowly, or don't move smoothly. Why is this?

There may be a number of reasons for this. Bad photography techniques and overly aggressive image compression (a compromise between image quality & file size that results in fuzzy images) may be a factor. An inferior viewer may show images that shimmer a lot when moving. It is trying to compensate for image distortion when the user pans the image. However, this may result in less than ideal clarity & smoothness. Panaviz tours utilize very sophisticated panoramic viewing technology that results in high definintion, high quality images and faster performance. Panoramic images that load slowly (very frustrating to the user), can be blamed on a poor performing server. Panaviz uses one of the fastest servers available, consistently outperforming competitive servers, allowing us to show bigger, higher-quality images that load more quickly.