Hurry up! The entry period of Panobook 2012 photo contest ends in 20 days!

Don’t miss this unique opportunity to have your best panoramas published into a beautiful book and win great prizes. All you need to do is select up to 3 of your most beautiful panoramas and send them through the Panobook 2012 website.

In only 10 days, we have received more than 450 panoramas from 300 contributors. Add your own contribution too and take your chance to win one of the prizes and have your panoramas published in the Panobook 2012!

All details are on the Panobook.org website.

Special thanks to our partner Nodal Ninja which contributes to the prize pool with its famous NN4 panoramic head, Ultimate R1 head and the P1 telescopic pole! Kolor gives a Panogear motorized head as the first prize and other prizes including the Panobook collection and large-format prints.

JOIN THE CONTEST TODAY! It’s free and anyone can participate.

Only 2 weeks after the launch of iBooks Author by Apple, Kolor provides a free update to Panotour Pro virtual tour software to integrate a special export compatible with iBooks Author and iBooks.

iBooks is the iPad app that lets you download and read digital books on your iOS device. The new (and free) iBooks Author app for Mac lets you create books by yourself, publish them in the iBookstore and let any iPad user read your books.

Panotour Pro already provided the export of the virtual tours in Flash format as well as iPhone / iPad format. It now also lets you export your virtual tours as widgets for iBooks Author, to include them in your books. Embedding a virtual tour in a digital book through iBooks Author has a great advantage: you can save your tours as digital books directly on your iPad and display them in iBooks 2 without being connected to the Internet (read the iBooks Author documentation to learn how to publish a digital book).

>> Download Panotour & Panotour Pro 1.7.2
>> Discover all the other features of Panotour Pro virtual tour software

Example: a 360° virtual tour created with Panotour Pro and embedded in a digital book through iBooks Author

Panotour & Panotour Pro 1.7.2: the other modifications

Version 1.7.2 also includes several other modifications, including the Japanese translation of the apps. Here is the full change log:

PANOTOUR & PANOTOUR PRO

Available in Japanese

Japanese translation is available for Panotour and Panotour Pro.

No more freeze when starting Panotour or Panotour Pro

The weekly check for available updates does not take time anymore.

Fixed issue 1116: no more crash when reading a project file

When a project file contained some erroneous logo data, Panotour crashed during the opening.

PANOTOUR PRO

Apple iBooks dynamic Widget support

You can now integrate virtual tours in iBooks created with Apple iBooks Author, and play this tour on your iPad without any internet connection easily.
Panotour Pro contains a new kind of export : iBooks Widget .

Fixed issue 869: no more crash on Linux when selecting the Google Map

On Linux, you can now select the Google Map in the panorama area without any crash, and then add your spots on the map with the Hotspot Editor.

Fixed issue 1117: Cursors URL are now correctly managed in menu templates

Customization of cursors was not possible due to a bug in the templates’ URL management.

Fixed issue 1119: Flying hotspots do not stop the background sound anymore

When opening a flying hotspot, the background sound of the tour was stopped and resumed from the beginning.
Now flying hotspots do not impact sounds.

Fixed issue 1123: Background sound correctly played when the tour name begins with a number

The background sound of a tour which name began with a “1″ was not played.

Fixed issue 1084: Adapt Cube Face size to tablet resolution

The cube faces generated by Panotour Pro were sometimes too wide for iPad, and tours took a lot of time to load due to the size of each cube face.

Fixed issue 1097: Quotes are now correctly managed in tooltips

If a quote was in a tooltip, the displayed tooltip contained extra quotes.

This new RC version fixes some bugs and improves the graphics card support (see change log below).

Download Autopano Pro / Autopano Giga 2.6.2 RC2 .

Change log

Revamped 360° blending

With engine 2.6.1, we introduced a new generic 360° blender that had some issues with soft rendering and uses more memory. We improved all parts : sharp rendering, less memory used but still with better blending over 360° edges compared to 2.6.0 engine.

New compatibility mode in GPU support

We introduced a compatibility mode in GPU support so that even fairly old GPU can use this mode in Autopano Pro. The GPU check has also beeing improved to check for both mode.

Fixes :

- 0000602: [Unclassified] Crash when using PtGui import – resolved.
- 0001147: [Cortex ( rendu )] HDR output issue (grey in burned zone) – resolved.
- 0001142: [Cortex ( rendu )] Softness issue in rendering (360° case) – resolved.
- 0001140: [Cortex ( rendu )] Not enough memory for rendering one line (360° case) – resolved.
- 0001148: [Cortex ( rendu )] Force Mercator and auto-crop conflit – resolved.
- 0000998: [Editor] MAC : some issue with a given GPU – resolved.
- 0001072: [UI behavior] Add GPU compatibilty mode in global settings – resolved.
- 0001125: [Editor] GPU compatibility mode – resolved.
- 0001133: [Image I/O] Image blurred when using haze on small size image – resolved.
- 0001138: [Cortex ( rendu )] Blending on zenith – closed.

Kolor Panobook 2012 contest is now OPEN! You can win great prizes this year. Send us your 3 most beautiful panoramas before the end of February.

All details are on the Panobook.org website.

Special thanks to our partner Nodal Ninja which contributes to the prize pool with its famous NN4 panoramic head, Ultimate R1 head and the P1 telescopic pole! Kolor gives a Panogear motorized head as the first prize and other prizes including the Panobook collection and large-format prints.

JOIN THE CONTEST TODAY! It’s free and anyone can participate.

This new RC version integrated a crash analysis system and fixes some bugs (see bug fixes below).

Download Autopano Pro / Autopano Giga 2.6.2 RC1 .

Main change

Papywizard focal length integration

Sometimes, it is really needed to check that focal length provided by images and provided by XML are good and matching. In some case, you just don’t have any focal length. We added an easy way to do that directly in papywizard plugin.
Crash analysis system for Microsoft Windows

Fixes

- 0001134: [Performance] Generic crash analysis system – resolved.
- 0000561: [Editor] Moving image issue with update – resolved.
- 0000932: [Shell Integration] Qt path under linux – resolved.
- 0001028: [UI behavior] Workspace saving leads to crash – resolved.
- 0001128: [Import plugins] Papywizard – Focal length integration – resolved.

- how to use your own graphical theme in Panotour Pro, to replace the standard buttons offered by the app,

- how to create your own virtual tour templates, that defines not only graphical items but also the positioning and behavior of each element of the theme that you can save and use on future tours.

Please note that both tutorials require to edit a bit of XML code, but that should not refrain you, especially for the first tutorial that is nearly at anyone’s reach. The second tutorial requires a bit more XML knowledge.

If you don’t want to create your own themes but wish to re-use the theme that we created for these tutorials, you can download it for free on the tutorials’ pages.

Download Autopano Pro / Autopano Giga 2.6.1.

Fixes :

- 0001096: [Import plugins] VR Drive 2 XML support – resolved.
- 0001124: [Image I/O] Canon 600D exif not well decoded – resolved.
- 0001118: [Shell Integration] AutopanoShell crash – resolved.
- 0001122: [Neurone ( optimisation )] Gigapan plugin broken – resolved.
- 0001121: [Cortex ( rendu )] 360 Generation broken – resolved.
- 0001112: [Import plugins] Ligthroom plugin issue – resolved.
- 0001086: [Cortex ( rendu )] Check this fusion exposure – closed.
- 0001092: [Image I/O] exif for panotour – closed.
- 0001091: [UI behavior] crop zone display – closed.
- 0001062: [Import plugins] Lightroom plugin not installed – closed.

One note :

We still have one complicated crash that appears only on windows 7, 64bits. It occurs when using Browse folder in autopano. It is a conflict with avast antivir software most of the time.
See this post on how to find the real cause and solve the conflict : http://www.kolor.com/forum/t13891-autop … h-analysis

Autopano Pro has just obtained the mark of 86/100 (“very good”) in the German magazine PCgo. The magazine highlights the application’s ease of use for beginners as well as the advances features for experienced photographers. Here is the full article translated in English:

“Kolor Autopano Pro clear project management following start is worth acclaim. Here, the user has access to all of the necessary photos and individual projects. The software backs up all relevant data, thus facilitating subsequent rework on a project. With the help of the standard features, even inexperienced users managed to create a panoramic image with very good quality. Among other things,
2-D surface, cylinder with up to 360 degrees and spherical projection are available here. The latter allows creation of a panoramic image (360 degree view).
Besides the automatic mode, the user can refine his or her results using the several Autopano features. The adaptation of the positions of each of the images is done using control points. The many options available here make the program excellent. Autopano Pro also excels in adapting the horizon and eliminating distortion.

Panorama experts are happy about the special features, such as the import of RAW data, support of fish-eye lenses and batch processing. The work with HDR (High Dynamic Range) Images is also possible. The program earns a couple of minus points for its speed. On older computers, a little bit of patience is necessary for some operating steps. This is observed in sorting the single images and final calculation of the panorama.

Internet: www.kolor.com
Price: approx. € 119.00

+ Very accurate features
+ Good project management
- Relatively slow on old PCs

Price/performance ratio: Very good 86 POINTS

Conclusion: Thanks to automatic features of PanoPro, there are quick results for amateurs. The many special features fulfil the wishes of advanced users and professionals.

Image caption: Kolor Autopano Pro makes both amateurs and professionals happy – the results speak for themselves.”

Prepare for the imminent launch of Panobook 2012 panoramic competition! The contest will open in a few days and this year, you will be able to win beautiful prizes!

Kolor Panobook is an annual panoramic photo contest open to all and that leads to the publication of a unique book composed of the winning panoramas.

Everyone’s invited to join the contest! No entry fee, no obligation to use a particular image-stitching application ; all you need to have is to prepare a selection of your most beautiful, original, inspired panoramas.

You will be able to send up to 3 images, so take the time to review all your photos and select the ones that have a chance to win!

A jury of 3 independent, professional photographers will select the winning pictures. This year’s jury members will be announced soon.

For those who are discovering this contest, have a look at the 3 previous Panobook editions and at this selection of last year’s winners:

Download Autopano Pro / Autopano Giga 2.6.1 RC1 .

Fixes :

- 0000597: [Cortex ( rendu )] Blending issue around 360° – resolved.
- 0000934: [Performance] GPU black image onATI X1400 – resolved.
- 0001044: [Cortex ( rendu )] Line 347 error – resolved.
- 0001085: [Cortex ( rendu )] Check blending case – resolved.
- 0001087: [UI behavior] Reload button crash – resolved.
- 0001089: [Cortex ( rendu )] Antighost edge choice – resolved.
- 0001094: [Cortex ( rendu )] Interpolation issues – resolved.
- 0001095: [Editor] Strange alexandroid in the editor only – resolved.