Revolvable Indoor Panoramas Using a Rectified Azimuthal Projection

We present an algorithm for converting an indoor spherical panorama into a photograph with a simulated overhead view. The resulting image will have an extremely wide field of view covering up to 4 pi steradians of the spherical panorama. Our method provides the photographer the ability to shoot at the ground level and later post-process the pictures to get a fake bird's eye view of the scene. We argue that our method complements the stereographic projection commonly used in the "little planet" effect. The stereographic projection works well in creating little planets of outdoor scenes; whereas our method is a well-suited counterpart for indoor scenes. The main innovation of our method is the introduction of a novel azimuthal map projection that can smoothly blend between the stereographic projection and the Lambert azimuthal equal-area projection. Our projection has an adjustable parameter that allows one to control and compromise between distortions in shape and distortions in size within the projected panorama. This extra control parameter gives our projection the ability to produce superior results over the stereographic projection.