Our website is almost ten years old and
throughout all of that period we have featured VR panoramas. VR panorama viewer
technology has moved on considerably during this time and we have tried to
update to the latest best offerings, consequently there are now several viewer
configurations used throughout this website, all but one of these are JAVA
viewers.
JAVA
VR panoramas are viewable on any platform
with a Java-enabled browser, so Mac, Unix and Linux users are catered for, if
you do not already have Java installed, go to Sun
Microsystems to get the version for your computer. Java is used by
many, many sites on the web, if you do not have it, you will be missing a lot of
content. Microsoft only stopped including Java in Windows as standard due to a licensing
row with Sun. Incidently, the Sun Java installer also asks you if you want the
Google toolbar installed in your browser, we use this ourselves and can
recommend it, it is worth it for the popup blocker alone.
If you try to view one of our Java panoramas and you are using Internet Explorer and do not have Java installed, a window will appear saying " The page you are viewing uses Java", there will also be a link to Microsoft for more info. If you see this, use this link Sun Microsystems to install Java on your machine. Depending on your OS and Explorer versions, you may also have to activate Java in Explorer itself, the Microsoft website explains how.
The latest Java viewer on our site is the PurePlayer, this viewer allows switchable fullscreen and map console views, interactive maps, navigation and zooming.
The older LivePicture and PTViewer Java viewers do not allow fullscreen viewing, and only PTViewer offers practical interactive maps and tours.
RealVR is our oldest method for displaying fullscreen panoramas, at the time it was the only feasible method available. Although we no longer use this for new panoramas, it is still the most common fullscreen viewer on our site, as we used it for a long time. You will need a plugin or an ActiveX module to view RealVR panoramas, installation instructions below.
Netscape (all), and
Internet Explorer 5 or lower
These browsers accept plugins, a plugin RealVR viewer is available
for PC and Mac free from Iseemedia, click 
to go there. You can also download
the PC (1.4Mb), or Mac
(1.3Mb) version direct from our website. Simply download the file to a
temporary directory and run it to install the viewer into your browser.
Internet Explorer
7, 6, and 5.5 (SP
2)
An ActiveX module is needed for these browsers as they cannot accept plugins.
The first time a RealVR panorama page is accessed, we will attempt to send the viewer module
to your browser automatically. A yellow warning bar will appear below the IE
toolbar telling you that our website is trying to install the MGI ZOOM control
ActiveX module from the MGI Software Corp., click on the warning and select
"install". You may then see another window pop up asking you again if
you wish to install the viewer, click install. On broadband the install takes
seconds and the panorama you first tried to access will then be displayed.
Both the plugin and the ActiveX module are one time downloads, once installed, panorama viewing is automatic thereafter.
Viewer Controls
All viewers are zoomed in and out using the
keyboard "A" and "Z" keys or mouse wheel. Panoramas are panned by simply
left clicking in the image window and dragging. In the Zoom viewers, extra controls can be had from the toolbar that is
brought up by clicking on the icon in the bottom left hand corner of the window.
In PurePlayer, clicking the Fullscreen button on the toolbar toggles fullscreen
view, there is also a return arrow icon in the top right of the fullscreen
window to return to windowed view.
Size Versus Quality
Our site is nearly ten years old, and many of the panoramas were put up when
modems were the standard mode of internet access, consequently we limited
panorama file sizes to 350kB. Because of this limitation, the older
panoramas will not have the resolution of our newer offerings, and as screen
resolutions of 1024 and 1280 are now common, the old panos will look a little
blocky. Now, with the ubiquity of broadband, our newer panorama files are 5 to 6
times larger, but there is still a limitation on quality, and this is imposed by
the Java framework used by our newest PurePlayer viewer, this has a maximum
memory size that it can process and this restricts the maximum quality of the
fullscreen panoramas it displays. There are viewers which show higher resolution
panoramas, but none of these have the flexibility of a programming language
which can produce the mapping and navigation aids that PurePlayer or PTViewer
offer.
We try to keep aware of new developments in panorama viewers and will no doubt be switching to better viewers in the future.