Inspiration
There are tons of other people out there, who feel tired and look for an opportunity to escape their daily stress and routine. So you decide to go on vacation. You book the train, hotel, arrive there, and then you realize it is not what you envisioned. Then you regret your choice. Why did this happen ? Because the pictures you’ve seen were deceptive. And advice you’ve heard from people with different taste than you. So how do you find the perfect destination without going through a numerous number of pictures and travel websites ? This was my inspiration and this is the problem which lead me to think of this app TravelSphere.
What it does
TravelSphere allows people to check iconic places from all around the world in Virtual Reality, 360 degree Panoramas. Simply saying with TravelSphere you can virtually travel to any place in the world. You can get the immersive feeling of you really being there. After looking at various places in the place where you want to go, you can make more informative decisions on where to travel. Further TravelSphere can be used by people who want to escape reality for may be one hour. With sound effects specific to each iconic place, with special lighting, TravelSphere gives users a unique, one of a kind experience. Not only the iconic places, travelsphere suggest you places to stay, bars, pubs around the area where you want to travel so that you know where to go and what to do before you even go there.
Content providers can register at _ www.travelsphere.tech _ and submit their 360 degree panorama content to travelsphere and get paid. On the other hand, advertisers can advertise their places (hotels, clubs, pubs around iconic places) inside TravelSphere. This business model makes TravelSphere easily expandable.
How I built it
The mobile application for Android was built with Google VR Unity SDK. The web application is hosted in Microsoft Azure and Image processing of photospheres too is done in the Azure cloud. This unique algorithm runs in the back-end when an advertiser or a content provider uploads an Photosphere to the TravelSphere system through the web application.
Challenges I ran into
I am a one man team and I had to take care of everything from creating icons and logos in Photoshop to developing the mobile app to creating the web app and finally writing the Image processing application as well. Hardships are numerous and currently I am in the process of trying to run Image processing in the cloud in Azure. Right now it is done locally. Have been stuck for a while here but let's see how it would go.
Accomplishments that I'm proud of
I am really proud that I was able to create the working prototype within this limited amount of time working alone. I am really proud of what I have created and I hope I would be able finish it off in style.
What I learned
Learnt a lot about Microsoft Azure. I am a new bee to Azure and thanks to the free Azure credits I got, I was able to explore the possibilities of using a powerful service like Azure. Further had to learn a lot about the framework I used to do the Image processing (EMGU CV). Though the processing part seemed obvious up front, had a go through a hardtime when doing it learning function by function step by step in the EMGUCV library. Though I have created apps for Oculus Rift, this is my first time wih Google VR SDK. Hence learnt a lot about how to handle it as well. Performance enhancing of VR apps is another thing I learnt while working on this project.
What's next for TravelSphere
TravelSphere is not just an app but a platform with a feasible business model. With business all around the globe coming into play, TravelSphere could revolutionize the way people Travel and plan trips. Further it could boost businesses all around the world with it's location based targeted advertising features. If I get an opportunity to take this forward, I am willing to take it to market as I truly believe this app could revolutionize how VR and 360 degree photography operate in the current world.
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