View the beauty of Paris in a 26 Gigapixel HD panorama

I’m in love with Paris – ever since my first visit, it has been my absolute favorite destination. Even after close to 60 visits, I never get bored of the atmosphere. Right now, I’m sitting behind my desk enjoying the city in all its splendor, thanks to a 26 Gigapixel panoramic photo.

The panorama was created by Martin Loyer and Arnaud Frich, and involved shooting 2346 individual photos, and combining them into a single image 354159×75570 pixels large. Their site lets you browse around the panorama and zoom in on any portion.

Helpful pointers describe some of the various landmarks, along with their history. On the right hand side, you’ll find a handy set of links to the most popular Parisian monuments.

And finally, in the top right hand corner is a small “HD” button – after installing a Microsoft plugin, you’ll be able to view the panorama in “real” HD quality.

The amount of detail is amazing – it obviously isn’t as nice as actually being there, but it sure is a fun way to spend my morning.