How to create the perfect 360-degree photograph for Google Street View, and the things I've learned using GoPro Fusion Studio.

GoPro Fusion Studio settings

GoPro Fusion Studio

When you lot get home, y'all'll have ii memory cards full of photos; one set taken past the front end photographic camera, the other by the rear facing camera on the GoPro Fusion.

GoPro have congenital a very simple piece of software, GoPro Fusion Studio, to stitch the two together to produce a 360-caste photos.

The photo files

Y'all can ignore this office entirely if you just desire to plug in your GoPro Fusion Camera via USB to create your 360-degree photos. If yous want to understand a flake more near what's stored on the MicroSD cards, read on…

GoPro Fusion photo folder structure

You lot'll be able to tell which photos are from the front end and dorsum by examining the file prefix (GF = Front, GB = Back).

GoPro Fusion Micro SD 1 and 2

Protip: rename (and physically mark) your MicroSD cards as "i/F" and "2/B" so y'all tin easily identify them. They are formatted as front and back by the GoPro Fusion camera when commencement used and later on placing them in the wrong slot will effect in errors. The battery points out the correct slots for each card.

The front photograph files agree all of the GPS information in their EXIF information.

Using GoPro Fusion Studio

You can connect the GoPro Fusion to your computer using the supplied USB cable or indicate the software to where the photos are stored on your reckoner.

After shooting, I copy the front and dorsum files for each segment of the tour into individual folders on my computer. Oft the start and last twenty photos will exist me setting up the camera. Occasionally I am besides disturbed mid-bout (usually by animals) too. By moving to my computer first I tin remove photos that I desire to delete from the tour before processing.

If y'all exercise showtime deleting photo pairs before stitching, brand certain you delete the pair (eastward.yard. GF023401 and GB023401). If you lot have uneven number of photos GoPro Fusion Studio will not load the photos and testify an error.

GoPro Fusion Studio settings

Once yous're photos are loaded, have a play with some of the settings.

The central ones I tend to modify are:

  • Yaw: rotation around the forepart-to-back axis (use if camera facing left or right)
  • Pitch: rotation around the side-to-side axis (use if camera facing up or down)
  • Roll: rotation around the vertical axis (apply if camera tilted to left or correct)

Still unsure?

Roll pitch yaw diagram

It's the same basic logic every bit yous'll exist taught if you e'er learn to wing. Simply replace the airplane with a photographic camera in the diagram to a higher place.

GoPro Fusion Studio settings

Utilise the sliders to attempt and line up the horizon and make sure the centre of the photos is straight alee.

Make sure to movement the fourth dimension selector to different points to see if your settings look expert. You might accept the odd photo that was taken at a wonky angle (I take many like this where I've bent down or slipped) which is why checking against a larger number of photos is advisable.

The "take hold of a 360 photo" tool is also useful to examination your modifications. Using a 360-caste photo viewer (e.k. Insta360 Player) you'll be able to see if everything is level and as expected.

Annotation, don't mess around with the colour settings also much, if at all. If you plan to upload to Google Street View, images where colouration has been significantly modified (recollect Instagram filters) will be rejected by Google.

Y'all might notice GoPro Fusion Studio does not sew a 100% true 360-degree photograph due to pocket-size blind-spots betwixt the two GoPro Fusion lenses. These blind-spots are virtually unnoticeable in the stitched photos, and in fact work as an advantage to ensure the photo does capture monopod stand.

Once complete, select all the tour segments and add them to the render queue.

GoPro Fusion Studio rendering

Rendering = stitching.

You have a few more options to select here.

GoPro Fusion Studio render queue

Brand sure to select the highest resolution possible if you lot programme to upload to Street View (they must be at to the lowest degree 4K).

If you shot in time-lapse mode, set the video codec to JPEG OR TIFF. This volition produce individual photos.

Annotation: y'all tin can sew fourth dimension-lapse photos to video files using GoPro Fusion Studio, however, I have found these are incompatible with Google Street View with Google rejecting the video file. You lot must therefore record in video manner on the GoPro Fusion to produce a Street View compatible output using GoPro Fusion Studio.

I prefer private photos over video as it allows me to easily manage what I and what I don't upload. Information technology's easy to delete photos you don't want versus cutting up video files.

Before rendering, check the output location on your machine for stitched photos is correct. Yous can view or modify this location under "Preferences".

A discussion of warning

Rendering in GoPro Fusion Studio is memory intensive. I employ a MacBook Pro with a good CPU (i7 processor) and 16GB of RAM. Whilst fairly powerful, the rendering process will make my figurer unusable until the process completes. As a rough estimate, on my computer information technology takes 10 minutes for every 1GB of photograph output.

Annotation: Stitching video captures to video files is noticeably quicker and results in a significantly smaller output size.

In any case, time to make a cup of tea…

Function 5

Read Part five at present: Publish 360-Caste Photos to Street View

Update December 2019: You can now access the Trek Pack Getting Started Guide online with all the latest information you need to create, procedure and publish your own Street View Tours.

Update June 2020: A newer version of the Trek Pack (v2) exists, that superseeds the pack (v1) described in this post.