Thanks to Steve Clayton for keeping us up on the latest Live Labs news (you can follow Live Labs on Twitter – hey they’re hiring!), as they release a new project –Zoom.it. Zoom.it is a simple way to make and share deep zoom images, just input a url and Zoom.it will spit out a shortened url to a deep zoom image of that page. Here’s the obligatory LiveSide Zoom.it:
A short description on the website tells how it works:
Zoom.it converts your image to the Deep Zoom format, which lets you smoothly and efficiently explore the whole image, no matter how large. Check out Deep Zoom Studio for examples of this technology in action.
Zoom.it runs on Windows Azure and takes advantage of Microsoft Silverlight to provide the richest, most fluid zooming experience possible.
Along with an entry point on the website to create your own deep zoom image from any url, there’s also an API:
and here we’ve created the API image as it’s own Zoom.it image, so you can read it better (if you’re reading this in an RSS reader, you may have to click through to see the imagery).
And if you remember Pivot, and the PivotViewer, well BizSpark startup Fireside Experience, an independent application and video game development studio based in South Carolina, has created a PivotViewer App called Zoomappy. Zoomappy currently is showcasing Apple App Store Games, but they’ve got lots more in the pipeline, according to their website:
Try it out at Zoomappy.com/appstoregames.htm (give it a minute or two to load)