... gallery listings, art exhibtions and shows, design news and events
... and ticket sales outlets
Torontowide is a site dedicated to exploring and documenting the
city of Toronto, Canada at the turn of the new century through a technique , digital panoramas, unique to it's time. We're archiving an extensive record of life in one of the most vibrant and diverse cities for
transmission on the world's most far-reaching medium of communication - the internet. .
We're also committed to promoting the excellence within the city's performing arts community through our city events
listings, broken down into several distinct categories that allow visitors to connect directly to many notable Toronto entertainment events and sites of interest, and our download wallpaper calendars that come complete
with an entire month's activities at a glance.
This site is optimized for viewing at 1024 x 768 resolution, High Colour 16 bit setting. All imagery on the site is digitally watermarked and is the
exclusive copyrighted property of Torontowide.com. Any unauthorized use of imagery from Torontowide.com without the written consent of the author is prohibited and illegal under Canadian and International
law.
Douglas Brown has been producing award-winning photography in the commercial photography field for over
twenty years.
In his early years in the business, he photographed for many Toronto publications including NOW Magazine, Toronto Life, Chatelaine and Canadian Business. As well, his work on CD covers
and promotional material in the music business received national and international attention, appearing around the world in various publications.
Douglas was also Head Photographer for one of Canada's first
e-commerce sites producing tri-annual print and online catalogues for several years. It was about this time that his work in VR imaging led to an interest in experimenting with the technique for the print medium, or in
the case of online usage, a static image. " I did VR work for many years, and often felt the thumbnail images were equally interesting. I noticed that a lot of times a unique image that engaged and challenged the mind
as a thumbnail, became something more ordinary in the VR viewer. It's as if the unswerving 'reality' of the VR panorama can drain the image of creative vitality. VR has it's uses and is a fascinating tool, but I
prefer to think of my stitching program as an infinite wide-angle lens, and shoot accordingly. Released from the structure of shooting in VR, I find you can often focus the photograph more by leaving out the blank, the
boring, and the unassocited areas sometimes found in virtual panoramas."
He has written articles on digital photography for both Luminous Landscape and MyFourThirds.com. Links to articles written by Douglas Brown include; An article about panoramic shooting click here , covering the chaos of L'Oreal Fashion Week click here , a user report on the Olympus E3 click here , and a review on the Sony A700 click here
This site has used a variety of cameras over the years.
Currently we use the Olympus E3 or E510 cameras with superb digital Zuiko lenses in focal lengths of 12-60mm. 50-200mm, and 70-300mm which combined with the Olympus 1.4 teleconveter gives us a effective focal range of
24 - 840mm ( in 35mm terms). Our Olympus equipment produces beautiful out-of-camera JPEG's to speed up workflow, and most of the equipment is heavily weatherproofed allowing photography in any
conditions. We also occasionally use our older Canon 20D with EF 70-200mm, Sigma 18-50 2.8, Sigma 10-20mm as well when two cameras with higher frame rates are required or
extreme lighting conditions might be encountered.
We rarely scan from prints anymore prior to stitching, but when this is necessary use the CANON 600 x 1200 dpi 42 bit N650U scanner
Although many
of the panoramas in the Galleries were taken handheld ( yes, it is possible), for the majority of subjects we prefer to attach the camera to a Kaidan KIWI VR tripod mount. It's sturdy, functional and, fingers crossed,
hasn't broken down yet despite it's permanent home through all seasons in the trunk of the car.
Our stitching program of choice is the old and reliable PhotoVista program. However many of our panoramas are now
a combination of stitched imagery and hand assembly in PhotoShop.
