Finals approach, and I’ve been working on my Big Project for art class, which is one of the first things due this year. I was initially planning on going with painting landscapes on spheres, something I’ll probably continue with (I’ve done several already, some of which came out quite nicely). But then I came across this amazing graphic when I was going through panoramic images on Wikimedia Commons, looking for references for the landscapes.

Turns out that it’s actually simple to do if one has Gimp and a suitable image – preferably a 360×180 panorama. (Of course, that kind of panorama is hard to make. It’s also possible to take a picture of a skyline whose ends meet up and use it instead.) So I spent the day installing Gimp and taking it out for a test drive. (This tutorial helped a lot.)

Here are the pictures I made:

This one was done from a true panorama, which is why it came out so well and required no tweaking (or any actual work for that matter) whatsoever. Picture from Wikimedia Commons.

This one is my favorite. Too bad I was working from such a low-res file. Also from Wikimedia Commons, but I don’t think it was a true panorama. Required tweaking and airbrushing to get the ends to meet up at the same place and in the same color and shade.

Also from the Commons, also needed work. Was a pain in the arse because I has to fill in some clouds where the ends met.

Anyway, this feature is a lot of fun. I’m thinking of doing a set of these pictures for my final project, blown up and hung on a wall. From my own photography, of course – not much to it just using other people’s pictures. Plus I’ve always wanted to learn how to do panoramas.