Don Bain's 360° Panoramas

Viewing the Panoramas

Structure of the Site

The Home page lists 92 regions. Each region contains from one to over a hundred localities. Each locality presents from one to twelve 360° panoramas with captions and navigation features.

Getting Started


On the Home page scroll down the list of states and regions. Click on a region you are interested in.

On the region page select the first locality, or whichever one interests you. It will take you to a collection of 360° panoramas. If you are working on a desktop or laptop computer or a tablet, the initial layout will be in standard view mode, with an option to change to simple view. If you are using a phone it will be in simple view mode.
 
In both modes the panoramas can be panned (rotated) around 360°, tipped up and down, and zoomed in or out. Some older panoramas are cylindrical, with limited vertical range. Most panoramas are spherical, with the ability to look straight up and straight down.

Standard Mode

The locality name is in the top left corner. It represent all the panoramas shown here.

Below the locality name there will be a box with a descriptive caption, the exact location, and the date of photography. This refers to the current 360 image and will change as you view more panoramas. To hide the caption box click on it, or on the locality name. To get it back, click the locality name again.
 
At the center-top there will be the website name Don Bain's 360° Panoramas. Click this link to go to the home page, scrolled to the appropriate place in the long list of regions.
 
In the top right corner there will be a thumbnail map showing the general location of this region. Click the thumb map to open a larger map window displaying the Open Street Map base map, with dots for all panoramas in this locality. The current panorama will be a red dot, the others yellow. You can pan the map and zoom in and out. If some of the dots are not currently in view a button appears offering to show all locations. Click any 360 symbol on the map to display that panorama. To close the map window click the thumb map again.
 
The wrench icon in the lower left corner will show (or hide) a tool bar. Buttons on the toolbar allow you to:
 
• show or hide the caption box 
• show or hide the thumbnail images 
• show or hide the navigation buttons 
• change control mode between drag and continuous 
• expand the pano window to fullscreen, or return it to the previous size 
• start or stop auto-rotation 
• return to the default pan and zoom 
• show more info

Click the wrench icon again to close the toolbar.
 
A row of thumbnail images will be at bottom-center, click any thumbnail to go to that 360. The current pano will be outlined in red, recently seen panos will display a checkmark.
 
Large navigation buttons are lined up below the thumbnails. With these it is possible to view a slide-show by repeatedly clicking the next 360 or previous 360 buttons. From the last 360 in a locality it will proceed to the first 360 in the next locality. From the first 360 it will go back to the last 360 in the previous locality. In this way it is possible to methodically view every 360° panorama in the region one by one.
 
The previous locality and next locality buttons will proceed through all localities in the current region, then loop around to begin again. The go to region button goes to the parent region page. The go to home button goes to the Home page of the entire site.
 
The simple view button in the bottom right corner hides some of the standard view items, and substitutes a compact navigation bar with arrows. This provides a less-cluttered view of the 360° panoramas.

Simple View

The simple view mode is automatic when viewing this site on mobile phones and other small screens. On larger screens you can chose it if you prefer a more streamlined layout.

The icons on the compact navigation bar do exactly the same things as the large navigation buttons in standard view
 
Most features appearing in standard view mode can be shown also in simple view mode by using buttons on the toolbar. But a phone will not show thumbnail images, the large navigation buttons, or the more info panel.

More Information

The more info button on the standard view toolbar provides additional information about the current locality and of each individual 360 panorama.

• metadata title will be used by some browsers to title the window, also when the locality page is bookmarked, and to name this page in search results
• metadata description will be used in reporting search results
• copyright, all parts of this site are copyright by G. Donald Bain and may not be used without explicit permission
• image file name is the stitched photographic image used to produce this panorama
• type of image describes whether the image used to make the current 360 is cylindrical (all the way around but limited up and down), or spherical (straight up and down as well as all around)
• date of photography of the current 360 panorama
• latitude and longitude of the current 360 panorama
• altitude of the current 360 panorama, as determined by Google Maps

My Recommendation

This site is arranged geographically, the regions and localities are presented roughly from north to south, west to east. The 360° panoramas in each locality usually follow a logical order also — north to south and west to east, or in a series along a road or river or valley, sweeping across a geographic area, bottom to top of a mountain, following a trail, or circling around the outside of a building then the inside. 

The standard view next 360 button (or the simple view right arrow) can be used to present a "slide show" that includes all the 360 panoramas in the current region. This is the recommended method for seriously viewing the site.
 
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The interface for this website was designed by Don Bain and Tony Redhead in May, 2025.