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Panelmatrix brings new dimensions to photography

Grahamstown is a small University town in South Africa with a total of four one hour photo-labs. One hour photo laboratories are normally service providers, developing customers films using technology provided by mother companies. In a special reversal of this story, James and Duncan Greaves have developed technology which expands the applications of their existing one-hour photo lab equipment. They recently launched a product, called PanelMatrix, at the SASOL SciFest 2004 which can turn a simple photograph into a massive work of art.

PanelMatrix is the concept of producing large photographic images by means of a set of panels pieced together into a matrix to make the complete image. Sounds simple, but the trick is in the specially developed PanelMatrix software.

How it works

An image is digitized either from a negative, a slide, original photograph or acquired direct from a digital image (ie. digital camera).

From within the software program a user selects the image and displays it on the screen. Simply enter the physical size of the required panels available on the printer available and enter the number of panels required to make up the mural. (ie. how many across and down). The panel slices are shown on the screen. The entire image or just a certain segment can be selected. And with the press of a button, the program sets about making up the image panels to make up the mural. It also produces a cover sheet and a tag on-the-fly. The cover sheet is the same size as the panels being generated while the tag is a smaller postcard image used on the outside of the complete package.

Once the image panels have been created digitally, they are sent to the printer. The printed panels are then pieced together to make up the mural.

Calibration

Greaves says that the coding was simple enough but the main obstacle to overcome was to accurately compensate for the bleed, or overlap that is lost when the printer prints all the way to the edge of the paper and a little more. The "little more" became the main focus of the program to overcome in the beginning.

Before the panels can be generated with any accuracy, the overlapping bleeds have to be compensated for, requiring a calibration process. Once the physical output panel sizes have been entered, a calibration print is made. This print reveals a series of concentric circles on the edge of each side. These circles and keys are counted to align the target points to the edges. The process is then repeated until exact alignment is achieved. The final entry is then saved for that particular size panel for future reference. Depending on the accuracy of the printer, this calibration might need to be done from time to time to ensure exact alignment.

Market

Greaves wrote the software specifically with the Fujifilm Frontier Digital lab in mind but it should work on any digital processing machine. Today there are more than 100 around the country and over 1000 world wide. Other labs in South Africa have already expressed a committed interest in acquiring the software.

The team recently launched the first in a series of image themes "Windows into Africa". These huge mural displays show the many faces of the African landscape as well as its diverse wild life. Greaves says that the main market for the "Windows into Africa" series are tourists but it appears that the corporate world such as motor companies wishing to display high quality and really large images of cars in show rooms are showing much interest. So too are décor companies and theatre set designers eyeing PanelMatrixes as backdrops. Visit their website for a range of stunning imagery for sale.

The beauty of the PanelMatrix system is in the packaging, The images are portable, easily packed in a box and then assembled later.

And how big can they go? Greaves says that the largest image they have generated was a 225 panel PanelMatrix measuring 5.7 metres wide by 3.7 metres high. And this is by no means the limit.

More information:

Visit Windows into Africa at www.windowsintoafrica.com/ for more information, catalogues and pricing.

Images above copyright Windows into Africa.

Contact: James Greaves - info@windowsintoafrica.com 

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