BigView allows for interactive panning and zooming of images of arbitrary size on desktop PCs running Linux. Additionally, it can work in a multi-screen environment where multiple PCs cooperate to view a single, large image. Using this software, one can explore — on relatively modest machines — images such as the Mars Orbiter Camera mosaic [92,160×33,280 pixels].

The images must be first converted into “paged” format, where the image is stored in 256×256 “pages” to allow rapid movement of pixels into texture memory. The format contains an “image pyramid”: a set of scaled versions of the original image. Each scaled image is 1/2 the size of the previous, starting with the original down to the smallest, which fits into a single 256×256 page.

This program was written by Timothy Sandstrom of Advanced Management Technology for Ames Research Center. For further information, click here or contact the Ames Technology Partnerships Division at (650) 604-2954.