Image Database Server Comes Your Way Now! By Yeung Man

To extend the image border for our colleagues, we are pleased to announce that an Image Database Server, a new University facility, goes into service now. This facility uses the image database software “Live Picture”, which runs on a SUN system, to distribute and view high-resolution, streaming images over the network. It also provides capability for users to store and retrieve images flexibly. Colleagues can easily use the software by invoking it from the Intranet.

To demonstrate some of the possible uses of this brand-new facility, a ready-to-use image library named “CityImage” has been established. The CityImage is a Web-based collection of images made ready for staff and students for academic, research and administrative uses. At the moment there are 3 categories: CityU Album, Image Collections and Reality Studio.

To pay a visit, invoke the Intranet homepage and click “CityImage”.

CityU Album

CityU Album is a photo collection of CityU’s people, places and events prepared by the Media Production Service (MPS) and some other departments. It consists of photos in various resolutions to fit the need of different applications. Through a Web browser, CityU Album allows one to zoom in on a photo for a closer look at the high-resolution images. The images are categorised by theme and the Album will be updated monthly. The actual resolution of the images can be used to produce hard copies up to around A3 size and therefore the file size required may be up to around 50MB.

(Note: Watermarks are added in the Album to prevent downloading of the images for illegal use. The original copies and actual images will not contain these watermarks.)

Image Collections

As the name suggests, Image Collections aims to provide photo collections of wide variety and diverse interest and its content is not limited to the CityU. Departments are invited to establish other collections for their teaching or research purposes.

Permission to use a particular collection is at the discretion of the owner, and colleagues have to observe the copyright law when using the images. For more information, you may contact the staff of the MPS.

Reality Studio

Reality Studio contains a number of sample Web pages capturing 3-D objects by using the Reality Studio tool set. The tool set can be used for creating, editing, serving and viewing zoomable contents and it allows Web designers to create 360° photo-realistic panoramas which can be linked to other scenes, objects and URLs. This can give visitors a “Walk-through” experience – they can explore all sides of a scene or examine objects in great detail.

How to get a copy of the image?

CityU colleagues are encouraged to build their applications using the image database software, or to enrich or simply use the content of the CityImage for academic and administrative purposes. If you need to get a copy of any of the photos in the CityU Album, please mark down the file name and pass it to the staff in the MPS (inside the Computing Services Centre). As for the images of the Image Collections, please check with the MPS for details. The images can be delivered in the form of hardcopy or electronic formats, and the service will be provided at a cost. For enquiries, please contact the MPS at ext. 8257.