Warsaw Photographer Gets Job Opportunity With Google
July 28, 2016 at 4:25 p.m.
By Jordan Fouts-
Geswein, a Warsaw freelance photographer and teacher for 25 years, was asked to be one of more than 780 photographers nationwide who put together virtual business tours for Google Maps street view.
“I thought it was a friend messing with me,” she said of the job offer. “I thought, ‘Oh sure, you’re Google.’”
Her next step, once assured the offer was for real, was to see if Google Maps Business Photos was something she wanted to do.
“I don’t want to sell snake oil to people,” she said, since photographers are responsible themselves to sell the $395 service, so she asked herself if it’s a good product that benefits both parties. “Then I looked at the product and I thought, ‘This is the coolest thing.’”
Launched in February worldwide, Business Photos is a paid service that can add a 360-degree interior view of businesses to street view and search results. Geswein uses her own high-end digital cameras with fisheye lenses to take a series of HDR photos – a dozen shots for every placement of the camera – then stitches them together into a navigable virtual tour using proprietary Google software.
Geswein set up Michiana Business Photos (michianabizpics.com) in April as an independent contractor for Google. One of only eight in Indiana, she’s responsible for the South Bend region.
The Orange Door Dental Group is one of Geswein’s 20 or so clients in the area. Owner Dr. Christiaan Willig said he heard about the service from someone in the office, and thought it would be a good way to get people familiar with the business.
Finding the Warsaw dentist office through Google Maps or a search result gives a floor-to-ceiling panorama inside the waiting room. The images are detailed enough that zooming in almost lets you read signs and sticky notes on the wall – when viewing a store, the same level of detail lets you read the labels on all the products on the shelf.
Navigation arrows lead down the hall of the Orange Door and into one of the patient rooms, where you can see the chair and all the standard cleaning and exam equipment. Willig said Geswein had a lot of suggestions on how to put the virtual tour together, with a good eye for detail, and had it all on the Internet within two weeks.
“I’ve had real positive feedback, people who see it think it’s pretty neat,” he said. “There was a cost, but it more than paid for itself in being such a cool and useful detail to include in a webpage.”
Geswein said Google software engineers give feedback during development of a listing, which go into the mix along with customer suggestions. “You can change this or that on the fly,” she observed.
Google also has a rigid level of quality control, she said, with standards not only on quality but also on privacy. She’s very careful about patient information appearing in a doctor’s office, for example, and most virtual tours are photographed without any people in sight.
Listings stay up permanently after the initial fee, though they can be updated or removed at the business owner’s request. Geswein said some businesses like to swap out images depending on the season.
She noted she’s done a whole gamut of businesses, from restaurants and hotels to attorney and doctor’s offices, and said it’s been fun to feature really unique locations like a motorcycle shop in Plymouth with cycles hanging from the ceiling.
She also likes to browse international listings and see how, say, a shopkeeper in Brussels does it. She said about 200,000 businesses worldwide currently have virtual tours up, and that it’s especially popular in Europe.
While she works alone for now, Geswein said she’d like to assemble a team eventually.
“I’ve talked to Google about bringing in other photographers, especially my students,”said the former Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne instructor. “I always had a dream of working as a photographer, and I would love to make that dream come true for someone else.”[[In-content Ad]]
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Geswein, a Warsaw freelance photographer and teacher for 25 years, was asked to be one of more than 780 photographers nationwide who put together virtual business tours for Google Maps street view.
“I thought it was a friend messing with me,” she said of the job offer. “I thought, ‘Oh sure, you’re Google.’”
Her next step, once assured the offer was for real, was to see if Google Maps Business Photos was something she wanted to do.
“I don’t want to sell snake oil to people,” she said, since photographers are responsible themselves to sell the $395 service, so she asked herself if it’s a good product that benefits both parties. “Then I looked at the product and I thought, ‘This is the coolest thing.’”
Launched in February worldwide, Business Photos is a paid service that can add a 360-degree interior view of businesses to street view and search results. Geswein uses her own high-end digital cameras with fisheye lenses to take a series of HDR photos – a dozen shots for every placement of the camera – then stitches them together into a navigable virtual tour using proprietary Google software.
Geswein set up Michiana Business Photos (michianabizpics.com) in April as an independent contractor for Google. One of only eight in Indiana, she’s responsible for the South Bend region.
The Orange Door Dental Group is one of Geswein’s 20 or so clients in the area. Owner Dr. Christiaan Willig said he heard about the service from someone in the office, and thought it would be a good way to get people familiar with the business.
Finding the Warsaw dentist office through Google Maps or a search result gives a floor-to-ceiling panorama inside the waiting room. The images are detailed enough that zooming in almost lets you read signs and sticky notes on the wall – when viewing a store, the same level of detail lets you read the labels on all the products on the shelf.
Navigation arrows lead down the hall of the Orange Door and into one of the patient rooms, where you can see the chair and all the standard cleaning and exam equipment. Willig said Geswein had a lot of suggestions on how to put the virtual tour together, with a good eye for detail, and had it all on the Internet within two weeks.
“I’ve had real positive feedback, people who see it think it’s pretty neat,” he said. “There was a cost, but it more than paid for itself in being such a cool and useful detail to include in a webpage.”
Geswein said Google software engineers give feedback during development of a listing, which go into the mix along with customer suggestions. “You can change this or that on the fly,” she observed.
Google also has a rigid level of quality control, she said, with standards not only on quality but also on privacy. She’s very careful about patient information appearing in a doctor’s office, for example, and most virtual tours are photographed without any people in sight.
Listings stay up permanently after the initial fee, though they can be updated or removed at the business owner’s request. Geswein said some businesses like to swap out images depending on the season.
She noted she’s done a whole gamut of businesses, from restaurants and hotels to attorney and doctor’s offices, and said it’s been fun to feature really unique locations like a motorcycle shop in Plymouth with cycles hanging from the ceiling.
She also likes to browse international listings and see how, say, a shopkeeper in Brussels does it. She said about 200,000 businesses worldwide currently have virtual tours up, and that it’s especially popular in Europe.
While she works alone for now, Geswein said she’d like to assemble a team eventually.
“I’ve talked to Google about bringing in other photographers, especially my students,”said the former Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne instructor. “I always had a dream of working as a photographer, and I would love to make that dream come true for someone else.”[[In-content Ad]]
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