click here to open project

In addition to developing interactive and educational applications for clients, they produce their own body of works, which range from purely artistic fine-art panoramic prints, interactive installations and sculpture, to high-end interactive panoramic exhibits, CD-ROMs, DVDs and web applications.

Although they do commercial panorama work, the bulk of their projects center on virtual tours and imagery of National Parks. “The typical web-based virtual tour is actually the least of the work that we do with everything,” says Gene Cooper. “To this point, we've photographed about 30-35 National Parks. We'll be releasing some big new products this year. One in particular is Ancient Ruins of the Southwest, which covers about 19 parks. In this case, we have about 150 panoramas in interactive format with maps, interpretive text, additional interactivity, etc. on the CD-ROM.” The team is just finishing up the Grand Canyon Colorado River panos and another project, Ancient Ruins of the Southwest, which covers 19 parks; both will be released on CD-ROM with interactive maps and interpretive text in the spring of 2004.

The duo kindly agreed to show VRMAG readers a sample of their stunning Grand Canyon panoramas, and answer a few questions about their work:

Your panos are stunning apart from the natural beauty of the subject! Please tell us a bit about your backgrounds and who does what in terms of expertise.

We're both trained as fine artists and have been working together for the past 10 years. About 4 years ago, we started the company Four Chambers Studio together to pursue the panoramic photography projects. We both do every part of the process of shooting, processing, and packaging the panoramas themselves. When it comes to the final products and websites, Gene does the programming and Taylor (with a background in writing/editing) develops the interpretive content for the projects.

You spent 17 days traveling down the Colorado River shooting panos on the O.A.R.S. expedition; can you tell us more about the nature of this expedition?

The 17-day trip that we were on was managed by the OARS (Outdoor Adventure River Specialists) expedition company and is typical of the trips they offer. On this trip, there were about 17 passengers and 8 crewmembers with some passengers and crew exchanging at the mid-point at Phantom Ranch (about 7 days from Lees Ferry). The trip for us was a great experience allowing us to photograph parts of the canyon only accessible via the river and boat. We choose the non-motorized trip because it allowed us the most time to capture the panoramas and allows for a more intimate experience of the canyon. During the trip, numerous stops and hikes along the way allowed us to traverse deeper into the side canyons guided and supported by the OARS crew. The panoramas produced will be featured on the OARS website and marketing and also used in some of the products that we'll be developing on the Grand Canyon. The new OARS website with panoramas is online now.

Did you employ outside photographers for this trip? What equipment did you use?

We do all of the panoramic work ourselves and use a variety of equipment. For this trip we used a Nikon Coolpix5000 (with IBM 1GB Microdrive) with a Kaidan Spherical Tripod head and a One-Shot panoramic setup with a Minolta X-700 35mm camera with slide film. To store the Gigabytes of images throughout the trip we packed along a laptop computer and solar charging unit to maintain battery power throughout the trip. A loaner solar charging (SolarRoll) unit was donated for the trip by Brunton. All of the equipment was packed in Pelican waterproof hardcases.

Can you outline some of the difficulties encountered shooting in this environment?

The most difficult aspect of the shooting was the lack of any power source along the 200+ miles of river. At the mid-point, Phantom Ranch, there are facilities such as a pay phone and a couple places where you might be able to recharge but time didn't permit us to stop to recharge and if we had been able to the charge for our laptop would only have lasted for about 2 days. The solar setup and portable battery source we brought along helped us overcome this hurdle and allowed us not only to download the images to the laptop but also burn CDROM backups of the data. Altogether we captured about 8 GB of data and shot 20 rolls of slide film.

Beyond the power difficulties, other challenges included keeping the equipment dry, carrying the equipment on some of the more rigorous hikes, and working with the crew to make special sometimes unscheduled stops along the river.

How did you become interested in photographing the National Parks?

We first gained interest in photographing National Parks while experimenting with panoramic work on camping trips in Death Valley National Park. At the time, digital photography was in its infancy still and was expensive so we shot on 35mm and without any special tripod heads. The panoramas were certainly not perfect but we enjoyed the work so much that we began to talk about doing the work more professionally. A couple of years later, our first project was photographing Yellowstone National Park. We spent about 3 weeks photographing the park, shooting and waiting for geysers 12-14 hours a day and then processing imagery in the campgrounds at night. We developed our first CD-ROMs, marketed them to the Park Association and local stores and have since photographed about 25 other parks throughout the United States. Our largest project to date covers ancient ruins in the Southwest and includes panoramas, interpretive content, maps, etc from 19 parks such as Mesa Verde, Bandelier, Montezuma Castle, etc.

You’re currently under contract to produce a website for the Grand Canyon Association. Can you tell us about this?

We are currently working with the Grand Canyon Association to redesign and develop their website and online stores. The Grand Canyon Association supports the park directly and serves as a premiere source for Grand Canyon information and activities. In the spring, their new website will be completed including a redesign of the Grand Canyon Field Institute (a program of the Grand Canyon Association). In addition we've completed a virtual tour of their changing art exhibits featured at the Kolb Studio on the edge of the canyon. We've photographed the first show and will be photographing each show in panoramic format (about 4 per year). Web visitors to their site are able to view the gallery and click on artwork within the panoramas to view details and enlargements of the work.

You’ve described yourselves as a for-profit company that operates in non-profit mode. Can you tell us about some of your non-profit creative endeavors?

For the most part, we don't drive dividends or funds back into our own personal pockets. The company does support each of us as employees but most of the funds from the projects are generally funneled back into the company in different ways. Those include supporting new projects, artistic exhibitions and equipment, and the funds are used to increase our ability to offer discounts on service and products for our National Park clients and stores.

You plan on releasing a CD-ROM of your Grand Canyon panos this spring; is this in conjunction with the GCA or something you’re doing independently and, if so, who are your target customers?

All of our products are produced independently. However, we always work closely with the National Parks to ensure the accuracy of the information and utilize them as a collaborator of sorts that can offer us guidance and a unique perspective on the work that we do. They have their pulse on the public audience that they serve and its part of their mission to help facilitate educational activities and endeavors. Park service personnel are generally willing (as their schedules and workload allows) to meet with us, review information we're developing, and provide feedback. The affiliated associations for each park handle the products sold in the official park stores. We work closely with them before our products are finished to ensure that what we are doing is of value to the public, would be able to be sold in the stores, and include educational content that most associations strongly encourage. We're currently planning on releasing the Grand Canyon CD-ROM in the summer or fall of 2004. Our target customers include the wide-range of visitors that come to the parks for recreation, vacation, exploration of the park environments, hiking, rafting, etc.
Email: gene@fourchambers.org