Combine aerial imagery pictures to create a layer

Question

We are looking for software or a web service that we can put in pictures we took using our weather balloon to create a single image, that we can use as a layer for our GIS project. Preferably free, or free for education.

EDIT: We use a ESRI system

Answer 1

The Towson University geospatial research & education lab has done something similar. They used Microsoft Image Composite Editor to mosaic pictures captured from a balloon and Microsoft Photosynth for capturing and viewing in 3D.

http://pages.towson.edu/morgan/bap/BAP_Poster.pdf

See the contact info on the PDF for more information/questions.

Answer 2

I don't know if software is quite good enough yet to do this automatically, though I know Microsoft Research was doing some cool stuff along these lines a few years ago. Ah, here we are, PhotoSynth

An alternate option is manually georeferencing with something like QGIS or GvSIG or any one of a number of free Open Source GIS. Then Mosaic them together using GDAL or its ilk.

You can possibly outsource the work, but as you likely have students around its probably a better idea (cheaper and educative) to get them to do it.

Answer 3

We have not ever tried it, but could be interesting: http://mapknitter.org/

I guess it needed an internet connection with a important speed!

Good job!