In this article, we will explain how to create a 360 virtual tour of your car, this will elevate your customers’ online buying experience by providing an immersive view from all angles. To produce this virtual showroom, you will not need any technical photography knowledge, post-production editing skills, or dedicated hardware.
Our simple capturing process will allow you fully remove and customize the background, add a virtual floor and give your 360 tour a turntable-like effect to meet your needs. Within 15 minutes you will have a 360 virtual tour with custom branding, interactive hotspots, condition reports, and more.
If you’d like to learn more or need assistance at any step, feel free to book a meeting with us to walk you through the process.
All that’s required to create your exterior 360 spin is a smartphone, both Android and iOS will work. Ideally, if your smartphone has an ultra-wide angle you will be able to capture your 360 walk-around with the least amount of space. The newer the smartphone camera the better your results will end up. Although it is not necessary, as our technology auto-aligns and auto–scales your car, some users enjoy using a gimbal to further stabilize the shot. Another way to elevate your virtual tour is to add an interior panoramic angle which will require 2 more pieces of equipment, a 360 camera, and a monopod. Below you will find a few recommended links to the most commonly used hardware:
Keep in mind that having more mechanical equipment will increase the possibility of unforeseen issues.
You can download the Glo3D app via Google Play or App Store, from there either log in or start registering. You should first configure the “Application Settings” when you head to the Home Page. Based on your previous activities, the Home Page can be different. If it is the first time you are using the Glo3D app to create a 360 car virtual tour, you will go to “Automotive Settings“. Here you can adjust everything to be a good fit for your needs. Once your settings are correct you can begin scanning the VIN of the vehicle, using our VIN decipher system it will automatically pull the basic vehicle & safety information (ie: make, model, etc.). We will use the VIN to match our 360 virtual tours to your inventory management system.
Broadly speaking, we have two types of 360 car photography namely, exterior and interior. The exterior 360 photos in which the car will be the center point as you walk around the car. After completing the capture, you will be able to apply desired changes to the 360 tour. The guided capturing process will depend on the setup you decided on in the “Automotive Settings”.
The interior (panoramic) photos mean that the camera is in the center of the car and scans a 360 image from inside. For the interior photos, if you want to use a 360 camera, you need to follow a process to get it connected to your smartphone. Having a monopod will be handy in this case to position the panoramic shot at eye level. Similar to the exterior photos, you can adjust what you need at the end.
Hotspots are used to highlight any specific parts of the car that are important for your audience to see in detail. You can edit the type and number of hotspots you wish to provide for each vehicle. Depending upon what kind of car you would like to capture, you will see a different outline. Both exterior and interior condition reports can be created here, they will help identify any issues with the vehicle such as a scratch, a tear, or a dent.
Once you complete your capture, there are lots of features you can access by signing in to your account on Glo3d.net. These features include background removal, auto alignment, auto-scaling, improving the quality, adding customized background, embedding, creating various formats to share, and adding albums to name a few.
Our ultimate goal is that you just walk around the car and capture your hotspots, then we take care of the rest. The entire system is designed to be easy to follow with simple instructions and we have automatic integration to connect your virtual tours directly to your website. More significantly, there is no post-processing you need to do! If you are seeking to learn more about capturing your virtual showroom, there is a wide variety of Glo3D tutorial videos on our YouTube channel to help you.
If you’d like to learn more or need assistance at any step, feel free to book a meeting with us to walk you through the process.
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