Deep Zoom: proof that Microsoft is still capable of amazing technology

Friday, June 6th, 2008

I can’t remember the last time a Microsoft technology demo knocked my socks off.  But yesterday, during a presentation for this year’s Imagine Cup, Microsoft’s Mark Taylor demonstrated the company’s Deep Zoom technology to appreciative gasps of admiration from the computing students present. And one demo-weary journalist.

Taylor started with a web browser displaying a rather grainy photo of Paul McCartney’s signature:

So far so what? But then he zoomed out of the photo to reveal that the signature was actually a tiny detail on the foot of a Beatles figuerine:

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