The city of London has long been a subject for panoramas by artists, mapmakers, and topographers. Many of their works have this as their title.
The earliest topographical drawings preceded maps according to modern definition, although they were mainly based on surveys or multiple drawings reduced to a (fairly) consistent perspective, as it is clearly impossible for them to have been produced from any single real viewpoint, unlike modern photographic panoramas. Wenceslaus Hollar's 1647 Long View of London from Bankside is an exception. Projected from a single viewpoint it resembles the perspective of a modern panoramic photograph.
Amongst the earliest known is that by Flemish topographer Anton van den Wyngaerde, produced in 1543 and published by London Topographical Society in 1881 with key added on bottom as reproduced here: [1]
Others include Van Visscher's of 1616:
Wenceslaus Hollar's Long View of London from Bankside of 1647:
Another by Hollar, 1666
Many modern panoramic photographs of London exist, from many different viewpoints:
Google Street View, a technology featured in Google Maps and Google Earth, provides connected and interactive panoramas from locations around the world, including throughout all of London, with views outdoors and indoors.
In Google Maps, when a user clicks on the yellow figure (named "Pegman"), that activates the street view map layer, which shows blue lines and blue circles superimposed upon the map, which represent what Street View panoramas are available. In order to see panoramas of those locations, the user either clicks on, or drags and drops Pegman onto, a blue line or blue circle on the map.
Street panoramas are all connected along solid blue lines, so that the user may virtually "drive" around on London streets from one panorama to the next (by clicking with the mouse pointer in the view), and look around in all directions from any point along the journey (by swiping the picture in the desired direction, or clicking on the compass-like rotation icon). Some off-street panoramas are connected with (typically dotted) blue lines to each other, while the blue circles on the map are standalone panoramas (called "image spheres"), which provide a single 360-degree view (usually with no connectivity to other views).
Some example Street Views from London's street system:
Some example Street View off-street panoramas in London:
Panoramic paintings are massive artworks that reveal a wide, all-encompassing view of a particular subject, often a landscape, military battle, or historical event. They became especially popular in the 19th century in Europe and the United States, inciting opposition from some writers of Romantic poetry. A few have survived into the 21st century and are on public display. Typically shown in rotundas for viewing, panoramas were meant to be so lifelike they confused the spectator between what was real and what was image.
A panorama is any wide-angle view or representation of a physical space, whether in painting, drawing, photography, film, seismic images, or 3D modeling. The word was coined in the 18th century by the English painter Robert Barker to describe his panoramic paintings of Edinburgh and London. The motion-picture term panning is derived from panorama.
Blackfriars is in central London, specifically the south-west corner of the City of London.
QuickTime VR is an image file format developed by Apple Inc. for QuickTime, and discontinued along with QuickTime 7. It allows the creation and viewing of VR photography, photographically captured panoramas, and the viewing of objects photographed from multiple angles. It functions as plugins for the QuickTime Player and for the QuickTime Web browser plugin.
Google Maps is a web mapping platform and consumer application offered by Google. It offers satellite imagery, aerial photography, street maps, 360° interactive panoramic views of streets, real-time traffic conditions, and route planning for traveling by foot, car, bike, air and public transportation. As of 2020, Google Maps was being used by over one billion people every month around the world.
Wenceslaus Hollar was a prolific and accomplished Bohemian graphic artist of the 17th century, who spent much of his life in England. He is known to German speakers as Wenzel Hollar; and to Czech speakers as Václav Hollar. He is particularly noted for his engravings and etchings. He was born in Prague, died in London, and was buried at St Margaret's Church, Westminster.
VR photography is the interactive viewing of panoramic photographs, generally encompassing a 360-degree circle or a spherical view. The results is known as VR photograph, 360-degree photo, photo sphere, or spherical photo, as well as interactive panorama or immersive panorama.
Google Street View is a technology featured in Google Maps and Google Earth that provides interactive panoramas from positions along many streets in the world. It was launched in 2007 in several cities in the United States, and has since expanded to include cities and rural areas worldwide. Streets with Street View imagery available are shown as blue lines on Google Maps.
Robert Barker was a famous painter from Kells, Co. Meath, Ireland.
Jacob Peter Gouwy or Jacob Peter Gowy was a Flemish Baroque painter of history paintings and portraits. He collaborated with Peter Paul Rubens and spent time in England where he was active as a portrait painter. As the creator of a large picture of a horse painted in England he can be considered one of the pioneers of the genre of portraits of horses.
Eye2eye Software Ltd is a UK educational software publisher, which has systematically photographed Britain in 360 degree panoramas and stills, publishing the collection as the school resource and home reference Eye2eye Britain. Using a portable panoramic camera developed by themselves they have followed a 'points of interest' approach – taking panoramas on mountains, beaches, inside parliaments, factories, heritage sites, etc., rather than a street (car) based approach like Google street view.
William Burton (1609–1657) was an English schoolmaster and antiquary, best known for his posthumously-published commentary on the Antonine Itinerary.
Anton van den Wyngaerde was a prolific Flemish topographical artist who made panoramic sketches and paintings of towns in the southern Netherlands, northern France, England, Italy, and Spain. He is best known for the many panoramas of cities in Spain that he drew while employed by Philip II. After his death, his works were dispersed into different collections, and their importance neglected. Their historical and artistic value have been recently rediscovered.
The Visscher panorama is an engraving by Claes Visscher (1586-1652) depicting a panorama of London. It shows an imagined view of London in around 1600. The engraving was first published in Amsterdam in 1616, with the title "Londinum Florentissima Britanniae Urbs Toto Orbe Celeberrimum Emporiumque".
Google Business Photos is a virtual tour service started by Google. It uses the same photography technique used in Google Street View in order to offer 360˚ interactive panoramas inside businesses. Once the virtual tour is published by Google, the link to the tour is displayed directly on the search results page. The tour is also published on Google+ Local pages and Google Maps. A user visiting a business published virtual tour can navigate inside the business in the same way a user of Google Street View can navigate roads, streets and highways.
Long View of London from Bankside is a panoramic etching made by Wenceslas Hollar in Antwerp in 1647. It depicts a panorama of London, based on drawings done while Hollar was in London in the early 1640s. Unlike earlier panoramas of London, Hollar's panorama takes a single viewpoint, the tower of St Saviour in Southwark, from where he made the drawings. It shows the River Thames curving sinuously from left to right past the viewpoint.
Media related to Panoramics of London at Wikimedia Commons