Snapshot courtesy David Bergman

In an age when Google Street Level is putting Main Street America on the map, pictorially speaking, there is another company putting super high-definition photographs that can be panned and scanned on the Internet too.

Gigapan.org says it "allows users to upload, share, and explore brilliant gigapixel+ panoramas from around the globe." And the pictures located on their web pages are phenomenal. Take a look at this one of President Barack Obama's inauguration.  The expressions on some of the faces are priceless.

 Taken by ordinary digital cameras, the magic is in the robotic scanning device - the Gigapan Epic.

It allows a simple camera to take many pictures and then, using stitching software, to create the incredibly detailed close-up pictures as seen on their web sites.

Here is the wave of the future.  Pictures so detailed a viewer can tell who is dozing during the Inaugural Address.  And of course, access to these pictures is available through the web.  Ain't technology grand?