One of the bad things about working for universties is that they never issues bonuses either for Christmas or any other reason, so I've never gotten a bonus or tip for anything.

A few weeks ago I did some work for the Cultural Virtual Reality Lab at UCLA (Bernie's old lab) to make some QTVR panoramas synchronize with each other as one of them is turned (see example below). That feature can be very useful for showing a virtually constructed view versus a photographic view, as in this case. They paid me for the work and that's fine.

A couple days ago, someone posted to a mailing list for paid help with creating a similar file for showing before and after views for two panoramas he shot. Since the topic was very fresh in mind and I had a template I could just drop his files into, I responded and got the gig for $40. No big deal: a quick job for a little pocket money. He liked my fast response so he "gave me a little something extra" in the check, he said.

The check arrived, for $100. Nice tip, eh? 150% of the original charge!



Here are a couple QTVR synchronized files to show the technology -- click on the top one and move the mouse to see the bottom one keep the same perspective. This works for zooming as well as panning and tilting. (You'll need QuickTime to view them.)