I first saw David Bergman's panorama of Barack Obama's inauguration earlier this year. I daresay that most people have seen it.  If you haven't take a look here:

http://www.davidbergman.net/blog/2009/01/22/how-i-made-a-1474-megapixel-...

I had been told that the image had been made with pro gear and that there were a team of photographers working on it. I had also heard that it was made with a multi million dollar scanning camera made by Canon and NASA that was one of the CIA's weapons against terrorism. It all sounded very believable because if you look at the image you can make out virtually everyones face in the crowd so any shooters or whatever in the crowd would be banged to rights.

The truth is stranger than fiction. The image was made by a pro photographer who was covering the inauguration ceremony but the photo is a panorama made up of 220 images from a compact camera (Canon G10) and a robotic device made by a company called Gigapan that costs $449. It was partly developed by NASA for making high res photos of the surface of the moon. It comes with it's own software and runs off batteries. Panoramas will never be the same again. I wonder if they are abvailable over here?

http://www.gigapan.org/index.php