Hi! I decided to take some time this week to continue my search for what program is best for my needs to share my 360° media. Today I’m focusing on the My360 web application!
I used the Ricoh Theta SC Hatsune Miku to capture my photos/videos as usual. I am interested in trying out different 360° programs in order to find what fits my needs best; something quick, efficient, and optimized for social media.
Initial Thoughts
The My360 website is a little wordy, but overall easy to navigate. My360 works as a monthly subscription, but only has a single tier (outside of the free trial version). This is cool and different from what I’ve seen generally for virtual tour software.
Once you’ve activated your trial (I did an education one), you are brought to a dashboard. This dashboard simplifies nothing and serves more as a bulletin board. I don’t know if this changes in the paid version, as the dashboard has announcements, news, and information on setting up your account. All things considered, this dashboard is kind of overwhelming in a bad way, but the trial makes it clear what you are supposed to do: create a tour, watch a tutorial, and complete your profile. In that order.
Clicking on the “Create 1st Tour” option allows you to begin setting up your virtual tour. Because I was following the steps, I did not watch a tutorial at this time. Setting up a tour is quite simple, you enter your desired information in (a title, maybe a location, etc) and then can batch upload panoramas to your tour. This is nice because generally, the virtual tour creators I’ve played around with don’t allow you to skip information (such as a street address, for example!).
I went back and watched the tutorial and was then able to change my hotspots as well as add in my logo image and tour color. Watching the tutorial on the My360 dashboard makes it really clear that this web tool is meant to help realtors and photographers collaborate on tours together. This is a cool tool for teams, but maybe not so much for the individual user.
My biggest issue with My360 is that the program is incredibly basic and kind of underwhelming. It doesn’t feel like there is much option to personalize your tours, and the options that are available do not feel innovative or different than other virtual tour software. It seems like you can do a lot with My360, but with the free trial version it feels very limited (not only because I could only make 2 tours!).
If you’d like to view my tour, you can do so here. I had some issues with my nadir cover, but got it working in an ugly way! I don’t love the lack of customization for nadir images, I feel like there should be an option to edit what I’m working with, outside of on my computer. In general, here are my pros and cons for the My360 web tool:
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Social media integration | Application does not have any unique features |
| Good for teams, professionals in the real estate and virtual tour spaces | Not geared towards hobbyists |
| Quick image uploads | No tiers, free or paid |
| Tool is simple to use, don’t need to finish entire 30 min. Tutorial to understand product | No editing abilities |
Concluding Thoughts
The My360 tool is competent for individuals who need to create a virtual tour but are unsure about how to do so; the tutorial is easy to follow and the website itself relies mostly on words rather than symbols, making it easy to navigate. That said, this product is not as customizable as I would like and does not offer enough unique features to offset the high cost and low-res design.