360° interactive views of Waterfalls throughout western North America.
Requires QuickTime
Waterfalls make difficult VR subjects. The most important feature (the falling water) is white, and the surroundings are often dark. The normal viewpoints tend to be one-directional, and there may be little of interest in view except the falls itself. The viewpoints are sometimes crowded with other photographers. Plus there is the issue of driving spray at the base of big falls in spring.
I feel that many of these waterfall VR's convey a much better sense of what it is like to be there, at the falls, than a regular photograph can. Many famous falls are in spectacular canyons or beautiful forests, which you will barely glimpse in a regular photograph. But in a VR you can look all around.
I am pretty broad in my definition of waterfalls, including the dramatic Dry Falls area of eastern Washington, a few dam spillways, and a number of rapids and cascades. Some of the great falls have still eluded me (most notably the falls of Havasu Canyon in Arizona, Feather Falls in the northern Sierra Nevada, Della Falls on Vancouver Island, and Hunlen Falls in the Coast Mountains of BC). Many others could be photographed again, better, with wider lenses and sophisticated technique (such as high dynamic range).
My best pictures of waterfalls are presented below in geographic groups, followed by a listing of all panoramas on the site that include a waterfall.
My Best VR Panoramas of Waterfalls
- Western Canada
- Pacific Northwest
- Columbia River Gorge
- Rocky Mountain States
- California
- Yosemite National Park
- Yosemite Valley
- Pacific Northwest
- The Comprehensive List
- All VR Panoramas of Waterfalls on the Virtual Guidebooks site
