Point Hotspot Properties

Point Hotspots are interactive points in a virtual tour that link panoramas, open websites, PDFs, videos, and informational texts. This article covers all the properties of a point hotspots.

The hotspot properties are found in the Properties Panel and will appear once a hotspot is added or selected.

ID

The ID of the Point Hotspot. You’ll find this ID addressed in the Skin Editor and listed in the outputted XML. Pano2VR automatically assigns the IDs in consecutive order. They can be renamed.

Type

Choose what the hotspot will do. What you choose here will affect the Link Target URL below.

URL – Enter the website URL or file name of a node (i.e. http://www.example.com).
Tour Node – Connects tour nodes.
Image – Clicking on an image hotspot will result in opening an image. Click the folder button for Link Target URL to navigate to an image. Or drag an image to the Viewer to add an Image type point hotspot. To pop-up an image, see: Adding an Image Pop-Up
Video – Show a video when the hotspot is clicked. When Video is selected, a menu will appear for you to choose the video’s Source: URL, File, YouTube, Vimeo. See: Adding a Video Pop-up.
Info – Use this to popup an information window displaying the text entered for Description. See: Adding an Information Pop-up Box.
PDF – This hotspot will open a PDF. Drag PDFs to the Viewer to create the hotspot, or navigate to the file using the open file button for Link Target URL.

Skin-ID

Use the Skin-ID to connect this hotspot to a hotspot template. For example, if there is a hotspot template called, wiki, and you would like a point hotspot to take that template’s characteristics, you would enter, wiki, in this field.

Depending on the point hotspot’s type, the Skin-ID will be prefilled with an ID that is used by the hotspot templates in the built-in skin. For example, an info type point hotspot will be given the Skin-ID of ht_info. This can be overwritten if your skins do not use the same convention.

Title

Add the title of the hotspot here. This title will be visible (e.g. tooltip) when the mouse pointer hovers over the hotspot.

If the hotspot type is Tour Node, you will be able to choose between a custom title or to use the title of the connecting node (User Data Title of the linked node).

Description

Enter a description of the hotspot here or text for an information pop-up box. If you plan to use an information hotspot template, the description would appear in the info pop-up box.

Type Parameters

The options here will depend on what is chosen for Type.

The file field found in Image, Video File, and PDF, has a context menu. Right-click in field to bring up the menu.

URL and Info

Link Target URL – Enter the web or file path URL.
Target – Add a target to specify where/how to open the website (or panorama). This determines if the URL is opened in a new browser window, in the same window, etc. Use the Copy button to copy the same target to all nodes in the project. | Target | Action | |———|—————————————————————| | _blank | Opens the linked document in a new window or tab | | _parent | Opens the linked document in the parent frame | | _self | Opens the linked document in the same frame as it was clicked | | _top | Opens the linked document in the full body of the window |

Tour Node

Tour Node – Choose a node from the menu. Click the green arrow (Follow Hotspot Link) to open the linked node.
Target View – Specify the view that the linked panorama opens up to.
- Enter Target – Enter the Pan, Tilt, and Field of View in this field. This will override the default view settings in viewing parameters of the target node when entering through this hotspot. Enter the parameters separated by forward slashes (/), e.g. 324.0/-3.5/70.0.
- Forward – Use Forward to ensure that the target direction always moves forward in a tour. This will override the default view.
- Backward – Use Backward to look back to the previous node when arriving at the target node. For example, in a tour with 3 nodes (node1, node2, and node3), you may want the connection from node1 to node2 to node3 to have the forward target and the connection from node3 to node2 to have the backward target, so you can immediately move back to node 2 once you arrive at node 3.
Target Viewing Parameters – This window will appear after clicking the bullseye button. Rotate the panorama to the desired opening view and click OK when you’re done. This option is only available for Tour Node type hotspots. ✭ Tip: Command/Control-click on a point hotspot in the Viewer to open the Target Viewing Parameters.

Copy Target – Click the copy button to copy the target to all point hotspots. This option is only available for Tour Node type hotspots.
Distance – Enter the distance between nodes. If the panoramas have GPS, distance can be determined automatically by selecting Auto. ★ Distance can be displayed in text fields using placeholders in the skin and even used as triggers in logic blocks. This setting will also affect a hotspot’s size, or how near or far the hotspot is to the viewer in WebVR.

Image

Image File – Click the folder icon to navigate to the image file.
Target – Add a target to specify where/how to open the website (or panorama). This determines if the image is opened in a new browser window, in the same window, etc. Use the Copy button to copy the same target to all nodes in the project.

Video

Source – Select the video source. Depending on the chosen video source, specify the file, web URL or Youtube/Vimeo URL below:
Video File – Click the folder icon to navigate to the video file.
Video URL – Add the URL of the video.
YouTube ID. Add the YouTube share link. Time stamp links are accepted (i.e., https://youtu.be/ElPYmmlcUh8?t=307)
Vimeo ID – Add the Vimeo URL. (i.e. https://vimeo.com/694838103)

PDF

PDF File – Click the blue folder icon to navigate to and add the PDF file. Or drag the PDF to the space to the left of the folder icon add the file.

Auto Place / Lock Position

For Auto Place, both the current node and the node you are linking to need GPS data. It is selected by default when activating a ghost hotspot and is signified with a lock symbol on the hotspot. This means that if the GPS data or North of one of the two linked nodes changes, the hotspot will be automatically placed in its new, correct location.

If you wish to move the hotspot to a different location, deselect Auto Place and move the hotspot or change the Pan and Tilt parameters.

A point hotspot can be locked even if it does not have location data.§

✭ If you plan to upload your project to Google Street View, be sure that Auto Place is selected.

Pan

Adjust the placement of the hotspot along the horizontal axis.

Tilt

Adjust the placement of the hotspot along the vertical axis.

Custom Image

Here, you can quickly assign a hotspot a custom image. This is useful for when a specific image is needed for one particular hotspot. For instance, if you are using a skin, but one hotspot needs a different image/icon, you can add it here. Likewise, you can add a custom image without having to create and add a skin.

Add the custom image by clicking the folder and navigate to the image. Once the image is added, it’ll be visible in the Viewer. To resize the image, drag on the red handles.

Width and Height – The image’s dimensions.
3D Distorted – When selected, the image will correctly distort with the panorama. You can also set the field of view (FoV) to adjust the hotspot’s size.

✭ If you’d like to apply custom images for certain hotspot types that will appear throughout a project, you can do this using hotspot templates. See: Custom Hotspot Images

Custom Properties

Custom Properties allow for additional parameters.

Click the plus button to add a custom property. A dialog appears where you define the parameters of the custom property:

The custom property is a variable that can be used in the skin. For Type, choose from Text, Number, or True/False as the variable type.

Once a skin is opened from the Web Output, the variable created here will be added as a variable in the skin properties.

Custom Property for a Point Hotspot added as a Skin Variable

A custom property can also be created from existing skin variable. Long press the plus button to create a custom value from a skin variable.

Right-click the label of the custom property to change the default value and the description, and to delete the custom property.