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AZeats 360° Virtual Tours

Go Inside Without Driving

Long before street-view mapping or interactive 3D venue tours became standard, AZeats.com was offering Arizona diners a way to step inside local restaurants before booking a table. Starting as early as January 1, 2000, AZeats introduced 360° Virtual Tours, giving potential guests an immersive preview of dining rooms, patios, and lounges across the valley.


Behind the Lens and Technology

Creating interactive panoramas in 2000 was a meticulous, highly technical process. Every virtual tour on AZeats was shot and programmed by Harvey, with Bill  or Robert assisting on-location during the photo shoots.


To capture a full 360° View:

 

  • Specialized Gear: Harvey used a high-end camera, custom wide lens, and a precision tripod setup that rotated incrementally, capturing dozens of overlapping photos to complete a full rotation.


  • Custom Web Integration: About a week after a shoot, Harvey delivered completed webpages engineered with JavaScript and custom styling to match the look and feel of the individual client's website.


  • Comprehensive Previews: A standard virtual tour typically captured 5 distinct areas of a restaurant (such as the entrance, main dining room, bar, patio, and private event space).


  • Interactive Navigation: Users needed a Java-enabled browser to pan across the room by clicking and dragging their mouse, with keyboard shortcuts to zoom in and out.


Early Virtual Tours (Spring 2000)

By May 2000, AZeats hosted virtual tours for a prominent roster of Arizona dining locations and nightlife venues, including:


  • Anna’s Café


  • AXIS-RADIUS


  • Coyote Grill


  • Eddie Matney's


  • Grille at Troon North


  • Hard Rock Cafe


  • Jerry Tucci's Brick Oven Pizzeria


  • Marco Polo Cafe


  • Marco Polo Supper Club


  • Mastro's Steakhouse


  • Matta's


  • Mill Avenue Beer Company


  • Rancho Saguaro


  • Sesame Inn


At a time when most restaurant websites barely displayed static text menus, AZeats was already giving customers an interactive preview of local dining atmosphere—pioneering experiential web marketing in Arizona.


Unfortunately, we are unable to display an actual interactive virtual tour on this page because modern web browsers no longer support the legacy Java plugins and embedded files used in the early 2000s. However, our team is actively researching and archiving original source files. Should we recover those assets, we will convert them into a modern format and present them here, so be sure to check back for updates!