This is the result of projecting the panoramic sphere onto the surface of a cylinder:
Cylindrical panoramas can have a horizontal field of view of up to 360 degrees. In the vertical direction the projection behaves similar to rectilinear: the vertical field of view has a physical limit of 180 degrees, and a practical limit of about 120 degrees. Cylindrical projection therefore is mostly suitable for single row 360 degree panoramas.
All vertical straight lines are preserved. For horizontal straight lines, only the horizon itself is a straight line in the cylindrical panorama. All other straight lines (including horizontal straight lines above or below the horizon) are projected to a curved line in the panorama.
As with rectilinear projection, cylindrical projection has a vertical compression slider. Increasing vertical compression reduces the stretching effect near the top and bottom of the panorama. At full vertical compression the result equals Equirectangular projection:
This is the projection of the panoramic sphere onto a flat surface. It is the projection our eyes are used to, the projection of a normal camera:
Rectilinear projection has the unique property of preserving all straight lines: any line that is straight in real world, is displayed as a straight line in the panorama. This makes it a suitable projection for architectural panoramas.
However due to the same property it is physically impossible to display panoramas wider or taller than 180 degrees in rectilinear projection. At higher field of view, stretching becomes apparent in the sides and corners of the image. This stretching becomes severe already at 120 degrees and more.
The corner stretching effect can be reduced by using horizontal and/or vertical compression: click on Projection Settings in the Panorama Editor and move the compression sliders to the right. By compressing the rectilinear view it is possible to create panoramas up to 180 x 180 degrees without extreme distortion. Horizontal and vertical lines are still preserved as straight but diagonal lines become curved when compression is used.
For panoramas wider than 180 degrees one of the other projections should be used:
This is a latitude/longitude projection of the panoramic sphere:
The field of view of equirectangular projection is not limited (although PTGui is limited to 360x180 degrees), which makes it the choice for full spherical (360° x 180°) panoramas.
As with cylindrical and mercator projection, only vertical lines and the horizon line are projected as straight lines in equirectangular projection. All other lines become curved.
Many spherical panorama viewers (applications that allow you to interactively look around, up and down in a panorama) use equirectangular source images and the 360° x 180° equirectangular projection has become a standard for exchanging spherical panoramas between applications.