It’s difficult to tell from a video if something will be as good as it looks but Live Labs is working on something called Photosynth that looks extremely useful — if it works.

The idea is that it can take a picture snapped and then form in a 3D space on your desktop other nearby, related pictures around that picture. So imagine you take a picture of the Space Needle in Seattle then Photosynth will relate and serve up photos taken by others to show you the surrounding areas in a panoramic-like view. Wow, now that would be a next generation visual search engine.

Yahoo has a trip planning feature which combines maps so you can create and share fun things to do while on vacation. Imagine Photosynth with Virtual Earth as a competing program? Talk about virtual travel agent wet dreams.

Again, all this with the caveat: if it works. If it does, watch out, this will be hot.