Stitching Panoramas together

PM
Posted By
Peter_Marsh
Aug 17, 2004
Views
242
Replies
9
Status
Closed
I have recently purchased a reasonable SLR digital camera and Photoshop CS and Apple’s Quicktime VR authoring tool. Trying to piece together series of photographs into a nice panorama is proving to be a difficult task.

I tried using the built-in tool in Photoshop CS {the panorama maker} and found it really came nowhere near a quality result. I then tried to manually put it together. One thing I had to overcome was the perspective aberration that occurred and was able to use the perspective tool for all the separate images to get the image ends to line up OK.

The next major step is to overcome slight variations in exposure in the scene. I fixed the exposure on the camera as I arched around, but there are still variations. How can I get the exposure of all the shots to be the same because some are lighter than others. It would be great if I could post my composition to date and allow anybody to fiddle with it and show how it can be done so that I can learn from this practical example. Is there a common location where I can send a file that anyone can download and work upon?

Thanks folks

MacBook Pro 16” Mockups 🔥

– in 4 materials (clay versions included)

– 12 scenes

– 48 MacBook Pro 16″ mockups

– 6000 x 4500 px

KN
Ken_Nielsen
Aug 17, 2004
I don’t think anyone has time to work on a file as we are all busy at work. You seem to be taking the right approach. Getting all your exposures the same is not the best goal, unless these are studio shots, which I assume they are not.

Your fiddling will yield the best education on the subject. I use the manual method all the time and it works quite well. Just plan your shooting and do your adjustments as needed, as you are discovering.
LT
Laurentiu_Todie
Aug 17, 2004
Some tripods are better than others; some lens shades… (hey! use an umbrella : )
SJ
Stevie_J_V
Aug 17, 2004
I find "Perspective" mode with the Transform tool is the most effective in setting up panorama shots.
NK
Neil_Keller
Aug 18, 2004
It would be great if I could post my composition to date and allow anybody to fiddle with it and show how it can be done so that I can learn from this practical example.

This is not a quick fix. It’s generally a bill-by-the-hour option. Sorry.

Neil
B
Buko
Aug 18, 2004
it you want to stitch together 2, 3 or more shots to make a panno. It would be advised to make all shots the same exposure this way you will have consistant looking shots. take the shots as quickly as possible so what ever is happening in the series of photos is in all of the shots. look for items in the shots that will be good reference points to line up your picture. there stitch them together by hand and custom blend the photos.

I find it is best to shoot your panno shots in 16 bit.
JL
jann_lipka
Aug 18, 2004
IMHO , PS image merge is a good helping hand , but stitching images is quite complex , so there is no ideal solutions .
Luminous Landscape has a review of a new tool
< http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/software/stitcher- 4.shtml> but it is an expensive program .

I love outputting a stitched image as a layered PS is a good option .

Of course some images come out good , some others don’t …. I wouldn’t dream about stitching really detailed images …

Here is a stitched 1Ds panorama from my SF – LA Highway 1 trip . Stitched it is over 14500 pixels wide …
<http://www.lipka.se/calif/vista_point_HW_1.jpg>

Probably about 170° ( you can see both directions of the road )

You can see component layers at :
<http://www.lipka.se/calif/layers.jpg>

What I think is an specially elegant solution is that layer names are corresponding to the original files ..
SJ
Stevie_J_V
Aug 18, 2004
Here’s <http://www.acay.com.au/~waylie/nowra.jpg> a 6 picture stich up job I did last year. I’m no photographer but it shows you can get a large panorama shot from even a 2 megapixel Canon.
NK
Neil_Keller
Aug 18, 2004
A couple of general suggestions: take your camera off auto exposure so that every frame is exposed to the same values. Use moderate lens apertures to avoid vignetting (this can occur when stopped all the way down) and to maximize sharpness. Don’t use any lens that has serious light falloff near the edges of the frame (most easily seen in a plain, blue sky). Overlap about 25% of the image (more or less). Use manual focus. Focus carefully so that foreground and background are sharp. Use the hyperfocal distance — don’t just set the lens at infinity. Use a tripod.

Neil
KN
Ken_Nielsen
Aug 18, 2004
My Canon has an auto-stitch panorama feature. I’ve only glanced at the feature in the manual briefly. Basically, it’s telling you to do everything we are telling you to do here to do it manually (look for reference points etc.) but somehow it figures it out for itself, or so it implies.

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