PANORAMA Shooting Question ???

[harcosparky]

OK so yesterday we were at a location that seemed to be begging to be a panorama photo.

My question is this .......

The location is a large reservoir and I would be on one shore shooting across the water to the other shoreline??

There is a tiny island in the middle and I may actually be able to go out to it and do a 360 degree panorama shot from there.

Would it be best to use a wide angle lens and take a few shots -OR- zoom in and take many shots.

I plan on doing at least 3 sets at different exposures and see what works best.

Probably let the camera do it's auto bracketing thing.

Camera will be on tripod with remote release.

THANKS

[wheezy]

Depending on your camera, you'll want to shoot anywhere from 24-40mm - any wider and you get distortion and it's a lot harder to put them together because of bowing lines. Try to keep everything straight up and down on the right/left edges and it will be a lot easier to stitch together, and you won't have to crop off the top and bottom thus making a narrow panoramic.

[akadmon]

You should take the panorama using portrait mode. This way it won't be as thin (on the up-down axis). Also, you should shoot in manual mode, with everything fixed (aperture, speed, ISO, focus), and include a 25% overlap between shots. Good luck.

[flosseR]

akadmon, this is the shortest and best advise I have read in a long time. I will actually try this this weekend.

Never thought of the portrait mode (you mean high format) but it seems like a quite logical choice...

I also love the 24mm suggestion because the one time i did try panorama shooting i did have distorted lines...

good stuff

//f

[miles01110]

You should use a tripod.

[PeteB]

Originally Posted by akadmon

You should take the panorama using portrait mode. This way it won't be as thin (on the up-down axis). Also, you should shoot in manual mode, with everything fixed (aperture, speed, ISO, focus), and include a 25% overlap between shots. Good luck.

Yep, this is the way I'd do it. Use a longer focal length and you won't end up with everything looking tiny (as you'd get with a wider angle).

I'd also advise to take two rows of photos (upper and lower), this way, you'll have far more data to crop a pleasing panorama out of.

Panorama taken with a 135mm lens, stitched portrait photos (16Mb).

http://the-aperture.com/Blenheim_Panorama-Large.jpg

[harcosparky]

Originally Posted by miles01110

You should use a tripod.

As stated in the original post --> " Camera will be on a tripod "

Originally Posted by akadmon

You should take the panorama using portrait mode. This way it won't be as thin (on the up-down axis). Also, you should shoot in manual mode, with everything fixed (aperture, speed, ISO, focus), and include a 25% overlap between shots. Good luck.

WOW ... so much information in such a small post.

Thanks, it makes sense, a lot of sense.

Originally Posted by wheezy

Depending on your camera, you'll want to shoot anywhere from 24-40mm - any wider and you get distortion and it's a lot harder to put them together because of bowing lines. Try to keep everything straight up and down on the right/left edges and it will be a lot easier to stitch together, and you won't have to crop off the top and bottom thus making a narrow panoramic.

Yeah I played with it yesterday and at wide angle there is a lot of waviness at the edges. I was aware of this ahead of time and took the shots accordingly, so that none of what I wanted would be cropped off. I am actually considering a bit stronger than 40 as I really want to capture more detail along the shoreline.

I did it 'freehand' and it was 'OK', tomorrow we take the tripod and it will be leveled 360 degrees to keep everything just right.

I was somewhat impressed with the results of the freehand, I know on a tripod with all setting fixed manually it will be just right!!!!!

[NeGRit0]

Please post the resulting pano.

[Sir SpemzR]

no one has suggested using automated photo stitching in photoshop?

[PeteB]

Originally Posted by Sir SpemzR

no one has suggested using automated photo stitching in photoshop?

I think that's a given. The OP's asking for information about how best to take the source photos for later stitching.

[miles01110]

Originally Posted by harcosparky

As stated in the original post --> " Camera will be on a tripod "

facepalm.

I did it 'freehand' and it was 'OK', tomorrow we take the tripod and it will be leveled 360 degrees to keep everything just right.

vindication...?

[cutsman]

Truth be told, the photomerge function in CS4 is so good that it'll do a damn fine job stitching handheld photos... even with slightly varying exposures between frames (in other words, even if you don't manually set a constant exposure).

Not to say this is an incredible example, but to give you an idea...below is a pano I took in aperture priority, handheld at Top of the Rock in NYC in May. Took about 15-20 frames, in portrait orientation... just started on one end, and snapped away while making sure to overlap 1/3 to 1/2 of the frame. No problems stitching whatsoever and took almost no time to take the shots since no tripod was involved...just click, turn, click, turn, click......etc