Panoramic Photo to Spherical HDRI for Rendering?

[whyrichard]

Hello Mac Community!!!

I did a search and the best suggestions were 4+ years old, so wanted to check in with the gurus...


How to convert an iphone panoramic photo to a spherical HDRI for the purposes of Rendering?

I understand the process I am searching for is not quite perfect, but it would do for much rendering purposes...

Found this: http://hydra101.com/product/hydra-hdri-pro-1/

But it is 4 years old and a bit expensive... are there other options?

I have an up to date adobe suite, and am using maxwell render.

Thanks!

Richard

 

[steveash]

HDRIs are 32bit in nature so upscaling an 8bit image is creating information that isn't there. Normally to create an HDRI you would shoot multiple images at different exposures (exposure bracketing) and then combine these in something like Photoshop's File>Automate>Merge to HDR Pro feature. The high bit depth is required as a normal cameras can only manage fairly limited exposure range without clipping to black or white. Working from one 8bit image is going to be fairly limiting and your renderings are likely to be very contrasty.

It is possible to use an iphone to create panoramas with multiple exposures but it is much easier with a 360 degree camera like a Ricoh Theta or to use a camera on a tripod with a panoramic tripod head and then stitching all the images together in something like Autopano.

The panoramic head results in the best quality but it is time consuming to create and not really an option if there is much movement in the scene. Even moving clouds can cause problems. I have found that a 360 degree camera is the best solution in most cases. I use a Theta and ThetaS-HDR iphone app to do the bracketing.