Friday, May 9, 2014

5 Tips For Digital Panoraming

panorama vanilla cupcakes



Panoramic pictures. They offer you a wider view of the world through the viewfinder without much the cost of purchasing a full frame camera or an ultrawide lens.

The advent of digital technology has given panoramas a more "user-friendly" approach to the point that many of today's digital cameras (and smart phones) offer in-house stitching to instantly create these world view photographs.

If you don't have access to in-house camera Panoramic features, Adobe Photoshop allows automatic Panorama production through it's Photomerge feature.  

Panoramas are a fun, cheap, and now, easy way of getting a world view or establishing shot of  the place you want to photograph. Below are some tips to help you get the best out of your Digital Panorama.


Shoot portrait
Shooting portrait in panorama gives you more resolution to the overall picture. It also gives you a more balanced look on the final shot as compared to shooting in the landscape view which makes it look like a long film reel. 

If you are one of the few people who doesn't understand what I mean by shooting portrait, refer to the camera position of  the person below.


Pictures steal your soul, so stop taking selfies.


Lock your exposure
In most cases, it is best to keep your exposure locked as you shoot your panorama to make sure that you don't get a merged picture of overblown highlights in one end and heavy shadows on the other (unless that is your goal).

Watch out for moving objects
Moving objects are the bane of panoramas. Unless you plan on shooting yourself as a ninja traversing from one part of a shot to the other, moving objects only cause problems to your  finished product. 

The problem with moving objects is that they may be duplicated in your shots and therefore come out twice, three times or more once stitched into a panorama. 


Panoramic shot moving object
Going all ninja mode with the discovery of the Panoramic Feature

Keep yourself level headed
Keep your Horizon Levelled. Keep it straight. One of the golden rules of landscape photography stands especially true when Panoraming. 

Keeping your horizon straight serves two things; you save more resolution of your final object because you reduce the need to crop to offset your shaky hands, and you reduce the chance that your camera's in-house panoramic feature will render your  horizon into Super Mario steps leading him to the flagpole at the end of a level.   



Errrr, close enough.


Use a tripod
This tip is more of a support to the last tip. if you can, the best way to get an even-level horizon is to use a tripod so go get that tripod.


Below are a few shots Panoraming off the coast of Baler in the Philippines. 




Panoramic shot Baler

panoramic shot baler church


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