More on Panoramas

Yesterday I took some more panorama shots that I was happy with and its getting easier each time! I think the best method is to shoot using burst (or sequential) mode at 3-5 frames per second while sweeping across the landscape or subject you want to capture. You end up with 9 to upwards of 15 shots per scene depending on how much coverage you want but Photoshop's photomerge works best if you have a lot of overlap between frames. On an EM5 (and possibly other cameras) you can enable an electronic level which helps keep everything lined up. Something to watch out for is that you have to be careful that you don't cut anything out of your frame. For the photo below, I wanted to make sure that all the electronics at the top of the vessel were in my picture so I positioned my camera (portrait style) in the center first and then moved over to the left and started taking the photos in a sweeping motion to the right. This helped me scale where I needed my camera to end up in the middle of the frame so that the whole boat was covered.  

Facing the beast, 15mm, f/8, 1/250, iso 200

 Here is the sequence of shots that were originally taken:

Breakdown of "Facing the beast"

As you can see I ended up with 16 pictures which is a lot, but I guess I was just being paranoid and ended up gong pretty slow. I suppose if you went faster you could cut it down to 10 or 12 shots. I am so grateful for my Flickr contact Lars who suggested that I try the "sweeping while in burst pulse mode" method for shooting panoramic scenes. If you have yet to compose a panorama and want to try it out (even if you only have a point and shoot) I suggest this method. They are a lot of fun and I cannot wait to try this technique out on some of the great scenery there is back home in Miami. Thanks for stopping by!

-Sam D

MORE PHOTOS!

Thunderstorm, 15mm, f/8,  1/640, iso 200 

Don Nikola, 40mm, f/8, 1/640, iso200