softboot
Posts: 162
Location:
Registered: 2 Oct 2006
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Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 12 Apr 2007 at 19:08 GMT
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Hi all.
Now the weather is better here in Uk i hope to start to go out and about to do a few panos, and hopefully a few good enough to post here. I notice a few of u here do a few in busy streets or carnivals, and apparently look invisible as those about you get on with their daily lives. Obviously you need to set up quick, do the job and go. Also a lot of places, Museums etc are not keen on tripods so my question is this. If you use a monopod can you give me some advice on using one, and also any hints and tips on handheld panos would be good. Keeping it level etc. How do you hold the camera, in close to your body? All advice welcome.
Thanks a lot, John Goulding.
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Henk Keijzer
Posts: 15
Location: Netherlands
Registered: 11 Jul 2004
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 12 Apr 2007 at 20:47 GMT
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Hi John,
I usually do all my pano's handheld. I have an Olympus E-300 with the Peleng 8 mm lens. I need to do 6 around + zenith and nadir. I use the following technique:
- find a spot on the ground some 10 cm in front of your feet
- hold the camera in portrait mode under your chin, look from above "through" the NPP at the spot on the ground and take 3 shots from left to right at -60°, 0° and 60°
- turn the camera to portrait mode and make a shot tilted appr. 60° up and another shot 60 down (keep the NPP as much as possible at the same spot and move your head back for the up shot)
- turn yourself 180° around the spot on the ground and repeat the steps above
The whole procedure can be done in appr. 15 to 20 seconds.
I use Hugin and this nice piece of software accepts a mix of portrait and landscape photo's. It can also deal pretty well with photo's not fully vertical or horizontal (i.e. rotated). The most important thing is to keep the NPP at the same place in space.
With two nadir shots and two zenith shots I hardly ever need to patch the zenith and nadir. Sometimes I have to remove the noses of my shoes or my forehead from the sky, but that's all. Have a look at home.wanadoo.nl/hwkeijzer
Best regards,
Henk
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Mark Schuster
Posts: 1321
Location: Welwyn Garden City, United Kingdom
Registered: 25 Jan 2006
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 12 Apr 2007 at 23:58 GMT
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Down with nodal points – down with entry pupils – down with parallax errors - down with panorama heads and tripods!
UP WITH THE REVOLUTION!
Henk,
Could we have some more examples of your work and a bit more detail on your technique. That it works is evident, and it’s very exciting, but I can’t quite follow your instructions.
Mark
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NYCreate
Posts: 496
Location: North Yorkshire & Northern England, United Kingdom
Registered: 21 Aug 2005
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 13 Apr 2007 at 10:00 GMT
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Ive just recently bought a monopod, after thinking for so long that it would be anygood... well how I was wrong..  It is the most useful bit of kit I can say I have ever bought... I dont go anywhere without it now! easy to set up, and so handy in all sorts of situations not just panos.
Climbed a 3000ft mountain last week and no way was I lugging the manfrotto tripod up there so took the monopod. I ll post the image when I stitched it soon..#
Not much extra effort to carry a monopod than going hand held but will give you a much more solid and accurate base to work with, unless you are super accurate and confident hand held of course 
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John Houghton
Posts: 3487
Location: Hitchin, United Kingdom
Registered: 17 Jan 2005
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 13 Apr 2007 at 13:11 GMT
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An excellent, if clumsy, way of taking hand held panos is to use a Philopod, as devised by Philippe Hurbain:
www.philohome.com/tripod/shooting.htm
I attached a thread via an elastic band around the gold ring on my Sigma 8mm fisheye lens. I shot a panorama that included objects quite close (1m away) and got a flawless stitch. PTGui reported an average CP distance of 1.4px and maximum 3.4px. You can even do an accurate nadir shot, as the plumb line maintains the correct entrance pupil distance from the ground when the camera is rotated downwards, and it's easy to allow a sideways offset for the lens. It's not fast and not suitable for all conditions (wind would be a problem) but it does work really well. It could hardly be cheaper or lighter to carry around.
John
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Andrei Zdetovetchi
Posts: 101
Location: Bucharest, Romania
Registered: 21 Jul 2006
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 13 Apr 2007 at 13:42 GMT
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I also have made a lot of panos shooting handheld. Actually all my panos posted in my blog are made handheld.
The technique is quite simple. I use a Canon 350D and Peleng 8mm. Shooting 4 horizontal pictures plus zenith and nadir. And of course I'm trying to revolve myself around an imaginary nodal point. Works best with large open areas, and I need to be extra carefull in closed spaces.
The advantage is speed in shooting, you can shoot a pano in under a minute. The bad part is that you might have some extra work to do when stitching and fixing parallax errors.
Another advice is not to try shooting handheld in low light conditions.
Check my examples here:
www.csvd.ro/panoblog/
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Henk Keijzer
Posts: 15
Location: Netherlands
Registered: 11 Jul 2004
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 13 Apr 2007 at 16:32 GMT
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Hi all, hi Mark,
Sorry, but this is not the silver bullet that solves all your parallax problems. You still have to be prepared for some serious photoshopping to get rid of them. All depends on your steady hand ofcourse.
The following shots hopefully illustrate the technique I use. I swung left, right, down and up only 45° instead of 60°, to keep myself in all pictures. It's the philipod idea, but without the wire.
Other samples of my work can be found on the WWP and on www.pbase.com/szw/200610_sr_panos
Best regards,
Henk
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softboot
Posts: 162
Location:
Registered: 2 Oct 2006
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 14 Apr 2007 at 11:33 GMT
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Wow, thanks for all your replies and advice. From reading these I am sure I can go off to do some handheld with more success than I had the other day as I didnt hold it all steady enough. John Houghtons post has also given me an idea! I also have the Sigma lens. So, workin as a full time cnc programmer and engineeer, I could easily machine up a ring clamp type of thing (out of delrin or nylon to avoid damage to lens). This would then clamp around lens over gold ring, and have a threaded piece to take a monopod, making it easier to balance camera! Anyone interested? Looking forward to Monday now, which makes a change!
I will post the results, thank all, John Goulding.
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softboot
Posts: 162
Location:
Registered: 2 Oct 2006
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 14 Apr 2007 at 11:38 GMT
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Hi Rudders, what monopod did ya buy, do you recommend any, or they all about the same. Thanks, John.
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John Houghton
Posts: 3487
Location: Hitchin, United Kingdom
Registered: 17 Jan 2005
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 14 Apr 2007 at 12:01 GMT
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softboot said: Anyone interested?
Yes, I would be. The gold ring probably isn't the best place to mount the ring as that prevents the use of the lens cap. But I like the idea of being able to rotate the camera 30 degrees so that full vertical coverage is possible. The Agnos page might give you some ideas:
tinyurl.com/yt89qb
John
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NYCreate
Posts: 496
Location: North Yorkshire & Northern England, United Kingdom
Registered: 21 Aug 2005
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 14 Apr 2007 at 13:38 GMT
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Hi John, I would recommend any sort of monopod. I just bought a cheap one off ebay for a tenner. Bargain as well as useful!
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NYCreate
Posts: 496
Location: North Yorkshire & Northern England, United Kingdom
Registered: 21 Aug 2005
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softboot
Posts: 162
Location:
Registered: 2 Oct 2006
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 14 Apr 2007 at 17:11 GMT
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Thanks for the link John.
I am thinking of a simple clamp around the lens similar to those at the link, but without the complicated degrees etc. You would simply walk around with it. I wonder now if it would be better to machine it at a slight angle upwards to avoid having to shoot the zenith. What angle would that be? I thought of clampin around the gold band as that is the aproximate nodal point is it not? Or maybe it vould be offset, and advice welcome, thanks, John Goulding.
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softboot
Posts: 162
Location:
Registered: 2 Oct 2006
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 14 Apr 2007 at 17:13 GMT
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Thanks Rudders, and a lovely shot by the way, with a cheap monopod it looks really good, cheers. Ebay here i come,
John Goulding.
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John Houghton
Posts: 3487
Location: Hitchin, United Kingdom
Registered: 17 Jan 2005
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Re: Hand held or monopod advice please
Posted: 14 Apr 2007 at 18:11 GMT
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John, I tilt mine up by 5 degrees, though the requirements of other cameras with different crop factors might vary. The upwards tilt could alternatively be achieved with a tilting head on the monopod. This built-in one looks very compact and light: tinyurl.com/2w6yxb
John
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