Fj Abraham
Posts: 20
Location:
Registered: 4 Aug 2006
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Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 1:18 GMT
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OK, I'm ready for being put in my place as I know I'll have it coming!
I've now downloaded trial versions of:
PTGui: Horrible experience, didn't even stitch.
AutoPano Pro: Stitched no problem but just couldn't figure out how to get a QTVR out of it.
Sticher Pro: Did the QTVR just fine with no help from me but the interface is cheesy to say the least.
Hugin: Ugh, worse than PTGui.
I had horrible to average results from them all. I'm used to using Panorama Factory for flat panos and it's works so well I'm just not prepared for the difficulty/involvement level of these programs.
I guess I'm missing something in the basics here. I tired looking over the help FAQ and forums at APP to no avail. I guess I need an idiots step-by-step.
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klaus mayer
Posts: 79
Location: Australia
Registered: 15 Jan 2008
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 1:49 GMT
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I know that feeling but I am glad that I continued trying and reading all the FAQs or How Tos to get to a point with a high success rate.
Rosauro has good step-by-step instructions:
rosaurophotography.com/html/technical3.html
It is also well worth reading the How To section here on panoguide.com
It took me a lot more patience and care to get from a flat pano to a 360x180 but once you have the first full pano you can't get enough of it.
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Fj Abraham
Posts: 20
Location:
Registered: 4 Aug 2006
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 2:02 GMT
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Encouragement is very welcome.
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klaus mayer
Posts: 79
Location: Australia
Registered: 15 Jan 2008
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Scott DuBose
Posts: 18
Location: San Jose, CA, United States
Registered: 22 Jan 2008
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 2:24 GMT
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FJ, we've all been there. Tell us what you tried... what camera, lens, what tripod and pano head (or handheld). What process from start to finish...
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Fj Abraham
Posts: 20
Location:
Registered: 4 Aug 2006
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 3:25 GMT
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Well I can't detail the steps of the various stitchers as I was trying to just let them do all the work. But everything else:
D70
Sigma 10-20 @10
360 Adjuste
6 shots at +30°
6 shots at -30°
1 zenith
I skipped the nadir thinking I'd put a logo there (hah, I didn't even get that far)
Processed all the NEFs to 1500 pixels tall plus adjustments in Nikon Capture. Saved everything as high quality jpegs then proceeded to the various stitching programs. I'm guessing one of my problems is that I assume these programs make 360s straight from the original images. Now I'm thinking that straight stitching is the first step. Not sure.
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Scott Dreslinski
Posts: 57
Location: Rochester Hills, MI, United States
Registered: 30 Jan 2007
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 3:57 GMT
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How about a zip of the 13 shots, so others could give your images a go and let you know what the results are?
Zip up the files and give us a link to them off your site or wherever.
I'm sure several will crank through them and let you know the results.
--Scott
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Fj Abraham
Posts: 20
Location:
Registered: 4 Aug 2006
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Scott DuBose
Posts: 18
Location: San Jose, CA, United States
Registered: 22 Jan 2008
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 6:36 GMT
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FJ, don't give up. Using PTGUI, it stitched fine after adjusting a few things. Doing an automatic stitch gave a lens type of circular (under lens settings) which obviously causes problems. Changing that to Rectilinear gives us a head start but I still had to move images manually into roughly the right location by Mode > Edit Individual Images in the Panorama Editor. Then Align Images again, and they fell into place.
It would probably be a good idea to calibrate your lens for future stitches. www.path.unimelb.edu.au/~bernardk/tutorials/360/c...
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Smooth
Posts: 1455
Location: Australia
Registered: 21 Jul 2004
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 6:48 GMT
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Fj Abraham said: AutoPano Pro: Stitched no problem but just couldn't figure out how to get a QTVR out of it.
AutoPano Pro does not output QTVR it just does the stitching. For Quicktime VR and Flash output take a look at Pano2VR www.gardengnomesoftware.com you just import your stitched image and select your desired output including HTML and thumbnails.
Regards, Smooth 
www.smooth360.info
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DorinDXN
Posts: 1671
Location: Timisoara, Romania
Registered: 14 Nov 2006
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Hans Nyberg
Posts: 822
Location: Denmark
Registered: 28 Aug 2005
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 7:22 GMT
updated: 14 Apr 2008 at 7:34 GMT
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I believe the basic thing you have to know about this is that fully automatic stitches will not work with a lens like this.
The reason is simple. EXIF data does not contain any data which tells the stitcher if you are using a fisheye or a rectilinear lens.
And this is essential for every step in the stitching process.
Wether it is PTGui or Autopano you have to tell it what you load.
PTgui has a preference for it which you can set. I believe you have to set it also when you load the images in Autopano.
As you may have either fisheye or rectilinear for all lenses from 10mm to 16mm this is a very important thing for automatic stitches.
But why should you do fully automatic stiches when a controlled optimized stitch takes less than 15 minutes including extra manual controlpoints which you always will need with a subject like this.
I should also say that -15 +15 is not a good combination for this lens, I have it also but do not use it for panoramas.
You can do 6 at +30 and 6 at +30 + zenith
You can also do 8 +4 +4 8 around at zero and 4 at +-45 degrees.
But the best option would probably be 6 at -30 6 at +20 + zenith.
This gives you a good overlap and you cover all way down to your rotator.
Hans
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jergolfer
Posts: 21
Location: Yucca, AZ, United States
Registered: 15 Mar 2007
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 7:55 GMT
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I have the Sigma 10-20 and D50 and have used it with my NN3 and PTGUI just fine, no fine tuning or anything. I think you should eliminate the + and - shots and just do the X number of shots (17?) around on one plane and try stitching those first so you at least get something done. Don't shoot RAW for your first pano, and don't do anything with them in Nikons software. Just shoot the correct number around on level plane in jpg/medium size mode, load into PTGUI and bam, it will work 100% as long as you have a good tripod and NN3 or some other pano head. Even handheld should get you fairly good results outdoors - indoors you need a pano head in my opinion.
Jeremy
VirtualTourMedia.com
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frozenjaZz
Posts: 42
Location: France
Registered: 8 Apr 2008
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 8:13 GMT
updated: 14 Apr 2008 at 8:15 GMT
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Hi Hans,
>I should also say that -15 +15 is not a good combination >for this lens, I have it also but do not use it for >panoramas.
>You can do 6 at +30 and 6 at +30 + zenith
hm... the original poster said he used exactly that... 6 at +30 and 6 at -30 ... plus zenith...
I must admit I am surprised by the size of the hole at the nadir, though...
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DorinDXN
Posts: 1671
Location: Timisoara, Romania
Registered: 14 Nov 2006
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Re: Totally discouraged and frustrated w/360s
Posted: 14 Apr 2008 at 8:17 GMT
updated: 14 Apr 2008 at 8:23 GMT
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The photos were indeed taken at -15 and +15 as Hans kindly pointed out, I agree with Hans that +30 and -30 will be a better choice
The poster mistakenly believed that he was taken the photos at +30 and -30
Dorin
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