Forum:
Q & A
Thread:
nikkor 10,5 or sigma 8 on a nikon d50
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you could try the tokina 10-17mm
Posted: 18 Mar 2007 at 14:00 GMT
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you could try the tokina 10-17mm, its a little bit less expensive, and works well on the Nikon mount.
- Shel
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Forum:
Q & A
Thread:
HEEEELP!!! Settings issue!!!
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Re: HEEEELP!!! Settings issue!!!
Posted: 18 Mar 2007 at 13:38 GMT
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Could you post your best four images (either reduced size, or full size)? Michel Thoby has a web page on the NPP point of the Sigma 8mm lens, and he reports that the NPP point shifts forward by more than 20mm as the angle of incidence increases from 0 to 90 degrees. I think that may be the source of your NPP mismatch.
I have a pentax 10-17mm fisheye, istDL 6megapixel camera. The two images in this NPP test were taken 60 degrees apart, portrait position, both images pointed down about 15 degrees. The door is 200mm from the NPP, and the calendar is ~2 meters behind the door. At a distance of 200mm, the door shifts about 3 pixels against the calendar, so the NPP is very close, but the camera should be shifted forward by about 0.5mm. Looking down towards the floor in the same two images, you can see the base of the panosaurus, and the "0" has shifted about 30 pixels from the first picture to the second! Moreover, the images are telling me that the camera should be shifted backwards 4 mm! The NPP is in a different spot at the steeper angle of incidence of pitch=-70 degrees, than it is at yaw=+/-30 degrees, and has apparently shifted 4-5mm.
1st)
2nd)
1st down)
2nd down)
- Shel
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Forum:
Galleries
Thread:
Few panos from Egypt
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Re: Few panos from Egypt
Posted: 16 Mar 2007 at 9:09 GMT
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Andrey,
these are wonderful! I like the Aswan lake panorama, and the hieroglyphics in the Karnak temple.
What setup do you use to take your panoramas?
- Shel
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Forum:
Q & A
Thread:
Full screen in pano2qtvr how is it done?
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fullscreen needs html viewer, and javascript
Posted: 13 Mar 2007 at 21:28 GMT
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fullscreen needs an html viewer with javascript. the following will work. Replace YOUR_PANORAMA.mov your panorama file. The html viewer will call apple quicktime, and magically generate a full screen view.
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<script language="JAVASCRIPT">
<!--
window.moveTo(0,0);
window.resizeTo(window.screen.availWidth,window.screen.availHeight);
window.focus();
//-->
</script>
<style type="text/css">
<!--
a {
font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
font-size: small;
color: #FFFFFF;
text-decoration: none;
}
-->
</style>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#666666" leftmargin="0" topmargin="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0">
<center>
<object classid="clsid:02BF25D5-8C17-4B23-BC80-D3488ABDDC6B" width="100%"height="100%" codebase="www.apple.com/qtactivex/qtplugin.cab">
<param name="scale" value="tofit">
<param name="controller" value="true">
<param name="cache" value="false">
<param name="bgcolor" value="#000000">
<param name="src" value="YOUR_PANORAMA.mov">
<embed src="YOUR_PANORAMA.mov" width="100%" height="100%" type="video/quicktime" controller="true" cache="false" scale="tofit" pluginspage="www.apple.com/quicktime/download/" bgcolor="#000000">
</embed> </object>
</center>
</body>
</html>
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Forum:
Galleries
Thread:
Nightime b&w pano
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Forum:
Galleries
Thread:
Nightime b&w pano
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Re: Nightime b&w pano
Posted: 12 Mar 2007 at 20:15 GMT
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beautiful!!!
Reminds me of our cruise stopover in Athens last summer... wish we had stayed longer.
- Shel
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Forum:
Q & A
Thread:
Multirow panorama questions
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Re: Multirow panorama questions
Posted: 12 Mar 2007 at 12:18 GMT
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The lower row will show the top of your tripod, but that isn't a problem. However, make sure there are no control points on the tripod or the panorama head itself.
Finding control points for the zenith may be a problem... you could try setting the zenith to pitch=90, and manually adjust the yaw until the colors match. If you can generate control points for the zenith and two other images, and if the zenith photo was taken with the panorama head, then go ahead and optimize with the three rows and the zenith. Otherwise, just optimize with the three rows. If you take a hand held nadir patch shot, that needs to be handled specially, after the rest of the panorama has been optimized.
- Shel
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Forum:
Q & A
Thread:
Newbie looking for advice...?
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Re: Newbie looking for advice...?
Posted: 11 Mar 2007 at 13:53 GMT
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yes, you can take a 360x180 with the EFS 18-55mm lens. I took 1 or 2, before getting my Pentax fisheye. Lennart Mollerstrom, has posted lots of 360x180 panoramas taken with the pentax kit lens. It takes a multi-row panorama though.
With the pentax 18-55mm kit lens, he shoots 38 photos, twelve photos at 0 degrees, twelve at 45 degres, and twelve at -45 degrees. And then one zenith and one Nadir.
You'll need a multi-row panorama head. The cheapest mult-row panorama head is the panosaurus, available for about 80 dollars. I use it in my 360x180 panoramas, both with the pentax DSLR and fisheye, and with my older Canon (p&s). I made a modification to the panosaurus, replacing the screw connection between the camera and the panosaurus base with no slip pad with a hex bolt. That seemed to make it quicker and easier to setup.
- Shel
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Forum:
Q & A
Thread:
couple of questons about indoor photography
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Re: couple of questons about indoor photography
Posted: 9 Mar 2007 at 3:45 GMT
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> i am interested in indoor virtual tour creation.
> i had purchased a pentax K110D cammera and a 11-17mm
I assume you mean the pentax 10-17mm lens.
> fisheye lens. i have pgigui.
> here are some questions that i have.
>
> 1. what program do i use to defish the pictures and
> what setting do i use in the program for my lens?
You could use ptgui, once you have an optimized set of parameters for you lens. The best way to get an optimized set of parameters for your lens is to create a 360 degree panorama, and stitch it. Take six shots around in (usually in portrait mode). But, you will get parallax errors unless you keeps the nodal point constant as you rotate the camera around (panorama head helps a lot). As a first approximation, the 10-17mm at 10mm is a fullframe lens, with a ptgui FOV of 132, and with a=0, b=-0.018, c=0. This can be used to defish if you specify a rectalinear panorama image in ptgui. The actual FOV due to b<>0 is about 136 degrees. The actual best optimization will also involve a and c as well as the shift parameters.
> 2. one shot comes out darker then the other is there a
> setting on the camera that would allow me to have even
> shots troughout the panorama.
Use manual exposure, and manual white balance. Set the shutter speed and the aperture manually, and look for the display in the lens to indicate correct exposure. If all of the images have the same exposure, they will stitch better. However, dynamic range in panaoramas is a tricky problem, and a lot of people use RAW. I just use JPG, but try to bracket the exposure so the brightest image is no worst than +1.5 or 2 and the darkest is no darker than -1. +2 (or even +1.5) will lead to some blown highlights.
>3. are there any good online sorces that teach how to
> shoot indoors?
With the fisheye on a tripod, try F/8.0, and as long an exposure as necessary at ISO200 or ISO400.
> 4. my camera produced colors that are different from
> reality. here is an image that came out wrong
> the part labeled 1 should be brown not red, and the part
> labeled 2 should be blue not purple.
Try manual white balance with a sheet of typing paper. The color balance will come out perfect. Or try tungsten indoors, if you don't want to manually set the white balance, but manual white balance works best.
- Shel
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Forum:
Galleries
Thread:
New night pano from Stockholm
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Re: New night pano from Stockholm
Posted: 8 Mar 2007 at 14:15 GMT
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very nice, thanks. I still there's still a little bit of ice and snow left in Stockholm. In Austin, the trees are all turning green, and the Cherry Blossoms are in almost full bloom. Today's forecast is high of 25 celsius, low of 12 celsius.
Thanks for sharing your technique.
- Shel
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Forum:
Q & A
Thread:
stitching multiple shots with a single person
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Re: stitching multiple shots with a single person
Posted: 7 Mar 2007 at 18:05 GMT
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I use ptgui. I've had panoramas where multiple photos of the same person or the same spot differ because the person (or the dog) has moved. Here's my methodology for fixing it.
1) Align the photos, don't worry about the multiple photos with different views of the a spot where a person has moved.
2)Create the 360x180 equirectangular or spherical panorama with all photos included in the stitched panorama.
3)Figure out which photos are involved in the spots with moving subjects. Generate a 360x180 equirectangular panorama with only one of the differing individual photos included. Another alternative is to include all photos except the one causing problems, and regenerate the entire 360x180 equirectangular panorama without one of the photos.
4) Use the 360x180 equirectangular panoramas from step 3) to patch the original panorama created in step 2). The two panoramas should line up very closely, so all that is necessary is to merge a selection from the panorama in step 3) into the panorama in step 2). If the exposures are inconsistent, use a feathered mask to merge the corrected selection gradually, over 20-30 pixels.
Hope this helps.
- Shel
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Forum:
Q & A
Thread:
Sigma 8mm f/3.5 EX DG Quality
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Re: Sigma 8mm f/3.5 EX DG Quality
Posted: 7 Mar 2007 at 4:32 GMT
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I have the pentax 10-17mm (same as tokina 10-17mm). Once you get used to its quirks, it works well. One quirk is that the FOV is curved, so the edges are not in focus when the center is focused at infinity, and at F/3.5, either the center is in perfect focus, or the edges, but not both. At F/8, focused at 1meter, everything is crystal sharp, maybe F/5.6
Maybe other ultra wides have curved FOV problems too.
Getting the right settings for 6/1/1 360x180 is a little tricky. I settled on tilting the camera down -7.5 degrees, and doing one zenith photo at +62.5 degrees for optimal stitching results. Then there is a 30 degree nadir patch.
If you're using the Tokina 10-17mm on a 1.6x Canon, it might be tighter for 360x180, in 6/1/1
- Shel
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Forum:
Galleries
Thread:
Downtown Austin Texas, at night
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Re: Downtown Austin Texas, at night
Posted: 6 Mar 2007 at 22:13 GMT
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Dorin, thanks for your comments.
I think nighttime photographs can be really neat. I noticed that the Orion constellation is visible in my panorama too.....
There's a lot of detail in getting a good panorama. I'm still figuring out my "patch the nadir" methodology. In this panorama, I tilted the camera about 15 degrees down, but I didn't squeenze the tripod legs, so the legs stuck way out in the nadir patch (see the bottom cube w/out nadir patch below). With the pentax 10mm fisheye lens I'm using, I think ideal is six shots tilting down about 7.5 degrees, with one zenith shot at 62.5 degrees, and one hand held nadir shot. Then I should wind up with an easily patchable 30 degree nadir. www.sheltx.com/share_stuff/PANP1776.html
This is my 2nd 360x180 with a nadir, the first time, I only tilted the camera a couple of degrees, though I did raise the tripod center pole (apparently a no-no). www.sheltx.com/share_stuff/PANP1764.html
Before that, I used to have the vertical control arm sticking out of my tripod .... also with a raised center pole. www.sheltx.com/share_stuff/PAN020307.html
And then there's the issue of HOW to patch the nadir. I defish and bring the defished nadir patch into ptgui, along with the other seven (or eight) photos, and then generate control points by hand between the defished nadir and the other six photos. Ptgui optimizes the nadir seperately as a rectalinear image, with yaw, pitch, roll, FOV, and shift parameters. The other more common approach is to do the nadir alignment in photoshop after generating the bottom cube w/out the nadir.
- Shel
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Forum:
Galleries
Thread:
Downtown Austin Texas, at night
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Downtown Austin Texas, at night
Posted: 5 Mar 2007 at 7:24 GMT
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Taken in downtown Austin, at the intersection of 5th street and Colorado. You can see the Frost building, and the lights reflecting off the pond, as well as some of the other buildings there.
www.sheltx.com/share_stuff/PANP1776.html
The panorama photographs were taken with a Pentax istDL, 10mm fisheye, F/8, 8 second exposure, ISO200. The Nadir patch shot is hand held at ISO1600, F/3.5, 1/5th of a second. The difference in the Nadir ISO, and sharpness (due to hand held at 1/5th, and the high ISO), show up in the final panorama. But the biggest "flaw" is the shadow of the tripod. But that was the best spot to take the panorama from, otherwise the Frost building was obstructed by trees.
The panorama was stitched with PtGui. I brought the defished Nadir into PtGui as a rectalinear image, and created lots of manual control points for the Nadir. Ptgui optimized the definished cropped Nadir FOV and shift parameters.
- Shel
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Forum:
Galleries
Thread:
2007 Lunar New Year Cup
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Re: 2007 Lunar New Year Cup
Posted: 1 Mar 2007 at 9:05 GMT
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amazing detail and clarity!
Looking down, I'm amazed that you managed to get a panorama tripod setup on the steps. Did you use a tripod, or a monopod?
Also, the railing is so close to the camera and yet I didn't notice any stitching problems.
Very nice.
- Shel
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