Widefield panorama shots with D800E

[Adelastro1 (Wayne England)]

Here are three panorama shots I merged tonight from my trip to Bordertown last weekend as a try out for the new D800E. Quite a bit of airglow to the south and horizon lights to the west is from the town.

I ran out of space on Flickr so had to upload the hi-res versions to Redbubble sorry! Merged in CS5, jpgs only, auto tone, contrast/brightness and some vibrance only. I see that the stars were stretched by CS5 at the top. anyone use a different method of stitching? Should lens correction be done first to help perhaps?


http://www.redbubble.com/people/powe...wamp-arch#zoom
The arch of the Milky Way over Poocher Swamp, Bordertown, SA. This is a panorama of four portrait orientated images to get more foreground in the image. Nikon 14-24mm lens. Each image was at 14mm, f2.8, ISO 6400, 25sec.


http://www.redbubble.com/people/powe...y-rainbow#zoom
The arch of the Milky Way looks like a night-time rainbow stretching across the sky. This is a panorama of two images (almost 180 degrees total view).
Nikon D800E, Nikon 14-24mm lens. Each image was at 14mm, f2.8, ISO 3200, 30sec.


http://www.redbubble.com/people/powe...-chimneys#zoom
This is a panorama of three images (about 180 degrees total view). Nikon 14-24mm lens. Each image was at 14mm, f2.8, ISO 6400, 20sec.

[rogerg (Roger)]

It's hard to feel what the shots are really like when the file dimensions are so small...

They are nice widefields, show good detail considering the exposure time and good promise of what can be achieved The orange is very strong - you could perhaps turn them in to a more artistic sepia or such, or maybe just grayscale image for more effect as the little bit of other colour showing doesn't really add much to the images I think in fact I think it pulls them down.

[colinmlegg (Colin)]

> I see that the stars were stretched by CS5 at the top. anyone use a different method of stitching? Should lens correction be done first to help perhaps?


Looking good Wayne.

To avoid the stretched stars you'll need to go with a fisheye like projection. PTGui is good for this. You can choose to keep the horizon flat but the edge of the image will be curved.

Here's a similar example - it covers 180 degrees and was done with a fisheye lens, but it's equally doable stitched in PTGui.

[Ross G]

Very nice photos Wayne.


Ross.

[Adelastro1 (Wayne England)]

Thanks very much for your comments Roger. Yes for short exposures they certainly do have great detail. The colour is a bit strong I agree. I processed them on my dull-screened laptop late last night so I didn't notice it as much. These colours were pretty much straight out of the camera though which surprised me a bit. Similar shots with other cameras with similar settings weren't as strong, so i can only assume it was the strong airglow that night.

Originally Posted by rogerg

It's hard to feel what the shots are really like when the file dimensions are so small...

They are nice widefields, show good detail considering the exposure time and good promise of what can be achieved The orange is very strong - you could perhaps turn them in to a more artistic sepia or such, or maybe just grayscale image for more effect as the little bit of other colour showing doesn't really add much to the images I think in fact I think it pulls them down.

[Adelastro1 (Wayne England)]

Thanks for that Colin. I'll try that program out! Lovely shot there too!

Originally Posted by colinmlegg

> I see that the stars were stretched by CS5 at the top. anyone use a different method of stitching? Should lens correction be done first to help perhaps?


Looking good Wayne.

To avoid the stretched stars you'll need to go with a fisheye like projection. PTGui is good for this. You can choose to keep the horizon flat but the edge of the image will be curved.

Here's a similar example - it covers 180 degrees and was done with a fisheye lens, but it's equally doable stitched in PTGui.

[Adelastro1 (Wayne England)]

Thanks Ross!

Originally Posted by Ross G

Very nice photos Wayne.


Ross.

[Lester]

I like the views Wayne, and the orange doesn't distract for me. All the best.

[Adelastro1 (Wayne England)]

Thanks Lester!

Originally Posted by Lester

I like the views Wayne, and the orange doesn't distract for me. All the best.

[gregbradley]

Those are excellent Wayne.

I would use lens distortion correction on in Capture NX 2 first and save as a tiff ir jpeg.

I'd use PTGui Pro myself but Photoshop is quite good also and that stretch may be fixed by the lens distortion correction in NX2.

Greg.

[Adelastro1 (Wayne England)]

Great, thanks for the info. I did think about doing lens correction first so I'll give it a go.

Originally Posted by gregbradley

Those are excellent Wayne.

I would use lens distortion correction on in Capture NX 2 first and save as a tiff ir jpeg.

I'd use PTGui Pro myself but Photoshop is quite good also and that stretch may be fixed by the lens distortion correction in NX2.

Greg.