panoramas with the *ist-d

arcterex wrote:

I'm sure this is a newbie question, but I'm having some troubles
taking panorama shots with the *ist-d (yes, I finally got one I
am used to the "panorama" setting on my little digital p&s, but
obviously the ist-d doesn't have one. I thought that the function
of panorama mode was to keep the f-stop constant, so when I had an
opportunity tonight to take a nice shot of some storm clouds
sweeping in over the mountains I set to P mode, got a reading, set
to Manual mode, set the fstop and shutter speed, and clicked off
two sets of panorama shots, re-reading the second time off the
darker area where the clouds are coming in.

The results were less than spectacular Photostitch under CS did
a completely sucky job, with big bands of dark and light across the
sky from where each image was merged together. Canon's photostitch
did a better job, but there is still some banding and the closer
objects (the edge of the road) is pretty curvy.

Some of the problems are mine (too sever a turn for example), and
those can be solved with experience. However, I'm wondering what
should be done and set on a camera level for a good panorama shot
(and also, is photomerge under elements/CS the recommended software
for stitching together?).

Many thanks! Hopefully will be posting some nice ist-d shots here
(or in the *ist-d gallery) soon

I find I now do panoramic shooting more often than single-shot, it's very addictive and the *ist D is ideally suited to it. I tend to switch to M, use the green button to find a good exposure, based on roughly the middle of the scene and then shoot, pretty much as quickly as I can.

This one is 8x1 in Portrait, about 11000 x 2800 pixels in final size

This is 6x2 in Landscape, about 13000 x 3500 pixels. It was taken about 5.20 pm today on my bosses roof.

For software, take a look at the combination of Panorama Tools / PT Assembler / Autopano / Enblend. Have a look at this site for info.

http://www.tawbaware.com/maxlyons/index.html

It took me a while to get good results, but these look great printed to 300x100cm, which I do for office murals, etc.

Have Fun...
--
David Kinrade