Panoramic view of Hong Kong

[James]

WSLam,

I think the view of the harbor is stunning, especially at night.

WOW! I am really excited for a return trip. Was going to return in June, but I decided to wait till after summer. Had a good time there last year.

Thanks for sharing this great pano.
James

 

[Amac]

WSLam,

nice panorama. It's a pity the file size is so big, but never mind. I agree that a night shot woudl also be good to see.

Good work.
--
Regards

Andrew McGregor

http://www.geocities.com/andrewmcgregorphotography

 

[Anthony]

I wouldn't know. but moire is a known problem with the 1D.
it's the 50mm/1.4 lens, i doubt it's the lens.

I had the 1d, sold it and picked up the D60 ( 1D too much camera for me).
The 1d does have a significant moire' problem. I have yet to see this on the D60

 

[Karl Gohl]

Most stitching software cannot handle the case where the shots weren't taken with the camera level. I took a pano from a mountain top with the camera pointed down significantly. The canon software made the image come out in a big arc. I researched this on the web a bit and bought Panavue Image Assembler. You can enter the amount that the camera was tilted up or down. If you don't know the number of degrees, it has a function where you specify several matching points between 2 or 3 images and it figures out the focal length and amount of tilt, which you can then imput when you do the stitch of the whole set of images. It also does a pretty good job of adjusting exposure between shots, so you don't have to use the same exposure on all the shots.

• Karl

ws

-Eddie

Could it be the tripod that is not aligned flat?
Could it be the lens that has some barrel distortion?

Adam

ws

I tried to do something similar 3 weeks ago. The result was pretty
bad: that was a hazy day and, as you said, the images were tilted.
The buildings were not aligned right (I only tried the Canon's
stitching software.) How did you fix it in PS?

Thanks for sharing yours. It is inspiring.

-Eddie

I manually stitched them in PS. I tried using PhotoStich 3.1, but
it didn't work for some reason. But doing this stitch really
revealed many bugs with the 1D. The most annoying was was that all
the images were TILTED (it's true), so they never align right. And
the Moire problem is obvious when you examine the buildings...

ws

I love your town (and your photo of it ). Makes me want to move
to Hong Kong tomorrow. Fantastic work here in stitching the images
together, did you use stitching software or did you put them
manually together in Photoshop? Well done. (Now do it again with
some nice a.m. or p.m. light).
Sven

--
WSLam

--
D60: http://eddiewong.com

--
WSLam

--
D60: http://eddiewong.com

--
WSLam

 

[WalterK]

If your camera was tilted, you could still get a perfect stitch with Panorama Tools, which can be downloaded free (do a search, I don't remember the URL.) It can adjust for anything, including taking some of the images with a different lens or even a different camera. If you put the time you spent stitching this good pano in Photoshop, into learning Panorama Tools, you would probably want to shoot lots more panos.
--
Walter K

 

[BillDrew]

I made a 360 of Tokyo from the Tokyo Tower and Stitch gave me a
horrible curve... I think to make it straight I would have to cut
off a portion of the bottom pictures. It took 11 photos, orginally
had 13. I just held the camera against the glass which was angled
down a few degrees.

Your image:



isn't corrected for pitch, i.e., being taken with the lens pointing downward. John Houghton has an excellent little tutorial on dealing with that at http://homepage.dtn.ntl.com/j.houghton/horizons.htm It is in terms of Panorama Tools and PTGui, but even if you use different software it will give you a good understanding of the problem.

 

[Texas]

chuck.....

thanks, i will try that soon. i would just as soon try again with a better camera... did a HKG panorama(Hong KonG) a while back but i was new with the camera and had NO IDEA what i was doing.... resolution is not so good compared to D60... this was in Dec 2000...

http://www.pbase.com/image/2368749/original

somebody at pbase has some really good night shots of HKG but i forgot who it is... wslam has a good vantage point!!

sure helps to have cable internet to look at these pictures account of the large files.

have fun,
nic

I made a 360 of Tokyo from the Tokyo Tower and Stitch gave me a
horrible curve... I think to make it straight I would have to cut
off a portion of the bottom pictures. It took 11 photos, orginally
had 13. I just held the camera against the glass which was angled
down a few degrees. Going to Tokyo to shop for a D60 next week.
This was taken with a G1. Never attempted to use PS on the image
here as I was not motivated to learn it at the time. Now I know
it's value. Good view from your house!!

Tokyo panorama
http://www.pbase.com/image/1966340

Nic

 

[Texas]

Thanks Bill,

I will try that.

nic

I made a 360 of Tokyo from the Tokyo Tower and Stitch gave me a
horrible curve... I think to make it straight I would have to cut
off a portion of the bottom pictures. It took 11 photos, orginally
had 13. I just held the camera against the glass which was angled
down a few degrees.

Your image:



isn't corrected for pitch, i.e., being taken with the lens pointing
downward. John Houghton has an excellent little tutorial on
dealing with that at
http://homepage.dtn.ntl.com/j.houghton/horizons.htm It is in terms
of Panorama Tools and PTGui, but even if you use different software
it will give you a good understanding of the problem.

 

[WSLam]

Hi Philip,

The shot was taken from my balcony... if you get to visit HK, go to 'The Peak'... that's where you will find 'the view'. But good luck though. Weather is tricky these days. During the day it's quite hazy (as you can tell from the photo), and at night it's often fogged up.

ws

I'm reading a book about hong Kong at the moment and i'd love to
know exactly where this was shot, and what i'm seeing in the photo.

--
WSLam

 

[WSLam]

Thank you all for the nice comments.

I will do another one as soon as the weather clears up. Mainly the AIR clears up. Has anyone notice how air pollution is becoming a real problem for photography?

ws

It was a rainy day, but i was bored.

My 'tilting' 1D gave me a lot of trouble stitching these together.
But i think it looks 'ok'...after a lot of work.

10 photos taken with the 1D/50 1.4 combo with the SAME exposure
vertically.

http://photos.lam.ws/family/Home/panorama-view.jpg

Photo is about 1.5MB.

--
WSLam

--
WSLam

 

[AndyM59248]

Nice one. Looking forward for another one with better light.
What's that new tower in construction in the center of the image?

That is the 'Two International Finance Center' being built above Hong Kong station. When completed, this 88 floor (412m=1,352 ft) will become Hong Kongs tallest building - but only until the 480m Union Square building is completed in a few years, above Kowloon Station (across the harbour).

Here is another view of 2IFC from sealevel, unfortunately on a very dull day - but hopefully it gives an idea of how it is already dominating the HK skyline...



If you are interested in getting more info, check out
http://www.skyscrapers.com/english/worldmap/building/0.9/100614/index.html

Regards

Andy

 

[WSLam]

Thank you Andy! =)

The Air polltution in HK is serious!

ws

Nice one. Looking forward for another one with better light.
What's that new tower in construction in the center of the image?

That is the 'Two International Finance Center' being built above
Hong Kong station. When completed, this 88 floor (412m=1,352 ft)
will become Hong Kongs tallest building - but only until the 480m
Union Square building is completed in a few years, above Kowloon
Station (across the harbour).

Here is another view of 2IFC from sealevel, unfortunately on a very
dull day - but hopefully it gives an idea of how it is already
dominating the HK skyline...



If you are interested in getting more info, check out
http://www.skyscrapers.com/english/worldmap/building/0.9/100614/index.html

Regards

Andy

--
WSLam

 

[AndyM59248]

Thank you Andy! =)

The Air polltution in HK is serious!

ws

Hi ws

Great panorama by the way ! But how about a few night views, archive shots of fireworks in the harbour, or even a webcam ?

I agree with you on the air pollution front, but if your panorama was taken from your home - then you are definitely living in the best place to avoid the problem, unlike us mere mortals down at sea level ! ;-)

Anyway all the best, and keep posting any more great views

Andy

 

[WSLam]

Hi Andy,
Here is a shot of Fireworks...



I will do a night shot. but weather has not been great like i said...

ws

Thank you Andy! =)

The Air polltution in HK is serious!

ws

Hi ws

Great panorama by the way ! But how about a few night views,
archive shots of fireworks in the harbour, or even a webcam ?

I agree with you on the air pollution front, but if your panorama
was taken from your home - then you are definitely living in the
best place to avoid the problem, unlike us mere mortals down at sea
level ! ;-)

Anyway all the best, and keep posting any more great views

Andy

--
WSLam

 

[WSLam]

but the fireworks shot was shot on a Nikon D1x (what am i doing posting it on the Canon forum!) =)

ws

 

[Texas]

ws,

maybe you could take a panoramic at night and try to capture some fireworks over the harbor in one of the shots.....just a thought.
nic

ws

It was a rainy day, but i was bored.

My 'tilting' 1D gave me a lot of trouble stitching these together.
But i think it looks 'ok'...after a lot of work.

10 photos taken with the 1D/50 1.4 combo with the SAME exposure
vertically.

http://photos.lam.ws/family/Home/panorama-view.jpg

Photo is about 1.5MB.

--
WSLam

--
WSLam

 

[WSLam]

Hi Nic!

Well, fireworks don't happen every night! =) sometimes it's only once or twice a year. I do like the idea though! will keep it in mind!

ws

ws

It was a rainy day, but i was bored.

My 'tilting' 1D gave me a lot of trouble stitching these together.
But i think it looks 'ok'...after a lot of work.

10 photos taken with the 1D/50 1.4 combo with the SAME exposure
vertically.

http://photos.lam.ws/family/Home/panorama-view.jpg

Photo is about 1.5MB.

--
WSLam

--
WSLam

--
WSLam

 

[Bernard Duchesne]

Interesting.
I see that it's from the same architects who did the Petronas towers
in Malaysia. The overall shape looks similar too (at first sight).

Nice one. Looking forward for another one with better light.
What's that new tower in construction in the center of the image?

That is the 'Two International Finance Center' being built above
Hong Kong station. When completed, this 88 floor (412m=1,352 ft)
will become Hong Kongs tallest building - but only until the 480m
Union Square building is completed in a few years, above Kowloon
Station (across the harbour).

Here is another view of 2IFC from sealevel, unfortunately on a very
dull day - but hopefully it gives an idea of how it is already
dominating the HK skyline...



If you are interested in getting more info, check out
http://www.skyscrapers.com/english/worldmap/building/0.9/100614/index.html

Regards

Andy