New School Panorama

[Robert Watcher]

I arduously shoot panoramic images while traveling - and then bring them back to my workstation to input and process in Autopano Pro. It can be very rewarding . . .

. . . but not nearly as effortless and enjoyable as when I used my son's new iPhone 5 last weekend on our yearly outing with he, his wife and daughter. Literally follow the arrow on screen and turn. The large processed image displays beautifully on the screen.

Of course I had to know how the image would look in Photoshop in my working environment. I had Ryan email this pano shot that I took with his phone camera, and I can say that I was actually shocked at the quality and the smoothness of the image stitching. I only went partially around - resulting in a 9 1/2 MB file that is 6,000px x 2,480px - - - while a full pano image was a bit over 9,000px wide.

The pano feature, is part of the new iOS6 and so can be added to say an iPhone 4 with an upgrade. But the new camera in the iPhone 5 is quite stunning I must say.

Rob

 

[Robert Watcher]

This is a rediculously small 650px x 650px crop at 100% screen size - maybe not top dlsr quality - but not too shabby, and plenty good enough to suit almost any non-professional.

Rob

 

[Asher Kelman]

I arduously shoot panoramic images while traveling - and then bring them back to my workstation to input and process in Autopano Pro. It can be very rewarding . . .

I think that using the iPhone's separate images in AutoPano would enable slightly better stitches but not by much. The verticals for sure could be more readily corrected and you would have no size limit and choices of projections.

But, as we can see, this is superb and so convenient. It would be an advance if one could get the stitched version and retain the images too. Also, one should be able to add as many rows as one likes!

Asher

 

[Asher Kelman]

Rob,

This picture is so beautiful that it deserves attention just for that! Amazingly, the family makes a giant single mass in the composition that balances the lavish curved areas of boldly-colored painted soft floor of the children's playground. This is so unusual that it's worth studying for its attractiveness, simplicity and effectiveness.

Asher

 

[Robert Watcher]

Thank you for the compliment Asher.


I do agree that more control could be had using pro stitching software - - - but the point is that most people will never notice irregularities and mismatches and will be totally content with the quality that come out of these files. It could be that the slanted house on the left was a result of my inexperience in using the camera - - - and if I had a more refined technique, that wouldn't have resulted. The panos the iPhone5 (and upgraded iOS6 on other devices) produce, are much wider than I did. I decided to press the button and stop the process once I reached the edge of the water pad.

One of the main reasons that I got Ryan to email me this file that I took - was so that I could view it in my Properly setup workstation - - - as well as run a print on some 13"x19" paper to see if the camera quality of this new phone really holds up to what it appeared on the iPhone's screen.

And so I just ran such a print through my Epson printer - and I was impressed to say the least. The image is 18 inches wide and while the quality isn't represented in this snapshot that I took of the print - - - I can tell you that my son and his wife will be very pleased to frame and display this print in their home. There is nothing that would suggest that it was taken with a phone or portable device for most viewers. I know it's not from a DSLR when I look closely - but the image didn't fall apart when enlarged as I suspected it might.

Rob

 

[jake klein]

I would like to see some panos from an iphone or my htc one S that are taken on a tripod with a pano head!