Panorama creation

For Peter:

The Panotools wiki (http://wiki.panotools.org/) has quite a bit of
useful info, although as with many wikis it is somewhat spotty with
blind spots and so on. Still useful though. In particular, take a
look at:

Hardware (lenses, panorama heads):
http://wiki.panotools.org/Hardware

PTGui (powerful stitching software):
http://wiki.panotools.org/PTGUI

And I encourage anyone who does do this sort of thing to consider
taking part in the regular World Wide Panorama events.

This is a quarterly themed event for panorama photographers around
the world. More information is on the site…

k


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A very good resource Keith but as you say a few ‘blind spots’, can’t recall seeing Microsoft’s Image Composite Editor (ice) mentioned, nor photosynth not that I’m recommending them.

Had another play with PTGUI as its been over a year since I started doing panoramas (not 360 degree) and having then opted for Autopano Pro.

PTGUI is much much faster than APP and renders detail / texture better but messed up on an easy stitch, think thats why I opted for APP. Probably easily sorted but right off the cuff APP scores.
I don’t think any one application can deal with all pano situations, even the above ICE managed a pano in some respects better than APP, shame about the completely misaligned section though.

seoras


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Sometime around 29/12/08 (at 07:53 -0500) seoras said:

can’t recall seeing Microsoft’s Image Composite Editor (ice)
mentioned, nor photosynth not that I’m recommending them.

A fair comment. My problems with Image Composite Editor (ICE) are
(a) that it is Windows-only,
(b) that it appears to lack support for fisheye images,
(c) that it is being used to push Silverlight (Microsoft’s attempt to
muscle in on Flash), and
(d) that it appears not to support control point editing for
precision image alignment.

Okay, ‘c’ is a personal reaction. But I do feel that an area such as
this is best served by cross-platform solutions both in the authoring
tools and the end-user players. Both ICE itself and the output it
leans towards are either Windows-only or are part of a broader plan
to promote Windows at the expense of other platforms.

ICE has good points, including HD View output (although that is also
Windows-only, dammit), but the fact that it is a Windows-only tool is
more than enough for me to leave it out.

Photosynth is fun but it isn’t really in line with what I’m talking
about, and it is Windows-only too. Additionally, by including image
scraping techniques it strays into serious copyright issues.

So - great ideas, but Windows-only implementations plus an ethical
issue not properly tackled.

I don’t think any one application can deal with all pano situations

Probably not. But I can testify to PTGui’s abilities - it takes a
little learning to get the most from some image sets, that’s for
sure. But it is exceptionally capable. It would be foolish to claim
that it can deal with all requirements. But virtually all pano
stitching situations can be handled well by it if time is taken to
learn how to make it work well.

AutoPano is also very good. But in terms of the final quality of the
output might it not be better to see how to get PTGui to handle your
images better? :slight_smile:

k


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Hi Keith,

I haven’t totally abandoned PTGUI. I was very impressed by its general speed and maintenance of fine detail, so shall have another look to see if I can get it to stitch more accurately. I only tried two examples but shall look at the one that failed again.

There’s a new update on the cards for APPro so will be interesting to see if it has any substantial improvements.

seoras


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