Not sure I could have pulled that off--impressed that you did 5x3 on a ball head! My second Manfrotto tripod didn't have a leveling bubble (odd, because the first one did), so I think that's where the challenge with pano's started, that and not using an L-bracket. I had never heard of a leveling bowl until I starting looking into the Acratech heads.

What I love seeing is your development of the RAW image into the final product! Something I have so often wanted to see on UHH is more of the before and after. When I was first learning to PP from RAW, I really had a hard time taking the process far enough. I felt the RAW was the reality and the drastic change to anything close to what I do now seemed garish in contrast to the original capture. I can appreciate why it's hard for a lot of people to change to RAW capture--trusting yourself to know when you have got it 'right' instead of letting the camera JPEG decide for you takes a leap of faith...not to mention a lot more time.

Stunning image!!!

Not sure I could have pulled that off--impressed that you did 5x3 on a ball head! My second Manfrotto tripod didn't have a leveling bubble (odd, because the first one did), so I think that's where the challenge with pano's started, that and not using an L-bracket. I had never heard of a leveling bowl until I starting looking into the Acratech heads.

What I love seeing is your development of the RAW image into the final product! Something I have so often wanted to see on UHH is more of the before and after. When I was first learning to PP from RAW, I really had a hard time taking the process far enough. I felt the RAW was the reality and the drastic change to anything close to what I do now seemed garish in contrast to the original capture. I can appreciate why it's hard for a lot of people to change to RAW capture--trusting yourself to know when you have got it 'right' instead of letting the camera JPEG decide for you takes a leap of faith...not to mention a lot more time.

Stunning image!!!

So is the weakness mitigated by all my DSLR's being only 24MP?

BTW, Gene, is there any accuracy to the 'Field Map' in Sharpness in the Measurements section of DXOMark? Are the results based on theory or testing, do you know?

This may blow up this post, but I took a look at Nikon's DX VRII 55-200mm f/4-5.6G ED for my D5300. It appears to be extremely sharp corner to corner even at 200mm @ f/8--destroys the 18-200mm VR at the same settings. I have seen some reviewers that use this particular model 55-200mm as the best lens available in the focal range for non-professional use. And the combo weight is practically featherweight compared to the 28-300mm on the D750. (If I carry two bodies, I would put the VR 24-85mm on the D750.) What the light weight backup wouldn't give me is the focal range once I leave the car and set out on foot, so, school's still out on that matter. But what are your thoughts on trusting the mapping in DXOMark?

What most who look at DXO Mark don't get at first is that it is probably the worst tool to compare one lens to another. The numbers in the results are not absolute. What they report is how a particular lens on a given camera does compared to a trallheoretically flawless lens. The genius in this approach is that you can save some $$ by not buying the most expensive and sharpest lens on the market for your camera if all of that benefit will never be realized due to sensor size and resolution. That's why the same lens will test differently on various bodies. It is a good metric to consider, but by no means the only one.

Thanks!

I used a torpedo level (from construction) to level the top of the tripod. Then I turn on the level indicator (azimuth) in the camera. The whole setup takes less than 2 mins if you have a leveling base, and a little longer if you don't. I overlap about 50% with the horizontal (rows), and I just sight something that is at the edge and move the camera until it is in the middle and repeat. For the verticals I do the same thing, first overlapping the first row with the next, then repeating the same for each image in the row, and so on. Yes, an L bracket is pretty much essential, since I do my panos with the camera in portrait mode.