RVDigitalBoy Loc: Clermont, Florida

I recently purchased a panorama head for the purpose of ... well, shooting HDR panoramas.

On my first day out I shot a few including this image of a stand of planted pine trees, a cash crop here in rural Florida.

For those who like data read below.

Hardware:
- Nikon D3100 (ISO 100, F:16, Manual Mode, RAW)
- Nikkor 18-55mm zoom lens (set to 45mm)
- Nodal Ninja M1L pano head with RD16 rotator
- EZ Leveler II
- Promote Control (to automate 7-exposure images) (+3EV to -3EV)

Software:
- Lightroom 4 (transfer and catalog images, fix any chromatic aberation and make any lens corrections)
- Protomatix Pro 4.X (merge exposures) [Enhancer, Default]
- PS Elements 11 (stitch images into panorama)
- Topaz Adjust (via Elements 11)
- Topaz photoFXlab ( via Elements 11)

Okay, I don't think I forgot anything. So here is the image ...

Armadillo Loc: Ventura, CA

RVDigitalBoy,

In my opinion you have missed one element, the trees at the left and right end are leaning in toward the center of the image. This can be corrected in PP after the HDR merge with a "Perspective Correction" tool. Use the tool before any cropping is performed.

Michael G

greymule Loc: Colorado

SWEET! Be sure to download larger image!

RVDigitalBoy Loc: Clermont, Florida

Greymule, isn't the image you downloaded big enough? The original unreduced image was about 5 feet wide! I couldn't run it through Topaz filters until I reduced it by 65%.

RVDigitalBoy Loc: Clermont, Florida

Michael,

A very interesting observation. I would espect this if it was one shot with a very wide-angle lens. But it is 9 45mm shots (vertical) stitched together. I think the trees are leaning naturally. But, I understand your concern. The next time I drive by that stand I will stop and take a good look.

Armadillo Loc: Ventura, CA

Lew,

The extreme end of the 45mm lens acting as a sort of wide angle can present perspective errors in the capture. The older 55mm prime lens would tend to do this if shooting a street scene with tall buildings, this is one reason lens manufactures designed and produces the "Tilt-shift" lens.

Only another drive-by can really confirm the growth of the trees.

Michael G

greymule Loc: Colorado

I meant those looking, hit the download. '-D

conkerwood

No need for a drive by the trees are not leaning naturally. If you look at the fence posts you see that they have the same inward lean as the trees. But more obviously, if you look at the grass it is also the same. Grass lays as the wind blows it all in the same direction so there is clearly some distortion which is easily fixable in PP. But as to the pic itself I really like what you have attempted, the sense of scale is fantastic. I particularly like the tiny building in the distance and the diagonal tree baring entry. The light has been handled very well though there are a couple of hotspots in the sky but nothing major. But as soon as you zoom in on the details you see that there is a huge amount of ghosting in the grass and the pine needles which has resulted in a very soft look to all the foliage. Even the tiniest breeze or camera vibration is going to create a problem that would be impossible for any software to cope with so I think you did very very well to get what you did.

Hope this helps.

Peter

RVDigitalBoy Loc: Clermont, Florida

Peter,

Thanks for the detailed insight. I examined the image at maximum pixels (via my flickr.com page) and now totally agree about the perspective with all who mentioned it.

I'm still learning to recognize these types of faults in my processing. But, really, I never expected to encouter this type of problem with panoramas, especially at 45mm (Nikkor 18-55mm zoom). I thought a perfectly level panorama head would eliminate any perspective error.

I guess the panorama head (perfectly level) probably reduces this problem to a minimum. However, thinking back, I may have tilted the camera up slightly. Perhaps this account for the perspective shift. I don't think it is the stitching process.

I'll try to make this small perspective correction in Lightroom 4 or Elements 11.

Thanks to all!