Mastering Digital Panoramic Photography [Paperback]

Harald Woeste (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 4, 2009

The unusual perspective of a panoramic image creates a unique and intriguing visual experience for the viewer. Skillfully executed, panoramic photography can realize scenes which could otherwise never be captured in an image or seen with the naked eye.

Panoramas offer new possibilities for creative photographers, either as flat, two-dimensional images, or mapped into a 3D space that can be visited on a virtual tour. New, powerful, panorama software makes the workflow easier and more efficient than ever before.

Author Harald Woeste takes the reader on a tour from the basics of capturing panoramas, all the way through stitching, editing, and printing panoramic images. He provides a detailed description of the necessary equipment and materials, as well as the various software tools that can be used in the workflow. The latter half of the book illustrates the making of panoramas through a number of example projects.

In Mastering Digital Panoramic Photography you will find everything you need to know to create amazing panoramic images.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Harald Woeste lives in Bonn, Germany where he works as a designer and photographer for international clients. Digital photograhic panoramas was the subject of his thesis at the "Universitaet der Kuenste" in Berlin, and it has become one of the tools for his work as an artist and designer. One of the widely recognized projects of Harald Woeste is the panoramic capture of the exhibit "Einstein, Engineer of the Universe" in Berlin.

Product Details

• Paperback: 160 pages
• Publisher: Rocky Nook; 1 edition (November 4, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1933952458
• ISBN-13: 978-1933952451
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 8.1 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #738,694 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Detailed, Technical Education on Panoramic Photography, February 3, 2010

By 

Jeremy Hall (Pleasant Grove, UT USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Mastering Digital Panoramic Photography (Paperback)

I found it interesting to read some of the other reviews prior to writing my own evaluation of this book. The information and approach taken by Woeste seems to be a definitely hit or miss with the audience that has chimed in. Here's why I think this is the case.

If you are looking for a simple step-by-step approach to getting a great stitched panoramic photo, this may not be the book for you. Though there is plenty of how-to type instruction with well documented screen shots, it is not presented in the recipe to success approach taken by some books.

Conversely, if you are the type that likes to get the entire picture (pun kinda intended in this case), including all the background, history, technique and philosophy to the panoramic technique, then this is the book for you. Woeste provides superb examples, front annotated behind-the-scenes setup views to beautiful examples of his own work, to compliment a thorough walk through panoramic photography. The history of the craft is included, giving some interesting background.

The detailed view of tripod heads & gear definitely puts this book beyond the avid amateur who is looking for just the basic simple software solution for stitching some photos together. Perhaps that is this books biggest difficulty, finding the right audience. Even so, for the photographer that enjoys knowing the deep details and options available in this area, I'd say this book is a good offering.

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars In the Round, October 12, 2009

By 

Conrad J. Obregon (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Mastering Digital Panoramic Photography (Paperback)

Aside from the obvious benefits of digital over other photography media, like greater control over exposures and post-processing adjustments, digital photography has enabled us to improve older techniques so that photographers are better able to convey their vision. Images that covered more than the normal angle of view, called panoramas, were first created in 1787, using large scale circular paintings in which the viewer was centered in the painting. Today, with very little additional equipment, a digital photographer can create very wide angle images, with great detail, by stitching together several separate images. He or she can even create virtual realities (also known as spherical projections), where a viewer can have the effect of being completely surrounded by an image. Particularly amazing is not just the angle of view, which can exceed any wide angle lens, but the resolution of the final image.

Harold Woeste provides an introduction to panoramic photography. After reviewing the history of panoramas, Woeste introduces the special equipment necessary to capture the images to be used in the panorama. While a panorama can be captured using a hand held camera, better results will ensue using a tripod with a specially designed head when shooting the series of images required for a panorama. The author then discusses the computer software necessary to stitch together the images. He also shows methods of outputting the images, which includes both wide flat prints of great detail and images which must be viewed on a computer and which allow the viewer to select any direction to look, including even up and down.

An important part of the book is the description of four different panorama projects that the author worked on, moving from the initial idea for the project, through the special considerations in capturing the images, to the use of multiple software packages to maximize the quality of the image, to the final output as a print or computer file.

On the other hand, Woeste's level of detail is at the familiarization level, not the practical level of actually taking the images or using the software. Thus, as I followed along I occasionally encountered references that I did not understand, such as control points, which were not related to the Photoshop CS4 software that I normally use, but are contained in PTGui, a more advanced piece of software that can be used for difficult situations and for spherical images. To fully comprehend what the author was saying, I had to download PTGui (there's a free trial available) and spend several hours reading the instructions (which were not very well organized) and even process a few trial images. On the other hand, snap shooters who aren't willing to spend the time and effort, are also not likely try their hand at panoramas, and understanding the uses of PTGui will certainly help if one encounters a problem where PTGui can provide a useful solution. I suppose I would have liked just a little more detail. For example, Woeste suggests that while PTGui is great for stitching, one can have better results if one saves the image and then blends it in Photoshop. Unfortunately neither Woeste nor the PTGui instructions mention that the stitched image must be saved as a PSD file rather than a TIFF to do this. Perhaps what I really wanted was a better PTGui instruction manual.

In any case, if you are a photographer who wants to move beyond the simple flat image capture and processing, wants to know what's available to help you create better panoramas, and wants to see some of the possibilities available in panoramic photography, this book will provide a good introduction.

NOTE: Since I wrote this review I've found that there is a way to save PTGUI files as TIFFs.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A very good guide to panorama photography, December 9, 2009

By 

Kent Baker "Photoguy" (Seattle, WA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Mastering Digital Panoramic Photography (Paperback)

I found this book very valuable in providing a great deal of technical expertise on this subject. I enjoyed the historical section, although I was already very familiar with the old techniques presented here (I have been involved in photography for 47 years), but I think those who are newer will find it fascinating. The very explicit explanations of parallax problems and how to remedy them with special tripod heads and 'L' brackets was very informative. I also liked the information on vertical panorama techniques and how to correct the distortions introduced by shooting with the camera pointed up. Although I already know how to do much of what is in the book (from long years of experience), I really appreciated the thorough coverage of the subject and how it is related to digital photography and techniques. After all, digital cameras are so good at panoramic photography that essentially all camera manuifacturers have ceased production of their film panoramic cameras (Fuji, Hasselblad, etc.). Anyone interested in panoramic photography would do well to study the methods and techniques in this book. the reason that I gave it only four stars instead of 5 is that those who mainly capture landscapes, with no close foreground objects, will need only a small amount of the information presented in the book, which spends a lot of pages on avoiding parallax problems and their remedies in situations that most of us avoid. That said, you should still be aware of those problems, and their solution. And the author does offer more simple solutions than buying expensive, specialized equipment - making the book worthwile for that alone!