Photostitch/Panorama technique

[Grainbelt]

Saskatchewan is the Land of the Living Skies.

With a 36mm equivalent starting point on my S5 IS, I generally have to stitch photos together to get the effect I'm looking for. A couple of n00b questions regarding exposure and colour when stitching.

I shoot fully manual when stitching to ensure that the frames are all exposed the same. All JPG, as the S5 doesn't support RAW. I'm curious whether switching the camera mode to 'stitch assist' is overriding any of my manual settings, or if the light is simply changing fast enough that one frame is simply darker than another.

Here is a sample, a road to nowhere. The stitch points on the right are pronounced, and to my eye the image gets darker frame-by-frame as you move to the right.

http://grainbelt.smugmug.com/photos/297629124_defxN-XL.jpg

I've searched a bit and it seems that by setting exposure to manual, using a preset WB, and given the infinite depth of field of a p&s, the resulting exposure should be consistent.

Any thoughts/advise/things I am missing?

Thanks much
--Mike

[ian408]

Can you tell us how you stitched the images?

Otherwise, I don't know that I would use the stitch mode in the camera. No
need. What I do is frame my first shot and make a note of what's about 2/3's
of the way in the direction I am shooting, frame, shoot and repeat.

I use CS3 to stich my panos together. As for exposure, I've done it both ways.
Manual and auto. WB is always automatic.

One thing that makes stitching difficult are things like the grasses as they're
constantly moving. Same with large numbers of trees. In each case, you need
to overlap more than usual--maybe 40-50 percent.

CS3 also allows you to synchronize all the images and adjust them as one. This
is important as well.

[Grainbelt]

Can you tell us how you stitched the images?

The photos were stitched using the Canon Photostitch app that came with the camera. Photostich will only accept photos that are the same size, so they were untouched jpgs off the camera. This means they weren't straightened or cropped to match up better before the stitching.

Photos were handheld as well, I didn't have a tripod or monopod with me on the bike that evening. Good point about simply paying attention rather than using stitch assist mode.

[ian408]

Your stitches should have worked. Excepting the grasses.

Hmmm.