The other day I had the opportunity to shoot in the late evening at Freshwater Beach on Sydney’s Northern Beaches. This is taken from a lookout at the northern end. The light didn’t hang around for long, just long enough and that’s all you ever need.
I have included a few actual pixel extracts from the shot. The resolution and shadow detail is amazing and totally kills the detail I can get from my 6×17 cameras on Velvia 50 slide.
This image is a 9 image stitch on my Canon 5D Mark II. Shot at 50mm it gives a close field of view as my Fuji GX617 with the 90mm lens. This images final size is 14895 pixels x 4965 pixels @ 240dpi.
I had stitched it in PTGui initially but I found the blending of the water very harsh, but in CS4 the blending was perfect. The other alternative would have been to output the files in PTGui and hand stitch and blend. But I try to avoid this if I can, take so bloody long to do, especially when your not running enough RAM or processing power.
Nice image.
Does this mean film is almost dead for you?
Thanks Merv. No not almost dead but I am shooting a lot more digital now and shooting film when I think the shot will be better done with that camera. Or the light would be better off captured on film like a red sunrise or sunset.
Some scenes lend them selves well to digital, some don’t. Thanks when the 6×17 will step in.
Very nice shot, Matt. Looks like you got some awesome detail there 🙂
mate soon you will forget the film camera. For your reds have a look at Joseph Holmes colour spaces. Might make that little bit of difference you need.
Thanks Beau…. yea the detail is great with the 21MP sensor.
Fletch yea I have seen those profiles before. Not sure which one to get. Do you have them. My issue with red sunrises and sunsets is blowing the red channel. But I haven’t shot either with the 5d Mk II yet so I will see how it goes handling the reds. I tell you when I do sell my film gear I will have a kick ass range of canon lenses. The 600mm f4 will make a nice addition for starters or the 800mm f5.6. Imagine the compositions you could get stitching with that bastard. 🙂
I’m with you Matt, images containing moving water seem to be better stitched in Photoshop, I’ve noticed that PTGui is leaving diagonal line across the stitched image that take a lot faffing around to smooth them out. If @ first you don’t succeed in PTGui then try, try again in Photoshop.
Nice image by the way, nice to see the detail that can be achieved.
Wow, I love the panoramic, beautiful composition. Best aspect of this shot for me is how the sky over the ocean slowly comes to light at the shore. Awesome 🙂
Great stuff Matt. I recently did a similar test with my new MkII (only comparing to the old 5D though) I was stunned with the results. How good is the 5D Mark II!!!
it has haep good details it must have taken u ages
Dan the 5D Mark II is great. Well worth the money thats for sure.
Molly this images was quite quick to take and put together. When you have your work flow down pat you can fly through putting images together.
Hi matt – great shot. Quick question – why do a lot of people, including yourself, talk about how amazing long lens stitched compositions are. Eg you reference to your ideal 600 or 800??
I have a 500 which I have only ever used for wildlife – am I missing out here?
Hi Murray… a longer focal length lens really just lets you shoot into places that standard panoramic film lenses really cant. Thats all. Your not missing out. 🙂