One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

[Ian]

I'm scratching my head over this. I have run the same pano stitch project on two different computers but using the same software (Photoshop CS6 Photomerge). I have taken care to use the same options and settings. On my new Dell Inspiron 15R N5110 laptop I got this:



That's after trimming and adjusting in Lightroom.

But here is what I got using my old laptop:



Ignore the fact that I haven't trimmed and cropped this one; but look at the joins and the bad alignments.

So what has gone wrong? The old laptop has 4GB RAM and the new one 8GB - could that be the reason?

Ian

[Chevvyf1]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

I would put the old one on the side for your daughters perhaps - or for emails etc and as a backup

I am blown away by the difference between the two

[StephenL]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

It's as if it's given up after the basic stitching stage and before the alignment and exposure balancing stages.

Does make you think that it's a memory problem.

Photoshop has/had a reputation for not releasing memory correctly - not as much of a problem if you've got loads of it.

[Ian]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

I forgot to mention that the pano is composed of 14 separate shots in portrait mode. And they were RAW files, so I think the finger of suspicion points firmly at a lack of memory. Both laptops are running Windows 7 64.

Ian

[StephenL]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

I must say I'm impressed how CS6 has managed to merge what are presumably wide-angle shots so well (on the right machine, obviously!).

What lens did you use?

[Dogcow]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

Well, I am not sure about the Photomerge function in PS6 (which I don't use) but in general it is not a good idea to stitch panoramas from RAW files.

RAW files are not very adequate for finding control points which is the reason most of the panorama software use 'on-the-fly' conversion from RAW to JPEG (or TIFF).
For that reason I only stitch my panoramas from (preferably) TIFF files which I convert to my taste first. (and when I need the dynamic range, I'll use 16 bit TIFFs, which I stitch into a 16 bit TIFF panorama. In that case: beware of the huge file size... )

And yes, lack of memory (or adequate room for the huge scratch files you'll need for large panoramas) could play a role here.

Karel

[Chevvyf1]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

... 14 separate shots in portrait mode ... RAW files
Ian

I am surprised the olde one did not crash and die forevermore

[Ian]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

I must say I'm impressed how CS6 has managed to merge what are presumably wide-angle shots so well (on the right machine, obviously!).

What lens did you use?

I used the Panasonic 12-35 f/2.8 on an E-M5.

Ian

[Ian]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

By the way the old laptop took 34 minutes to get it wrong and the new one took 8 minutes and got it right

Ian

[George Dorn]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

Off topic: with a bit of pp, I would prefer the second pic in a way, always a sucker for real stitching (80's Polaroids)

[Ian]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match



Produced successfully this time by the old laptop - I adjusted the RAWs in Lightroom and than exported reduced size TIFs and then ran them through PS CS6 Photomerge.

Ian

[Dogcow]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

Great result, next step could be to straighten the horizon...

[wanderer]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

I would suggest part of the problem is using a wide angle.
I try not to go wider than 25mm. I find the distortion otherwise becomes a problem.

[Dogcow]

See here for an example, taken with the E-M5 + Samyang 7.5mm FishEye.


Karel

[Ian]

Re: One for Dogcow? Pano stitching mis-match

Great result, next step could be to straighten the horizon...

The central vertical is just about straight, but I guess you mean get rid of the faux curvature if the earth?

Ian