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Project #9 - Creating Panoramics

[Novamar Panoramic]

What's so special about this picture that it ends up in the project section I hear you ask. Well the main reason is because the picture is a panoramic which comprises of three separate sections of the ship; the front, middle and end: just so you don't think I am trying to pull a fast one on you, here are the original photographs.

As you can see, there were actually four separate exposures, but only three of them were used. The reason of four exposures was to ensure that I could get the ship joined up without too much difference.

When taking photographs to make a panoramic always use a tripod or monopod and set your camera to Exposure Lock - this will give your image the same lighting throughout.

Panoramic scenes are not that difficult to create, the problems really are getting the exposures you want and then matching them up, which is more of a time consuming and fiddly task. With a little patience you can pull off a panoramic scene too. Here's how:

  1. The first thing you need to do is scan your exposures into Photoshop. Don't worry about enhancing the colour just yet; that comes later.

    When you have your images scanned in, you need to select one of them (I started with the middle and then worked outwards) and change the name of the Background Layer - This will make it a floating layer.

  2. Before you can start bringing in another layer, you need to adjust the canvas size. Since you are creating a panoramic scene you only need to adjust the width of the canvas.

    Bring up the Canvas requestor by selecting Image... Canvas. When it appears, click on either the left or right middle arrow settings. This will make your canvas stretch to either the left or right.

  3. Now that you have stretched the canvas, you are ready to bring the next layer into play, in my case, it was the front of the ship. This is were the fun begins. First of all, change the blending mode to screen, this will let you see through the topmost image enabling you to get both images aligned properly. For more accuracy, use the cursor keys which will move the image one pixel at a time.

  4. When you are satisfied it is lined up correctly, change the blending mode back to normal. Repeat this process until you have lined up all the images.

  5. When you have positioned all the images onto one layer, you will still be able to see where each image joined up. To remove this line, use the clone tool. Remember to change the source frequently otherwise you will end up with a repetitive pattern running vertically down your image.

    That is the basics of making your own panoramics. To get the ultimate effect, print the image on a good printer.