Shawn Wilson |
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Composition input needed
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full crop
Shawn Wilson
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my crop
The dimentions were chosen to fit a poster frame that I have.
Shawn Wilson
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I have been getting more active taking panoramic pictures as the tools out there to stitch them get better and easier, but have come upon something I need some input on.Compositon of certain shots is troubling me because I want to make these pictures produce as much wow factor as possible, but the compositions lend themselves to center alignment. What I'd like is for those of you out there with some 'street cred' to take this picture and compose it how you would see fit and maybe comment on why. Attached is my source picture (washed out for some protection) and the final that I did.
October 12, 2006
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Shawn Wilson |
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No takers? *frown*
October 12, 2006
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Pete H |
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Well Shawn, Not sure why no responses, but if many are like me, we don't try to "re-do" someone elses work. ..but since you ask;
If I were to shoot this shot, I would probably have panned a little further left or right and not center this image. Here's why I would do it this way: 1) Symetrically centered photos don't lead the viewer into the pic; they are already there. No mystery. 2) If the shot were panned left or right, with one of the hills occupying 2/3 of the frame, the viewer is now more comfortably pulled into the photo to see something of interest. Kinda' like a treasure hunt with a prize waiting. 3) By panning the shot (cropped) with again, one of the hills filling 2/3 of the frame, it will lend itself to size, majesty and scale of the hills. What I would have done is what I like, maybe not everyone.
I like your shot, but feel it could have been composed a little better for the human eye. Pete
October 13, 2006
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Shawn Wilson |
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I realize that people don't like to re-do other's work like you said, but I'm hoping to get some input none the less. I guess my thought process was that since these are panoramic pictures that will be printed at 3 to 5 feet wide they may benefit from different compositon rules than an 8x10 print. Is that thought process flawed? Should you compose the shot with the same thought process regardless of the final print size? Your comment about the person being lead into the picture of already being there sparks this thought. Because when displaying a panoramic image at 5 feet wide that's kind of the point, to feel like you're there. Does an image still benifit from a leading in composition with all that considered?
October 13, 2006
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Pete H |
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Well; in my opinion, a good composition is a good composition, regardless of the size.
Pete
October 13, 2006
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Shawn Wilson |
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Pan final crop
Colorado - near mount Belford.
Shawn Wilson
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I think I decided on a final cut. I adjusted the crop as you suggested and as the rule of thirds suggests... although not fully to a third, it's at least offset from center now.And I'll admit, even the little shift draws your eye across the picture rather than locking it on center. I need to take this into account as I'm shooting the panoramic source images next time to help with the final shot.
October 13, 2006
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Pete H |
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I will say, I do like this one better...kinda' draws me in and makes me a feel a little overwhelmed as I can feel and sense the size of these hills. Pete
October 13, 2006
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Samuel Smith |
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i can't get a sense of the image at all because of someone wrote their name all across the image.
I thought the first one was overexposed and the second taken in less than complimentarity light.
sorry you ruined your own photo just for our viewing and conjecture.
not a personal attack at all shawn,an opinion.
can't you just shoot the scene and then just mask out the top and bottom for the appeareance of a panoramic shot?
sam
October 13, 2006
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Shawn Wilson |
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First, no offence taken, that's my name and I know it's distracting, but I'm proud enough of my pano shots to want to keep them mine. Of course the watermark isn't present in the print, only when tossed out here in the open. Whether or not I'm really that good yet is debatable, but when people see the pictures at their full resolution and size I get wows, as pan shots often do, so I know I'm on the right track and opted to lock the image up a little. With considerable effort one may remove the watermark of course, but like any security, it's more of a detturant than anything. Next, these are all the same shot. I washed out the one source to give something to work with, but once again to protect the orignial shot. (you didn't read the post?) Yes, for some shots you can just crop down to appear like a pan shot, but you cannot then print that shot at 5 or 6 feet wide with perfect clarity or introduce details that were not captured at that small of a size. This image is 72 megapixels in it's source size. You can pretend all you want, but a true pan shot is quite obvious. The point of stitching pictures to make a bigger picture is two fold. First, to allow for a field of view that is not normally physically possible (at least not without huge fisheye distortion). And second, to allow for HUGE prints or at least very large prints (5 feet and larger in width) with perfect clarity. My shot here is greater than a 90 degree field of view and isn't possible to capture in one shot normally. Given a fisheye lens I might have captured it, but it would look like a sphere and not anything like the actual scene my eyes looked upon that day. Barring extreme fisheye distortion, it is simply impossible to capture some scenes without stitching. I have 4 pan shots from this trip, one of which is a 180 degree view from the summit, and you can take in the view clearly. No single shot can capture that.
October 13, 2006
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Samuel Smith |
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ok i'll do some searching on my 20mm.field of view and such.degree of coverage.
but from what i've read,the height or angle the view is shot from does make a huge difference on distortion,or as you said fisheye curve view..not picken,talkin.
i may owe an apology,sam
October 13, 2006
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Shawn Wilson |
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The exact numbers aren't what it's about really. I've seen 190 degree fisheye lenses but as we all know those images are spheres and while they can be interesting in their own right, they aren't meant to represent the scene as seen (pun?). Wide angles like 18mm, where I've seen numbers of 75 degrees or so field of view sometimes capture the right compsition, but also waste a lot of the frame. Especially when talking digital where a certain shot may only give you less than a third of the available sensor pixels worth of image information. But pan shots have been around far longer than digital cameras. They occupy a world of their own really. Especially when printed. Much like IMAX movies, an image that can capture the peripheral view that was present in person is an amazing thing. And being able to do that without any distortion is wonderful. Lastly, the detail aspect is sometimes enough of a reason to stitch a scene. You can take a shot of a tree for instance, the best possible film or digital shot you can muster. And blow it up to a 10 ft tall print. But in that shot, while it will be good, you will not see veins on a leaf half way up the tree. With a pan shot though, you could make that happen.
October 13, 2006
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