Lets switch gears for a moment and discuss my two other favorite genres of photography, landscapes and architecture. In this article I will discuss 3 popular techniques that we can use for photographing subjects that don’t move…and I am NOT referring to an agency model that can’t pose worth a damn…LOL.

38MP image F/11 @ 1/3 sec, Nikkor 60mm f/2.8 Micro, 6-image pano-stitch

I will begin by discussing how we can create 30+megapixel by combining single-row panorama stitching and bracketed exposures used as layers (better and realistic looking HDR images) and finally including a 10 stop neutral density filter for surreal water-scapes.

Three weeks ago I had the opportunity to travel for business and recreation. First to St. Louis, Missouri to visit the parents, and then later to Portland, Oregon, then Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming, and finally Denver, Colorado before returning to Seattle last week. I took a few high megapixel snappy-poos along the way.

An explanation of two popular types of panorama shooting techniques. A single-row panorama is a series of images shot from left to right as the image below demonstrates. This can be just two images or it can be as many as you require and these are typically around 40-60MP or 3-6 images.

On occasion, I may shoot a multi-row panorama. This is stacking one single-row on top of another. Now we are talking baby…. 100+MP images that really blow up! I may shoot 12 images or more. Last summer I did shoot several multi-row panos that had 3 rows…upper, center, and lower. These 3 row image files can easily top out at 150MP and more. My camera is 12MP, the Canon 5DMK2 21MP files would be about double that or 300MP!

For camera support and hardware, I built my own L-Frame out of steel and a few extra camera accessory parts. My camera weighs in at about 6 lbs. with lens and the inexpensive pano rigs ($75-200) are not designed for this kind of weight. An afternoon in my father’s machine shop using the electric welder and I made my own super-duty L-Frame.

Hardware I purchased from B&H Photo for building my single/multi-row pano rig:

1) Manfrotto 438 Compact Leveling Head – this item is attached directly to the tripod base and levels the ballhead siting on top. Levels the tripod to the ground….step 1

2) Cullman Magnesit 35 Nm Ballhead – Sits on top of the Manfrotto leveler. The Cullman ballhead levels the camera to the Manfrotto…or the tripod…..step 2

3) LensCoat 3-Axis Hot Shoe Bubble – yes one can use the bubbles on the ballhead, but this unit slides onto the flash hot shoe, and is much more accurate and 10x faster. It is perfect for keeping vertical and horizontal lines straight for shift lenses and architectural photography. We don’t leave home without it.

Leveling the camera is a 2-step process and requires both levelers as discussed. This was initially confusing to me but makes a lot of sense in practice. One can spend 30 minutes adjusting each tripod leg and then the ballhead and camera separately…..or purchase the Manfrotto/Cullman/LensCoat assembly and be done in 30 seconds. When the outside temperature is 30F and the sunlight is changing every 30 seconds….quick setup without clumsy gloves is of the essence…trust me on this!

One can also purchase a super nice ready to go ReallyRightStuff single/multi-row rig. This is the unit I copied when building my rig. You will still need the Manfrotto 438 Compact Leveling Head.

In case you are wondering why this elaborate L-Frame/Ballhead/Leveling system is required for panoramas. In short….we want the center of the lens axis dead center on the tripod vertical axis. Also commonly referred to as the lens nodal point and not to be confused with centering the camera on the tripod. Lens centering creates perfect stitches for complex architectural stitches that have many vertical and horizontal lines that we need to line up perfectly….like this 6 image stitch I shot for an Electrolux USA ad campaign in NYC two years ago. Click here to see the super cool virtual tour done with my image below.

For processing the RAW files I use Capture One Pro 5.2. I prefer this software above all others for color fidelity and image quality. The individual camera brand color profiles Phase One has created within this software is superb right out of the box. Skintones and blue sky always look dead on. Other RAW processors make the skintone too magenta and the sky too cyan….hmmmm…Adobe…hint hint.Phase One took 5 years to put this product on the market, God, they pissed me off to no end with the delays. But know….it is the best RAW software on the market hands down.

For the image stitching software my recommendation is AutoPano Giga. This software does so much more than just stitching images together, rather it is a complete panorama solution for the photographer. It would take to long to discuss all it can do. Visit their site.

Just 15 minutes after my first shot I took another image of Oxbow Bend in Grand Teton. A few sleepy head photographers decided to join me at 6am in the 30 F degree morning. My father took a cell phone shot of the spectacle, it is the second image down.

38MP image F/11 @ 1/30 sec, Nikkor 60mm f/2.8 Micro, 6-image pano-stitch

1MP, BlackBerry Cell Phone Camera, Lens Unknown….hand held single image

After a few minutes we jumped in the car and drove on to the next spot, chasing the Sun and morning shadows. Dad drove fast and I held on to the tripod and camera pano rig.

38MP image F/11 @ 1/80 sec, Nikkor 60mm f/2.8 Micro, 6-image pano-stitch

This was taken just 10 minutes later at Jackson Lake right on the Dam. We ignored the “No Parking on Dam” sign….rules are meant to be broken for the sake of a good image.

40MP image F/16 @ 1/100 sec, Nikkor 60mm f/2.8 Micro, 6-image pano-stitch

The morning light was really beginning to fade so we turned around and headed back to the buffalo herd we saw earlier. My father drove right up and I set up for a shot….keeping a cautious eye on the head bull (far left) who was less than amused at my close proximity to his female herd.

Now that we understand the basic single-row panorama, lets add the 10 stop neutral density filter for the surreal water effect. This filter allows us to shoot a 30 second @ F/5.6 – F/8 exposure at sunset hours. For mid-day hours I use a 20 stop neutral density filter.

I prefer the German B&W brand Schotts glass neutral density filters for optical quality and the brass ring construction (less likely to get permanently “screwed” onto the lens threads). I purchase the best brand filter for the largest size of my lens or 77mm, and then buy several inexpensive step-down rings for the smaller diameter lenses in my bag.

• ND 3.0 (exposure adjustment = 10 stops, transmits 0.1% of light)

• ND 4.0 (exposure adjustment = 13-2/3 stops, transmits 0.01% of light)

• ND 6.0 = (exposure adjustment = approx. 20 stops)

The 30 second exposure allows moving water to blur and photographs like glass or fog. Why not just stop down to f/16 or 22 instead of using a neutral density filter. You know me, I am anal about lens and image resolution. I want to be shooting at 2-4 stops from wide open on my prime lenses. The neutral density filters allow me the 30 second exposure as well as the wide aperture f/stop. A cable release and placing the camera in “mirror lockup” also helps a great deal with “tripod/camera/wind shake” during 30 second exposures.

40MP image F/11 @ 30 sec, Nikkor 60mm f/2.8 Micro, 6-image pano-stitch

We can take this process even further and shoot bracketed exposures and create separate panorama layers. My business partner Tim shot the image below using bracketed exposures and pano layers. One panorama layer for shadow detail, one for midrange detail, and one for highlight detail. Tim loaded all three layers and selectively erased the unneeded portions of each image layer. When completed, Tim flattened the layers for this final image. AutoPano Giga creates these individual panonorama bracketed layers automatically for us in this how-to article on their website.

60MP image F/5.6 @ 30 sec 6-image pano-stitch

Photographers often over analyze lighting and try to make it all so complicated. Just because we have lights does not mean we have to use them every time. One of the finest  and busiest architectural photographers in the Seattle area rarely uses his 4 Profoto Air Mono-head lights when shooting multi-million dollar residences and commercial properties all over the world. Ben shoots with an Alpa 12 Metric and 65MP Phase One Digital Back. With 12 stops of dynamic range per image, Ben shoots several bracketed exposures and loads all the layers into Photoshop as one stack. Ben then selects what he needs from each layer and erases the rest with a Wacom tablet. The many layers are then flattened into a single final image. In case your wondering what Ben’s basic camera bag runs…$100,000. Lots of primo German Schneider optics at $6000-$8000 a lens.

When asked about HDR software, Ben’s response….HDR software just doesn’t have the same image quality as a manual layer erase and adjustment. He is a purist and I fully respect his opinion, his amazing portfolio speaks for itself.

Architecture photography on a budget for you and me….can it be done…absolutely. I use my Nikkor 24mm F/2.8 AF-D…FX or film lens. It has all kinds of nifty floating elements and keeps vertical and horizontal lines straight…when the camera is level. Point the camera up or down just a few degrees and we begin to see a little barrel distortion. The ideal solution to fix this is to use a shift lens. Tim has one….I don’t, lol. My Nikkor cost $300 new, Tim’s cost $2000. Notice the slight barrel distortion in my image below. I could and will fix the image below in PS when I have more time.

38MP image, F/11 @ 1/3 sec Nikkor 24mm f/2.8, 6-image pano-stitch

Using Ben and Tim’s technique of blending bracketed exposures, I shot this extremely high-dynamic range church interior. The first image above is my father’s, Martin Ott Pipe Organ’s Opus 80. It is located at the Mount Angel Abby Monastery, just an hours drive outside of Portland. Opus 79 and Opus 80 are two amazing pipe organs, actually two pipe organs that can be played from the smaller pipe organ locate in the front of the church, just behind me and to the left (organ not visible in this image). If you are a National Public Radio fan, these two organs were featured for a live recording at the dedication.

How can we apply all this knowledge to what we shoot every day? I want my readers to think outside the box. Sure, we can give up the family vacation for the next 5 years and purchase a 65MP Phase One back with 12 stops of dynamic range. Or we can use what we already own and make the best of it. Hey, my Nikon D2x has 6 stops of REAL dynamic range, what can I do with what I have. I may have to take three images, one for the highlights, one for the midtones, and one for the shadows….and blend/erase them a little in Photoshop post-production.

On this last trip, I photographed the Zion Lutheran Church in Portland, Oregon. Designed in 1950 by world renown architect, Pietro Belluschi, the church is listed as a National Historical Landmark for contemporary church architecture. Below is the final image by combining two separate panorama exposures. My father has another pipe organ there as well, Opus 104. I will take a new photo for him next week to replace the not so great image someone else shot, lol. Hey…the church is as dark as a cave and pipe organ photography is much more difficult than it looks. Try it sometime, it will tame the biggest photo ego in zero time at all and separates the boys from the men.

38MP image, F/11 @ 1/3 sec, Nikkor 24mm f/2.8, 6-image pano-stitch

Why not just blast the room with as many lights as possible? Well, it is such dark wood that 10,000 w/s would just be swallowed up instantly. Secondly, bounce the lights off the ceiling or walls and we create a dramatic red shift to the color of the benches and room. See, I told you this is not as easy as it looks. No, best to use the available light as the architect intended and designed and avoid any additional color shift headaches. Also, I wanted the photograph to look real to the congregation members and visitors. It was critical to show the natural light coming in from the small glass blocks in the left wall.

An architectural photographer shoots images that tell a story about the building and the architects vision. Hmmm…that concept also work for fashion and car and product photography. Could they all be related….simple answer is yes.

Above is the “highlight detail” exposure. Autopano Giga 6 image pano-stitch.

Above is the “shadow detail” exposure. Autopano Giga 6 image pano-stitch.

In final post-production I only needed the 2 exposures, but I still shot 30 bracketed panorama images for 6 separate layers just in case. Better safe than sorry, we can always throw extra unneeded files away later.

If you are fortunate enough to own one of the latest Canon 5D MKII’s or Nikon D3 or D700 series, you have a leg up on me. No, these cameras are not the same as medium format backs, yet we can achieve very similar results with a little time and effort. Prime lenses, quality RAW software such as Capture One Pro, and a tripod or pano-rig are the secret.

If your subject does not move, then try the 3 techniques discussed in length. This is a big hint for the architectural, food, landscape, still-life, and car photographer. Now you too can shoot incredibly sharp and very large images. Want 20″ x 30″ prints for your next art gallery show that will not break your photography budget….try stitching your images!

What does all this gear and software cost? Much less than you think.

AutoPano Giga is $280 or 200 Euros. It does everything for stitching images for architecture, food, landscapes, products, and stills. Built in layers and HDR and so much more. This software has been around for 5 years or more, it is very polished and runs extremely well on Mac, PC and Linux. APG engineers have added great features for separate scratch disks and memory allocation. I created all the images for this article on a late 2006 15″ MacBook Pro laptop with a 2.16 Core 2 Duo with 3 gigs of RAM, just to prove a point. Nothing crashed, it just worked and cranked out the images. The 40MP images took about 10 minutes each to process at 16 Bit ProPhoto Colorspace in Tiff….400 MB each. The much larger multi-row, 3 row images that are 150MP and up take about an hour to process. These files come in at about 2 gigs each. I just can’t say enough about this software….been using it for 3 years and it rocks.

If you are shooting with the heavy pro body Nikon D2x/D3/D3x or Canon EOS D1 series you will need a Really Right Stuff setup for $800. You already spent $6000+ on a body, you must have another $800 under the sofa pillows in loose change. RRStuff has the finest and most well thought out solution on the market, it is eye candy to use and look at. Ben has the setup mentioned and swears by it.

For 90% of the rest of us that own the much lighter Nikon D700/D300 or Canon EOS 5DMK2/EOS D7 series I would still recommend the RRStuff setup. Why, because you might be the wealthy pro or hobbyist that can afford the superb Nikkor or Canon L shift/tilt lenses at $2000 a pop. These lenses are about 3 lbs each and will now put you over the 5lbs mark when attached to your camera body. Add a little breeze at that landscape shoot and a 30 second exposure…..hmmm…all of a sudden your tripod looks like a drunken sailor on shore leave.

Now, for everyone else that just wants great panos and would like to try/experiment with this on a budget before spending anything. Just use what you have. AutoPano Giga is so good at stitching that you can handhold and swivel your body for each frame…..distant landscapes only! I tried this myself and yes it works.

There are several very inexpensive single-row pano rigs on the market for $75-$200. They are made out of heavy duty polymer plastic and work very well. Which ever route you take, splurge on AutoPano Giga first, experiment and see what works, then pull out the credit card for the next toy.

Honestly, if you take just one great landscape photo, your image can easily sell for $$$$$$ at the local art fair.

Disclaimer: I have not received any free software or gear for this article what-so-ever. Every item of software and hardware was purchased by me at the current manufacturer price.

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