jeffk wrote:

I have a Canon 5D and a Sigma 15mm Fisheye.  I take 6 shots around, one zenith and one nadir and it seems to cover it. I tried stitching it for the first time and the zenith and nadir are a challenge to get to look right.  Is there a trick to doing this, a tutorial, proven method or something for APP and making this look right?

I don't know why you should be having trouble stitching image sets shot like this with APP.

Can you upload a sample image set to the Web somewhere we can download it? - then I'll be happy to take a look and see why you might be having problems. Or maybe you can post some screenshots to show us what sort of problems you have in the stiched images?

I hope you are using APP1.4.2, and not the 1.9 alpha (which is barely useable at present).

Are you usung exposure bracketing? Did you check and/or set the crop circle? Did you select/enable Advanced distortion in the settings? What interpolator and blender settings are you using to render - I usually use Spline36 and Smartblend?

I use a Nikkor 10.5mm Fullframe FE on a Nikon D40 - functionally the same as your 5D with a Canon 15mm FE.

I usually shoot 6-around at about -10 degrees and one up at either +90 or at about +65. This leaves small 'hole' about the diameter of the rotator of my Nodal Ninja 5 pano head at the nadir, and avoids APPs auto CP detection placing spurious CPs on the pano head hardware. Shooting a 'zenith' at +65 rather than +90 helps link the zenith to the main row in scenes where a +90 zenith image would lack features to set control points (for example a clear blue sky or a plain white ceiling). You might need to use slightly different angles with your 5D but the concept would still work.

My image sets stitch very easily in APP. The only time I might have problems (easily resolved) is if the screne has many visually repeating elements - eg. arches on each side of the nave in a church or the interior of a dome - which can confuse APP's auto CP detection.

I don't usually bother with a nadir shot - there's seldom much of interest under the tripod - instead I place a mirror ball cap at the nadir using the patch feature in Pano2VR, or I limit the range of view in the player again set in pano 2VR so a persoon viewing the pano cannot view the nadir. If you are a 'purist' and want to have a full nadir you are probably better off shooting a separate nadir - with camera off the pano head - and patching it in using an image editor after stitching and rendering.

Last edited by mediavets (2008-12-11 11:09:17)

OK, I shot 6 around and one image at +60 zenith up and one +90 zenith.  All 8 images are in this folder below. I tried the 6 around and one +90 in APP and it seemed OK...but it can be better.  When I did the 6 images and one +60 APP got confused.  I am not a pro at APP like you guys are so I would love for you to tell me the best settings to use with the images I have uploaded here.  All my pictures are shot the same way.  I did bracket but chose the best exposures and they are all the same.  These images have been downsize to 1000 pix high.
http://mediafuel.net/downloads/lucasoil/

This is a problem image for APP as of now hope the new alpha will address this problem.
Just wondering why does APP pick bad points to begin with?

I tried with PTGUI & at default settings it works perfectly & even shows blended pano in its editor window.

jeffk wrote:

I appreciate the suggestions here...great info.  My settings were different than what you suggested above so I will adjust and try this again!

Your images set is a very good example of how scenes with repeating elements  can confuse automatic control point detection in APP.

You are fortunate to have run into this early on because it's a perfect introduction to editing control points in APP - an important skill to acquire.

Here's a video tutorial that I think you will find helpful in conjuction with the tips given in various posts:
http://www.autopano.net/wiki/action/vie … _panoramas

Here's my stitch of your downsized images - with Quality of detection set at Standard and a little CP editing to remove bad links and CPs, followed by the Automatic horizon tool to level it up - I used the +90 zenith shot (and didn't use the +60).

With this sort of image set each shot in the main row needs only to link to its neighbours on either side and the zenith shot (and it doesn't matter if the zenith does not link to every shot in the main row). You can remove any other superfluous links. I used (as always) the Spline36 interpolator and Smatblend blender when rendering, downsized to fit within forum post limits and sharpened a little. Stitch looks good to me when viewed in DevalVR player.

Here it is as a FlashVR with mirror ball nadir cap:
http://www.three60views.org.uk/pano-oil … t-oil.html

Last edited by mediavets (2008-12-13 10:59:04)