I forgot to mention that I am mostly trying this with planar projection... perhaps that is wrong?

scabadaska wrote:

I am trying to instead achieve very normal shots just emulate the resolution and quality of large format film.

I might need a longer focal length because when I try with the 85mm I seem to get too much distortion from having to be entirely too close to the subject to get "pieces" of it.

I like what Max Lyons is doing here: http://www.maxlyons.net/locreadingroom.htm where it doesn't look have that panorama look but just a very detailed shoot that could possible look as if it came right from an 8x10 camera.

1) Select the right point of view by using a zoom lens and watching the viewfinder (to remember the frame you selected you could record a single image to be used as a shooting guide and final cropping guide)
2) place your tripod and panohead at the exact location you selected (that's the main point!)
3) the longer the lens you will use the higher the image definition of the resulting pano
4) shoot enough images to cover the frame you selected (the truth is you should not hesitate to record "more images than needed" along the 4 sides of the panorama because too much is better than not enough!)
5) portrait/landscape camera orientation don't matter
6) when stitching use planar projection
7) when stitching use the crop tool and the image described at (1) as a guide.

The rules are:
- the location you select to shoot the source images for a panorama will decide of the resulting image perspective (the used lens don't matter, this is a surprising but well established rule.)
- to reproduce the usual look of photographic images (to avoid panoramic images look) use planar projection mode only
- to reproduce the usual look of photographic images be sure the panorama field of view is corresponding to the focal length of the lens you would use for an ordinary single shoot image.

In a few words: the only solution for a panoramic image being identical to a single shoot image is to shoot from the exact same location. Period.

Your questions are very interesting as answering them forces one to stress the analogy and the differences between usual photography and panoramic photography...

Last edited by GURL (2010-07-09 10:17:08)

Thanks everyone so far for your input. It has been quite useful.

So, if I wanted to replicate the action of a 4x5 camera for instances using a "standard" 150mm lens (on the 4x5) then, in theory, I could use perhaps a 50mm lens on my Canon to roughly frame off the scene I want to shoot and then, keeping my tripod exactly where it is, I could swap out lenses for a longer focal length (perhaps the 135 canon) and start grabbing "frames" of that scene??

I mean, this is what I have been thinking to do, I guess I just don't know enough about the technical process yet. Also, just to let you know, after the image is created I always crop down to 5:4 ratio.

Regarding the click stops: luckily the Nodal Ninja has tremendous flexibility in terms of click stop settings so I should be able to accurately achieve the right amount of horizontal movements (for example - for my 85mm I found that 12 degrees works best).

One thing I wanted to ask everyone is how you deal with depth of field issues as you increase your focal length? I have noticed even on my 85mm by doing a 5x3 mosaic I really don't get much by way of DoF. Are you focus stacking? Or do you just adjust focus once as you rotate your camera vertically (for example: as you take shots of the ground do you adjust focus once or take two photos of each frame with near and far focusing)?

I try to get out as often as I can to improve my technique and understanding.

"Your questions are very interesting as answering them forces one to stress the analogy and the differences between usual photography and panoramic photography..."

Thanks for the comment GURL - that's exactly what I am speaking of, too. It interesting really because I want to use panoramic techniques but not really for a panoramic picture. I am glad for everyone's input, too - I guess perhaps my approach is maybe a bit unusual.