17 shot hi res pano of the castle!

[Charade]

http://home.comcast.net/~eciwtdennab/castle_highres.jpg
(right click and save it to your PC to view it)

I didn't embed the photo because it's HUGE and a nearly 5 meg JPG. The PSD file is over 100 meg. This was done in Photoshop CS and it's ok but I'm looking for a better pano program. If I get good results from that, I'll print a poster size for my office!

This was shot with my D70 and the 18-200 VR Nikon lens.

 

[Kelly Grannell]

You don't need to do all that. Just get onOne Genuine Fractals 4.1 and you can get a wall-sized poster with a single click (yes, I wrote "wall sized"). Whatever the original size of the pic is (8 MP can easily print up to 20"x30" no problem), GF 4.1 can enlarge it by up to 800% with no problem.

So your 8 MP single-frame pic can be enlarged up to 160" x 240" (or about 13 ft x 20 ft) with a single click (and a wait time approx. 20 minutes)

 

[Charade]

Unless they made major changes to GF since the last time I tried them, I have a hard time believing they can match the native resolution of a pano for detail. I will download the trial (if they have one) and give it a try.

 

[Kelly Grannell]

which version did you tried? If it's version 1 or 2, version 4 is leaps and bound (and more) compared to verion 1 and 2 (I've never tried version 3).

Of course a pano will give you a better native resolution, however, as you can see on your pano stitch, the exposures are all different (you can clearly see the stitch lines), plus the distortion from the lens restricts you from making a perfect stitch.

Extrapolation is always worse than a real pano, but if you can reach 90% perfection with a single click in 30 minutes, why spend hours and hours of work to get that 100%, especially when viewed from a proper distance your eyes will not be able to distinguish the difference.

My anecdote is not completely accurate to your situation, however I took a picture of a landscape using my 8 MP camera and my boss took the same landscape with his medium format digital (about 30 MP). I use GF 4.1 to extrapolate my data to 30 MP equivalent. When printed at 80" x 120" (different ratio for his camera, of course), from double-arm's length, you'll be hard pressed to see the difference.

 

[Charade]

When I shot the pano, I know I wasn't using the best method. I didn't use a tripod nor did I use manual exposure. My overlapping was irratic too. I just shot 17 quick shots to see what I could get from the D70.

I'll let you know how I make out with their trial version.

 

[Charade]

Kelly, I played with GF a little and I'm still not convinced that it's any better than what PS can do. Here's two sample pics. They are 100 percent crops from the same image run through GF and PS. Without looking at the filename properties, can you tell which is which?

 

[Kelly Grannell]

I bet you the bottom one is Genuine Fractals.

 

[WillCAD]

Yeah, that does seem like a lot of trouble to only double the resolution of a 6mp camera.

I bet if you took a 6mp image and ressed it up in Photoshop, even without Genuine Fractals, you'd find a passably good image of the same resolution as the pano you listed, but without the stitch lines, ghost images, or differences in exposure.

 

[Charade]

I bet you the bottom one is Genuine Fractals.

You are correct. And IMO, it looks worse than the PS version.

 

[Charade]

Yeah, that does seem like a lot of trouble to only double the resolution of a 6mp camera.

I bet if you took a 6mp image and ressed it up in Photoshop, even without Genuine Fractals, you'd find a passably good image of the same resolution as the pano you listed, but without the stitch lines, ghost images, or differences in exposure.

IMO there is no subsitute yet for native resolution and optical (with decent glass of course) magnification. However, in some cases, software interpolation is adequate. With the proper techniques, panos and mosaics can be pretty much flawless.

In my (somewhat crude) example, I'm not doubling the resolution to 12mp, I'm more than quadroupling the resoultion to 24mp. The pano is about 6949x5240.

One reason for such an hi res image is large prints.

Here is a crop of the pano and the same crop upsampled in PS.

 

[boBQuincy]

I have seen a few reviews of Genuine Fractals, comparing it to Photoshop and some other res-up methods. The results have been mixed, with no clear winner. The images look different but I sometimes prefer FG, sometimes PS.
Now with GF4 I would imagine GF is a step ahead of PS although that may change with CS3 or whatever Adobe calls the next release. PS has five different res-up settings with more probably in the works.

Increasing resolution with stitched images is a good method, it's just the mechanics that make it so difficult to do properly.
My thoughts are:
use a tripod with a degree wheel or a protractor;
use a prime lens for minimum distortion;
only use the central 2/3 of each image;
set the camera to manual exposure and white balance;
no polarizer;
include some edges in the image to help align it;
take square multiple images (4, 9, 16).

Four images is probably a waste of time, as Will said it is likely not much, if any better than ressing up. Nine should show some real gains and might allow a 30D to emulate a good MF digital. Sixteen sounds like way too much work. I may try some sequences of nine at Yosemite.


boB

 

[Kelly Grannell]

You are correct. And IMO, it looks worse than the PS version.

I think the bottom one have more line details than the top one. Also, you must've tried the regular GF and not the Print Pro, right? (I don't think there is a Print Pro for the trial version).

Another thing, when you used the trial version, did you change the picture size AND the dpi? Most people tend to forget that.

Chers,
Kelly.

 

[Charade]

I think the bottom one have more line details than the top one. Also, you must've tried the regular GF and not the Print Pro, right? (I don't think there is a Print Pro for the trial version).

Another thing, when you used the trial version, did you change the picture size AND the dpi? Most people tend to forget that.

Chers,
Kelly.

I tried Print Pro. It wouldn't let me download (the link was the same for) regular GF. I only changed the image size (330 percent). The DPI was 300.

The results I see with this version of GF are pretty much the same as I saw the last time I tired it (GF 2 I think). I'll be saving my $159 for something else.

IMO, the GF version looks a bit "impressionistic".

 

[Kelly Grannell]

LOL! I'm sending you PM.

 

[boBQuincy]

I'll be saving my $159 for something else.

IMO, the GF version looks a bit "impressionistic".

People pay a lot of money (Monet?) for impressionistic! $159 is cheap!


boB

 

[WillCAD]

IMO there is no subsitute yet for native resolution and optical (with decent glass of course) magnification. However, in some cases, software interpolation is adequate. With the proper techniques, panos and mosaics can be pretty much flawless.

You're quite correct, there is no software that can invent pixels as well or better than increases in optical resolution.

In my (somewhat crude) example, I'm not doubling the resolution to 12mp, I'm more than quadroupling the resoultion to 24mp. The pano is about 6949x5240.

One reason for such an hi res image is large prints.

Here is a crop of the pano and the same crop upsampled in PS.

You're confusing file size with resolution.

Doubling the resolution of an image results in quadruple file size - twice the number of horizontal pixels and twice the number of vertical pixels = 4 times the overall number of pixels. Going from an image that is 3475x2620 up to 6949x5240 results in a fiule size that's quadruple - but you've only doubled the resolution.

Your example is not terrible-looking. Certainly, blowing up a small piece of image to create a large image results in something that's a little less smooth or polished than shooting the image at a higher resolution to begin with, but if your objective is to blow up an entire image to a large size, you also have to take viewing distance into account.

Print your 6949x5220 pano at poster size (about 24x36 or so), and print a 6mp image at the same size, stand back far enough for your eye to take in the whole image (say about 8 feet), and I bet that the only way you'll be able to tell which is which is from the stitching artifacts. And in fact, the stitching artifacts will make the pano look awful, while the 6mp enlargement will look smooth and clean.

 

[Anewman]

Wow I go to Vegas for a couple days and miss some good threads.

You're confusing file size with resolution.

Doubling the resolution of an image results in quadruple file size - twice the number of horizontal pixels and twice the number of vertical pixels = 4 times the overall number of pixels. Going from an image that is 3475x2620 up to 6949x5240 results in a fiule size that's quadruple - but you've only doubled the resolution.

Maybe I am old school but I always understood it as.
File size is measured in bytes(mega, giga, etc...). resolution is measured in pixels.

But I agree depending on how you measure in order to double PRINT SIZE you must quadruple resolution to stay at the same dpi.

But that is only if you consider diaganal print size vs actual print area, I wont start that debate.

 

[Anewman]

I just(as in the last 15 mins did this little upsizing comparison.
I picked a bad picture to begin with since I feel this would be more challenging for all software involved. And I found it Ironic that it was one of 3 shots that I shot for a PANORAMA.

Now I do use GF on all my larger prints. But no it does not even take 2 mins to upsize to 25mp. And I am sure we would all love to have enough NATIVE pixels to work with.

 

[WillCAD]

Maybe I am old school but I always understood it as.
File size is measured in bytes(mega, giga, etc...). resolution is measured in pixels.

Actually, yes, you're correct. Even old OCD Will tends to use the terms incorrectly sometimes.

Resolution - number of pixels per unit of measure across or down. Usually expressed in pixels per inch. Variable depending on how large one prints an image. If your image is 6000x4000 pixels, and you print it at 4"x6", it will be 1000PPI. Print the same image at 8"x12", it is only 500PPI.

File size - Amount of disk space the image file takes up when saved, expressed in bytes (or multiples, kilo, mega, giga). Remains constant in uncompressed file formats like TIF, varies wildly in a compressed image like JPG due to image composition and JPG compression settings.

Image size - A) Total number of pixels across and down in an image (6000x4000), B) Total number of pixels in an image, computed by multiplying number of pixels across by number of pixels down, usually expressed in megapixels (6000x4000=24,000,000 or 24mp, 1mp = 1 million pixels). Doubling A will give you double resolution at the same print size, and will quadruple B, usually quadrupling file size as well.