I thought I'd share some thoughts on one of the areas I've always struggled with a bit, processing decent, clean panoramas. And how easy the new Lightroom CC panorama stitcher is to use.
I've tried a few different programs, such as Hugin, Arcsoft & Photoshop. Had a couple of decent results with Hugin but you just about need a special degree in physics and mathematics to be able to use it effectively.
The other program which I have had really mixed results with is Photoshop, one of the main problems being major banding throughout the image (see image below).
So when Adobe announced they'd be incorporating a Panorama maker in their newest Lightroom update, I was pretty keen to see how it went. So I went through my archives for an image I liked, which I had stitched in Photoshop previously, but had the problems as mentioned above, banding.
One advantage I noticed straight away over photoshop is you get a live projection preview before it starts stitching. You only get half the options that photoshop offers (Spherical, Cylindrical or Perspective) but it's so handy being able to see a preview before the stitch starts, which in turn will save a countless amount of trial and error time, especially if you're just a novice like me.
Another cool little advantage is you can auto crop before stitching. This will probably only save you a couple of seconds in post, but it's handy nonetheless.
From there all you have to do is hit merge and let the magic happen. The time it takes to stitch would be about the same as if you'd just right clicked and sent it to Photoshop. Depending on your computer's capabilities though, I'd say it's faster and more efficient to use Lightroom, and would use much less ram than if you had to open up Photoshop at the same time as having Lightroom open.
From there once it's stitched it's saved directly into the folder you stitched the photos from, and you can start processing straight away! Too easy.
So that's my super quick review of the benefits that I can see of using Lightroom for panorama stitching over Photoshop.
Below I'll show you the full image I stitched using Lightroom CC, then a sample of the banding I got using Photoshop.
Matt.
meimages.net
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| Little Bay, NSW. 6 vertical image stitch using Lightroom CC. |
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| Close up of the vertical banding caused when stitched with Photoshop CC |
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