photoartflightLake Woodruff NWR Multi-Image iPhone Panoramas
Posted on October 11, 2021
Many times when we are out walking in Wildlife Refuges I carry a main camera with a 400mm lens or a 150-600mm zoom lens and a m43 camera with wide angle 14-140mm lens. I also have in my photo vest a few Teleconverters just in case I see something interesting farther out for the full frame camera. But as I am getting older I am using my iP11 Pro more for the Wider or Multi-Image Landscape Panorama shots. The Featured Image is made with the iP11 Pro using the 1.5mm lens (Full Frame Camera Equivalent ~13mm). I shot 14 images, shooting 3 rows of 4 images and then 2 images in the center just as a precaution to make sure the images line up successfully. When using the iP11’s 1.5mm lens I overlap the images even more than if I was using the 4.3mm or 6mm lens. Photoshop does a good job lining up and blending the multi-rowed images from the iPhone..
Tree Panorama From Davidsons Mill Pond Park
Posted on March 19, 2021
We were taking a walk through the woods at Davidsons Mill Pond Park to get some exercise & fresh air. I was just using my Phone 11 Pro looking for interesting landscapes on the trails going though the woods. This image was near the very end of the trail through the woods. I was using my iP11 Pro with the widest lens 1.5mm (Full Frame Camera Equivalent ~ 13mm). I took 5 horizontal images in a series going from somewhat straight on to looking up, then the final image getting the top of the trees. I loaded those images layered in one Photoshop file and blended them for my flattened image file. I then adjusted my final blended image to get rid of most of the “distortion” because of the extreme wide angle of the 1.5mm iPhone 11 lens. This corrected a lot of the “bowing of the trees reaching for the sky”. It actually came out better then I thought it would.
Raindrops On Fall Leaves
Posted on October 14, 2020
We went for a walk in our community and wanted to photograph some of the colorful leaves that have finally turned colorful. The images here are multi-image panorama images shot with my iPhone 11 Pro with the 6mm lens. Equivalent Full frame camera focal length would be approximately 52mm. The featured image was 3 vertical images blended in Photoshop for the final image. I also usually use the 16×9 image format on my iPhone which gives me a wider or taller image to work with.
iPhone Cloudscapes
Posted on August 26, 2020
While taking a walk in our community, we noticed very low huge cloud formations. They were quite impressive, so I shot a series of images with my iPhone 11 Pro. Most were panoramas shot with multiple images to be assembled in Photoshop for the final image. I do not usually use the pano feature in the iPhone because it distorts the left & right ends of the image giving a “bowing distortion” in the middle. Most images were shot with the 6mm lens with digital zoom added in the iPhone. I never really used the digital zoom feature much before, but it actually worked out quite well, especially for clouds.
The featured image is a single shot with the 6mm lens with 318% Digital Zoom added on the phone. I was photographing from a distance because if I got closer the trees blocked more of the bottom of the clouds and I only could photograph the small top cloud section.
Cloud Panorama, iPhone 11 Pro, 4.3mm lens, 195% Digital Zoom Added, 3 Image Blend in Photoshop
Cloud Panorama, iPhone 11 Pro, 6mm lens, 168% Digital Zoom Added, 4 image Panorama, Blended in Photoshop
Cloud Panorama, iPhone 11 Pro, 6mm lens with 260% Digital Zoom added, 3 image Panorama, Blended in Photoshop
Cloud Panorama, iPhone 11 Pro, 6mm lens with 318% Digital Zoom added, 3 image Panorama, Blended in Photoshop
Cloud Panorama, iPhone 11 Pro, 6mm lens with 213% Digital Zoom added, 5 image Panorama, Blended in Photoshop
Cloud Panorama, iPhone 11 Pro, 6mm lens with 214% Digital Zoom added, 5 image Panorama, Blended in Photoshop
7 Image iPhone Panorama
Posted on April 6, 2020
Another panorama from our trip to Florida in February. For this panorama I chose to shoot with the 1.5mm lens on my iPhone 11 Pro. This would be an equivalent field of view of 13mm on a full frame camera. I shot 2 rows of images, top row 4 images and bottom row had 3 images. Somehow I miscounted on the bottom row, but it worked out anyway. I selected the files and adjusted the phone jpegs in Adobe Camera Raw before opening them into one layered file in Photoshop. I have my Adobe Camera Raw setup to open jpegs as raw files with settings. I tried setting the iPhone to shoot HEIC raw files, but that just slowed down the camera and did not see much of a difference in quality only a much larger file size. The panorama images below are multiple images in one row, combined and blended in Photoshop.
Another Multi-Image version of the same view. This time a one row, multi-image blend shot with the 1.5mm lens. (Each Image in Series Full Frame Equivalent 13mm)
2 image iPhone panorama, shot with 4.3mm lens. (Each Image in Series – Full Frame Equivalent 26mm)
14 Image iPhone Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge Landscape Panorama
Posted on February 14, 2020
For this landscape I used the 1.5mm lens on the iPhone 11 Pro and shot 14 images. (Full Frame Camera Field of View equivalent is 13mm). I brought the files into Adobe Camera Raw to adjust the files and pull out detail and balance my settings. Than I open them into one layered Photoshop file with each image in a layer. Next in Photoshop I align and blend Automatically the 14 images into one final blended image. I still have layered sections and save the layered file just in case I need to touch up something. Then I flatten the image for the final image.
Fall Walk In The Woods
Posted on November 28, 2019
We took a walk through the woods at a local park just to get some fresh air. I only had my iPhone 11 Pro with me since I was not thinking anything would be interesting to photograph. The sun was low and most of the leaves were off the trees, but the shadows of the trees were amazing. The iPhone did a nice job photographing in a variety of lighting conditions. After getting use to the new iPhone for a while now, I tend not to use the pano mode as much, preferring to shoot multiple images to assemble my own wider or panorama views. Even with the 1.5mm lens selected (Full Frame Equivalent 13mm), I want more width without more height. On this walk I had enabled the phone to shoot HEIC Raw files instead of jpeg files. This way I supposedly had true Raw Data to work with in Adobe Bridge before opening in Photoshop instead of enabling Adobe Camera Raw to open jpegs as Raw files with settings. Also for certain scenes I like using the 16:9 capture mode setting for longer scenes without using the 4:3 usual capture. The 16:9 does not work with the 1.5mm lens.
1.5mm lens
1.5mm lens
16:9 format – 4.3 lens
2 image panorama – 4.3mm lens
4.3mm lens 16:9 Format
2 image panorama – 1.5mm lens – assembled in Photoshop
2 image vertical panorama – 4.3 format
4.3mm (26mm Full Frame Equivalent) 16:9 Camera Format
i Phone Panoramas
Posted on November 25, 2019
I use 2 different methods when using my iPhone for panoramas (or for images just requiring a slightly wider view like the featured image). The examples here are with my older iPhone 6 when I was in Florida in the Spring. The iPhone 6 had a 4.2mm lens which is equivalent to a Full Frame camera lens Field of View of 29mm. Many times you get a “curve” on the horizon and a distinct “Curve” and distortion on the ends when using the panorama feature on the iPhone 6. It really stands out if you are on a road that is straight left & right of your position and you are basically shooting a pano looking down the road to the left moving the phone down the road on the right. You get a distinct “bowing” look to the image as in the last photo in this post. Sometimes you can say it is an interesting effect, but not really ideal for the image. How close the objects are in the center has another set of problems because the far left & right are farther away and with a wide lens on the iPhone distortion looks more prominent. Because of this sometimes I take 2 (or more) individual images with my iPhone and use Photoshop to blend them for a panorama (or just a slightly wider view than the standard 1 image). I do this instead of the Pano mode in the iPhone which tends to distort the horizon line. The featured image is just a little wider so the tree on the right is more in the image. With the new iPhone 11 Pro, I have 3 lenses so I can shoot much wider than the older iPhone with the 1.5mm lens (Full Frame Camera Equivalent is ~13mm). In the examples below I also used the “Warp” feature in Photoshop (Edit>Transform>Warp) to straighten out the horizon somewhat which also can get a slight curve to the horizon in the image. I also have my system setup to open jpegs from the iPhone in Adobe Camera Raw to have even more options in adjusting my files before I even open them in Photoshop. Doing it this way, I can adjust the settings of the jpeg file, sort of treating it like a faux “Raw” file. It seems to really work well with my new iPhone 11 Pro. But these examples are from the older iPhone 6.
2 Horizontal Images, stacked vertically for more clouds
iPhone 6 – 2 image pano Stack for a little more clouds
iPhone 6 – 2 image sunrise Pano for more width (Horizon Line Corrected somewhat in Photoshop)
iPhone 6 – 2 image sunrise panorama, with more overlapping of images, assembled in Photoshop. This give a little more on the left & right sides. Sometimes you lessen the “curve” arc of the pano mode by shooting 2 single images and blending them then using the “Pano” feature.
Panorama made with iPhone 6 showing “warping curve” distortion of railing on deck platform by just using the Pano feature on the phone. (Horizon line here was Corrected Somewhat in Photoshop)
iPhone 6 Panorama shot @ Blackwater NWR Wildlife Drive – Showing distortion of road (on left and right) by just using the pano feature while standing on the road.
Test Images iPhone 11 Pro
Posted on October 16, 2019
My old iPhone was not able to update to the newer software updates so I got a new iPhone 11 Pro. I was interested in seeing how the new camera would stand up for image quality. The new camera seems to work well to a point, but skies or solid color areas seem to have a slight darker center area in wide angle mode. But that is somewhat easy to change or fix in Photoshop. Some of the extreme wide angle shots also have a weird distortion, but again somewhat fixable. The file size seems to be also good for uprezzing (to a point) for larger printing. Overall I am quite happy with the performance. At the wide end the lens is only 1.5mm, but in full frame camera equivalent field of view is 13mm. So that is why you are seeing distortions that need some work in Photoshop. I also had to try shooting images for assembling for panoramas in Photoshop. That seemed to work well also. You just have to overlap more than usual. It has a 2X optical zoom, but up to 10X digital zoom. You probably would not want to print the digital zoom images too large, but handy for documentation or for the web.
Single Image @ 1.5mm (Full Frame Equivalent 13mm)
2 image Panorama, assembled in Photoshop @ 1.5mm (Full Frame Camera Equivalent 13mm)
Single Image @ 4.3mm (Full Frame Camera Equivalent 26mm)
2 horizontal image Pano – stacked, iPhone 11 Pro @ 1.5mm (Full Frame equivalent – 13mm)
Single Image @ 4.3mm, iPhone 11 Pro – (Full Frame Equivalent 26mm)
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