photoartflight131 Egrets In Trees
Posted on December 23, 2020
I am still working on images from past trips. Gives me something to do during these Covid times. This is a 3 image handheld panorama shot with a m43 Olympus OM D-1 with a 14-140mm lens @ 41mm (Full Frame equivalent ~82mm). Then aligned & blended in Photoshop. Just for fun or maybe boredom, I counted about 131 Egrets plus 5 Roseate Spoonbills & 6 Wood Storks. I probably missed a few and could not see what was on the reverse side of the trees. Below are a few cropped in sections.
Great Blue Heron Panorama
Posted on November 28, 2020
A three horizontal image panorama of a Great Blue Heron. There times when I am out walking at a Wildlife Refuge when I come upon a photo subject that is too close for the lens I am carrying. In this instance I was walking along the Wildlife Drive near the entrance and saw this Great Blue Heron standing in the water. I was too close for the lens I had with me so I shot three overlapping horizontal images to combine for a vertical panorama. It seems rare when you are too close to get the whole bird in. Usually you do not have enough focal length for what you see and want photograph. If you can shoot a series of images quickly before the bird moves you can make some interesting panorama images. The Featured Image is 3 horizontal images taken with a 300mm lens on a Canon 7D. Assembled & blended in Photoshop. I usually always photograph from the head down for the series or the head then to side for however many images you need.
Fall Panoramas From Davidsons Mill Pond Park
Posted on November 25, 2020
These panoramas are from a visit to Davidsons Mill Pond Park in early November. We went mainly for a walk through the wooded trail, but I brought a camera with a 24-105mm lens in case I saw something interesting. Usually on a walk I just use my iPhone, but I am glad I took a regular camera this time. I thought the Large Pond on the trail through the woods looked interesting. So I tried a few different panoramas from different locations by the Pond in the woods. The last image was sort of strange because it was just on top of a large rock about 10 to 12 feet out in the water from the shoreline.
Community Meeting House Fall Panoramas
Posted on November 20, 2020
As I was walking around our condo community, I liked the Fall colors and clouds around our community Meeting House. This building is used for community meetings, concerts, church services and a few other gatherings. Because of Covid-19 it has been closed for quite a while, but it is still fun to photograph especially with some of the Fall Colors and bright blue sky. The Featured Image is a 2 vertical image panorama taken with an iPhone 11 Pro using the 4.3mm lens (Full Frame Camera Field of View is 26mm).
Panoramas From Davidsons Mill Pond Park
Posted on November 4, 2020
We went to Davidsons Mill Pond Park to take a walk through the wooded area and see how the Fall colors were. The panoramas here were from the large pond on the Farm Road Trail. The featured panorama image was 6 handheld horizontal images, @ 24mm looking down the pond from the narrow end of the pond. For handheld panoramas I tend to overlap the images more than if I was using a tripod. When doing panoramas, the amount of overlap on the images determines the length of the panorama.
Last Praying Mantis In the Gardens
Posted on October 19, 2020
The featured image is a stacked multi-image, multi-row Praying Mantis panorama. This was the last Praying Mantis I photographed in our gardens this year. We had quite a few throughout the summer, but this was the largest Mantis I photographed this year. The featured image is 8 images, shot in 3-multi-rows of overlapping images. I managed getting 3 images for the top row, 3 images for middle row & only 2 images for the bottom row before it moved. I was shooting handheld with a 300mm lens @ f/5.6 for a softer, smoother background since I wanted a blurred background not showing details of the flowers & siding on the house. I concentrated my focus on the head and front legs and so the yellow flowers behind the Mantis gave a bright pop of interesting color.
Dragons & Damsels Panoramas
Posted on June 19, 2020
Panoramas are not just for landscapes! I enjoy shooting panoramas for a variety of subjects. Plus they look interesting when you print them very large! Here are a series of multi-image Dragonfly & Damselfly Panoramas. I was using Canon & Panasonic Cameras, with a variety of lenses. The featured Blue Dasher Dragonfly image was 5 handheld images taken with a Canon 300mm lens, with extension tubes @ f/9, 1/250th sec. Then assembled and blended in Photoshop. When shooting panoramas handheld, I tend to overlap even more just to be safe & that I got enough overlap to blend nicely. I may not need them, but it helps if you do need more images when assembling them. The images below have some details on exposure & images shot per panorama.
Eastern Forktail Damselfly, 4 image panorama, Panasonic GH2 with adapted Canon FD 200mm Manual Focus Macro lens, blended in Photoshop.
Blue Dasher, Female – 400mm DO lens with extension tubes, Canon 1D mkIV, 3 image panorama, f/11, 1/250
Eastern Forktail Damselfly, 3 image panorama, Panasonic GH2 with adapted Canon FD 200mm Manual Focus Macro lens
Bombay Hook National Wildlife Refuge Panoramas
Posted on March 1, 2020
I am going through old files that I have not had a chance to work on before. These are from a visit years ago to Bombay Hook National Wildlife Refuge. The clouds were amazing on this visit so it was fun to do some panoramas. I photographed a series of handheld panorama landscapes but only worked on 1 of them back then. So here are a few more from that visit. Bombay Hook NWR is great for photographing multi-image landscapes because of the landscapes you see along the Wildlife Drive. On all the visits there we always saw amazing cloud formations. All images were taken with a 24-105mm lens @ 24mm, but the number of frames per panorama are varied. When shooting handheld panoramas you try to overlap somewhat equally, but it is better to shoot more than you think you need just to be safe. This way you have more frames to choose from when assembling the panorama. Once you get used to doing them you usually require fewer frames. The featured one is my original I posted then. The one below is a landscape made from 3 images, so there is more overlapping on each image.
3 images @24mm, but less overlapping of images and finished more to the right
Cloudscape Panorama across from entrance – 6 image panorama @ 24mm
Cloudscape Panorama across from entrance – 9 images @ 24mm
6 images (vertical) @ 24mm panorama to get more sky & clouds
More Sandhill Crane Mult-Image Panoramas
Posted on February 18, 2020
On our visit to Lake Woodruff NWR in DeLand Florida, it was amazing how the Sandhill Cranes seemed to not be bothered by people. But then again there were not many people around. So maybe they were just curious. We did not try to get close to them, but they walked right up to us as to check us out. We were a little nervous at first but they just seemed to be checking us out and went on their way foraging in the grass. It is a little intimidating to have such a large bird get that close to check you out. They are about 4 ft tall and have about a 7 ft wingspan. The trouble was I had to shoot series of panoramas to get the entire Sandhill Cranes in. Usually you can never get close enough to fill the frame with birds! The featured image is made from 2 images, @ 300mm and assembled in Photoshop. The amount of images per pano is also a guide as to how close they were to us! The more images per panorama the closer they were!
Sandhill Crane 2 Vertical Image Pano, 300mm Close Focusing lens
Screen Grab of Initial Setup letting Photoshop align and blend 5 handheld images before Photoshop filled in the blank areas with content aware fill feature.
Final Image With content Aware Fill added and other adjustments for density, etc. added.
Sandhill Crane 8 image Panorama, 300mm lens
28 Great Blue Heron Landscape Panorama
Posted on December 11, 2019
Since the weather got colder I have been going through old files that I have not worked on before. I started with files from about 10 years ago taken at the Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, Brigantine Division in Oceanville, NJ. The featured image is a panorama made with 14 images shot back then with a Canon EOS1D MkIII with a 400mm Canon DO lens showing 28 Great Blue Herons. Images (Raw files) shot handheld, and final image assembled,aligned and blended in Photoshop.
Example of 1 image of the 14 images used for the panorama
Smaller Panorama showing 11 Great Blue Herons. I tried first with 5 images before working on the larger version (Can you find the 11?)
