Members Photographic Articles

For some time now I have enjoyed taking a series of photographs and combining them using Photoshops Photomerge. Through this article I will explain how I go about this from start to finish. Its been trial and error for me, and a lot of experimenting, but now I think I've sort of hit the nail on the...

You know what, I didn't even know an automerge existed in photoshop. I always do it manually. The process is more or less the same except that you mask the layers yourself and therefore you have more control of how the joins occur.

Couple of tips I'd like to add to the tutorial:

Get to know about Hyperfocal focusing. Focussing at infinity could cause near objects to become blurred. OK, so they'll be easy to merge but the final result isn't as nice as when everything's sharp. Focusing at the hyperfocal distance ensures the maximum depth of field. The distance varies according to the type of camera and the focal length. Check out dofmaster.com for a guide and tables which will help you. I printed tables from this site, laminated them and carry them in my camera bag. I use them for virtually every landscape shot I take.

Manually blend the joins using layer masks. Doing this will enable you to pick and choose exactly where the joins are. This helps when items in the foreground are very noticeable where there is a join. You can change the join by painting or erasing areas in the mask, therefore choosing which layer you want to be visible at that point. Use a large, soft edged brush to start with to create your initial blend, then a smaller, harder brush for the finer parts of the join. It takes longer than the automerge but I find it more satisfying and the result is usually more convincing.

Andy.

Cheers for the helpful tips, Andy!

Like you, I used to the all my panoramics manually in Photoshop using layer masks with gradient fills, then use a big soft edge brush to titivate the final image.

As for the very helpful link you have given, I have now bookmarked it and am going to print these tables myself and give it a tryout.

Once again, thanks for the very useful hints mate!!!

Very useful. Couple of points. I find it useful to use exposure lock on the camera. This keeps the same exposure for all shots and avoids that mismatch on merge, especially in the sky. In edit following the merge you can 'select all' and using the edit/transform tool you can stretch the image outside of the merged area, which is sometimes useful.

Ah yes, forgot to mention exposure. Like focusing, it's best that you do everything manually, so that every image is the same. I use manual exposure mode which will have the same result as Exposure lock. If you're not using manual exposure, you should be!
Andy

Super, getting the kids in the car now to try and find a scenic spot!!! Thank you, this is such a great help. C

Thanks Mark for the lesson cant wait to give it a try!