If you have been following my work over the years you know I am a fan of panorama photos. It is such a different point of view from a straight image. Here are a couple ideas to help you create stronger panoramas.

After sunset

When making landscape images I recommend waiting until 12-15 minutes after the sun has dipped below the horizon. When you wait until after the sun goes down your shadows become soft, the color intensifies and the scene becomes Nummy. Nummy is a technical term I have either coined myself or appropriated from hearing it somewhere else.

Light entry point

The light entry point is key to getting the highest quality in your panorama stitch. Most people rotate the camera around the sensor. If you rotate instead around where the light comes through and crosses before heading to the sensor you remove parallax error which makes it easier for your stitching software to create clean seams. Here’s a link to an article on how to set up and know if you are pivoting around the light entry point.

The stitch

This is the menu that helps you choose the method which Photoshop employs. Usually, especially if you have used the light entry point on your lens as the rotation point Auto will work well. Add in the Remove Vignette tic box and you are good to go.

Photoshop Photomerge dialog box
Screenshot of the Photomerge dialog box in Photoshop. make sure you choose the Vignette Removal box along with Blend images together. The Auto selection often works just fine. If no, experiment with the other settings such as perspective and Cylindrical.
photoshop layers palette
Resulting Layers Palette. Photoshop creates the blending masks. If there’s a blend that didn’t quite work you can adjust the masks.

Content Aware fill

Photoshop has a great tool to help you fill the edges of your image if you don’t wish to crop. Select the areas that need a fill. Go to the Edit Menu > Content Aware Fill. In the dialog box see the result. You can help choose which pixels Photoshop is using if the selection isn’t turning out the way you wish. Once you accept the fill it is loaded onto its own layer. Be aware if you are filling a large area there may be some visible replication of elements you will want to clean up using the Stamp Tool.

result of photoshop content aware tool
The circled areas are showing replicated areas that need attention using the Stamp/Clone tool.

Result

Here’s the final image after the Photoshop stitch, Content Aware Fill and a bit of color correction. MMMM, nummy!

sedona red rocks photo
Here’s the final image captured after the sun went down. Lots of color, depth and dimension. I would definitely remove the gold color light to the right as your eye moves to the area of highest contrast.

Here are some more links to creating panorama photos:

Yours in Creative Photography, Bob