Shooting an excellent panoramic photo will depend largely on location. But even if you are not in a scenic place like London or Dubai, there are several things you can do to end up with far superior final images that you can stitch together for a perfect panorama. Here are some tips from Red & Gold on how to shoot panoramic photographs.
Once you have chosen a location for shooting a panorama, be sure to spend some time setting it up. It is much easier to shoot panoramic photos using a tripod because it keeps the camera in a fixed position.
Decide the beginning point and ending point of your panorama. Set your camera up to the first picture and frame it. Then, move the camera around to check and make sure that everything is level and square.
Shoot in the manual exposure mode and work at an average reading across the whole range to ensure that the exposures are consistent. Also, for consistency, it is best to set the focus to manual focus. Focus on a midpoint and make sure you have enough depth of field so that the whole scene is in focus.
One of the secrets to a good panorama is the way you overlap the individual pictures. In the first picture, identify an object that is at the far right of the shot. For the second photo, pan the camera until that object is at the far left. Do this in subsequent shots until you have reached the end of your panorama. This method gives you a long and narrow panorama.
To get a deeper panorama, turn the camera vertically, so that the long aspect of the image is creating the height of the frame. You will have to take more photos to get the same panorama, but it will not be quite so narrow.
Since you are not rotating the camera on the lens axis, the frames will not line up vertically when you rotate the camera. To counteract this, use modern stitching software or buy an attachment that fits on your tripod and allows you to position the camera directly above the axis of rotation on the tripod.
Following these simple techniques will result in a far superior panoramic photo. For more professional photography tips and techniques, look no further than Red and Gold Photography. Based in Dubai, Red and Gold Photography offers you a wealth of photography resources.