As I trundled in to London this morning, I thought about just how far you could take a camera like the G9 for high-end use. I am finding it pretty good at low ISO single shot, raw mode.

My thoughts are to find a very small light tripod and similarly suitable pannoramic head in order to stitch six G9 shots in portait orientation - theee top, and thre bottom - to create a single high resolution image which would then be stitched. The idea of stitching compact camera shots is not new, but with 6 G9 shots stitched, allowing for overlap, so say 8 useful mp from each shot, you'd end up with a single image around 48mp, more if you increased the number of stiched shots.

This is not to get a poanoramic shot, but an image that would compete with a MF back for the traveling photogapher. The problem must be in sourcing a compact pano head and ultra-light tripod.

Any ideas?

Quentin

I don't know if this would fit your needs, but its the smallest pano head I've found. At one time I considered it but thought it would be too small for my larger bodies/lenses. http://www.nodalninja.com/
There are a number of small tripods--none of which I've ever used. There is this very small, lightweight strange tripod called Gorillapod that has been recommended to me for traveling--and the SLRzoom model should be strong enough to hold the Nodal Ninja plus G9. http://www.joby.com/products/gorillapod/slrzoom/

I'll be interested in hearing what others come up with.

Diane

Thanks for the feedback. Sounds interesting; will investigate

Quentin

"Carnegie Mellon University on Wednesday announced a $300 robot designed to easily enable people to create super-high-resolution panoramic pictures..."
http://www.news.com/8301-13580_3-9785356-3...l?tag=nefd.lede

Fun, but ultimately a fad.

Quentin

Here's mine:
Click to view attachmentClick to view attachment
It's missing the bullseye level on the base, but it works well.
I put it on a small table-top tripod, or just hold it in place on a table. It's pretty incognito for "no photography" locations.

I don't even bother using a pano head. All of my panos are shot hand-held and stitched using PTGUI (www.ptgui.com). PTGUI works the way the pano tools in Photoshop could if Adobe were to focus more on developing their software and less on marketing. Give PTGUI a try -- it'll blow your mind. Here are some shots I made with it using a Canon 5D with the 24-70 EF L lens:

http://www.neutralhillsstills.ca/index.php?showimage=191
http://www.neutralhillsstills.ca/index.php?showimage=147
http://www.neutralhillsstills.ca/index.php?showimage=139
http://www.neutralhillsstills.ca/index.php?showimage=135
http://www.neutralhillsstills.ca/index.php?showimage=66
http://www.neutralhillsstills.ca/index.php?showimage=43

HTH

You can make your own quite easily, have a look at http://www.stockholmviews.com/diyphotogear/pano_head.html

Hi,

Some great panos!

I already have PTGUI. I have done quite a few panos in the past, and I have had some success with handholding. That's fine for quite a lot of uses, but not where you may want to take two duplicate shots with different exposures for HDR purposes, or where you are shooting multi-row to increase resolution.

Although I am looking at pano stuff, I am really using pano technology for a different purpose - to increase resolution in a compact portable package. the finished result should look similar to a standard wide angle shot - not an obvious pano. In fact I cannot see any reason why you could not use good compact camera to produce 8x10 qualty shots with enough stitched frames. Ideally, the viewer would not know they were looking at a stiched shot. They would assume it was a single shot from a very high qualty source.

Quentin

Did you try any 3 x 3? I find those a great deal harder handheld--ir not impossible for me. I can easily do normal 2 or 3 stitch panos that way--but the 3 x 3 eludes me without being on a tripod.

Diane

Did you mark that for points (as nodal points) for 3 x 3 shooting or in some way so you know how to deal with that? This seems a very basic thing--I think I could even do it LOL. Thanks for the info.

I have to admit I do my 3 x 3 with a TS lens (doing 2 shots--up/down---at 3 stops, then stitch those 9 shots together.

Diane

Ah, I should have read to the end in the thread before making replies. That's my question. I would prefer it not to be just one row wide and am interested in how you resolve the multirow. I do it now with a TS lens--which works really well--I figured out the nodal point pretty well, put the lens on my focusing rail at the points required (with the camera in vertical) and do up/down shots at 3 points--giving me 3 over 3. I could also bracket for HDR at each of those points. I haven't figured out how to do this with the G9, considering whatever you used to be small enough to travel with--the whole point of the G9.

Diane

I got my G9 this morning and my first impression is that this is a cracking camera for what I want (light portable on-the-spot photography). But it is no Leica/Medium Format replacement as it flat out doesn't have the dynamic range to compete. It's an excellent camera and state of the art for the moment. However, the sensor size needs to go up in order to provide better quality pixels.

I understand what you are trying to do with stitching, but IMHO you won't have the dynamic range unless you also bracket shots as well as pan the camera.

NB : This is not to put people off buying this camera, as it really is quite good for what it does, however, you need to take into account that it does have limitations and does not replace a good quality DSLR/MF Back.

NB2 : Does anyone get the point of the optical viewfinder? It's obscured by the lens half the time, is too small and has only 80% coverage of the frame when you have a clear field of view and doesn't show any focus/metering/operational information.

I haven't actually gotten around to making my own one yet, but I will in time.

Which is why I mentioned it was part of my plan - and one of the reasons hand-held won't cut it - to shoot two or more shots for each position to HDR the files. The dynamic range is nowhere near my Mamiya ZD but as you say its a great camera for the size.

Quentin