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Archive 2012 · Panoramic group portraits.

  
 
jhartman
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Panoramic group portraits.


Here are two recent group portraits made with multiple images; one for fun and the other out of necessity.

The high school golf team wanted a poster portrait that featured their pants so we met on the course for a sunrise shoot. I used three Einsteins (one main and two kickers) at full power to overpower the sun (the cast shadows are from the sun, not from the lights) and to light each person individually as the camera was panned - they were not stripped in. In fact, the only PS work done was some minor skin retouching to remove blemishes and a slight contrast/sat boost with Nik CEP 4. The six images covered a 160º field of view.

The choir needed a group shot for publicity purposes and we had a very brief three minute shooting window just before their concert. There was a piano on the floor to the left that would have blocked some of the members so the camera was moved in front of the piano and a seven shot pano was made. Of course there is some vertical distortion on the ends, which IMHO is much preferable to the horizontal distortion you get on the ends from using an extreme wide angle lens. In fact, the one really interesting thing about doing group panos is that you don't get any horizontal stretching at all of the people on the outside edges of the picture, no matter how wide it is. The same three-Einstein light rig was used here.

Both series were shot on a 1DsMkIII and 16-35/2.8L II mounted horizontally on a RRS Omni-Pivot pano head and stitched in AutoPano Pro. I've been doing these group panos in APP now for over four years, and I'm still amazed how it can make one face out of several, even if the subject moves. I've studied these at 200% while retouching and have yet to see any evidence of the stitching.

It's a great time to be a photographer.

jh




May 03, 2012 at 04:40 PM
alohadave
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Panoramic group portraits.


Nicely done.


May 03, 2012 at 04:48 PM
jek-wy
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Panoramic group portraits.


It's always an inspiration to see your work and read your setup. Very enjoyable - Thank you!


May 03, 2012 at 09:22 PM
SloPhoto
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Panoramic group portraits.


what is going on with the guys neck (bottom row, far left) in #2. It looks like his head is shifted 1 inch to the left.

Cool ideas though. I presume #1 has some speedlights for rim lighting that were moved for each person?



May 04, 2012 at 01:07 PM
richard cooper
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Panoramic group portraits.


Great work.

I do group panoramas and use PTGui for stitching plus a plug in called "Smartblend".

Smartblend routes the stitches so no part of the image is cut off or left out of the final image. Smartblend analyizes the overlap area and adjustes the seams accordingly.



May 04, 2012 at 01:40 PM
eNoBlog
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Panoramic group portraits.


Interesting. Look also into the Brenizer method. Pretty cool stuff.


May 04, 2012 at 05:20 PM
Jonathan Huynh
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Panoramic group portraits.


Nicely done.


May 04, 2012 at 11:58 PM
jhartman
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Panoramic group portraits.


"Look also into the Brenizer method. Pretty cool stuff. "

Agreed. I've tried a few portraits with it, and while they are a lot of work, they do produce results you can't get any other way.

jh



May 05, 2012 at 11:24 PM





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