UK Panoramas

Here are some more shots from our UK holiday (Click each one for a much wider version!)

Inside Windsor Castle

View of the Docklands from the Observatory at Greenwich

The family walking in St. James Park, near Buckingham Palace

Stonehenge

View of the Serpentine in Hyde Park

The National Gallery, Trafalgar Square and Nelson's Column

Ever since I had my dSLR, my interests have been piqued by the concept of panoramas. To me it's mind boggling while insanely beautiful; it's eccentric and mystifying (the latter describes immersive, or VR panoramas). To that end, I invested in an ultra wide angle lens, a Sigma 10-22mm. That lens sort of got me started due to very wide angle shots, with the only problem that pictures were warped near the edge of the field of view. The quality is very very good and I loved the pictures that came out of Istanbul.

So, I next tried another technique : the multiple panning shot technique using my normal zoom lens - and used software to digitally blend and merge the pictures into one continuous panorama. My poison of choice is Adobe Photoshop Elements 6.0; it's a cool piece of software, but you do need a serious kit to run it fast (mine takes forever to complete tasks on a 3 yo Tosh). While preparing for this post, I also found this website that have these amazing immersive VR panoramas. I'll probably try doing that when I invest in a proper tripod and rotating head... I hope I can find a printer in Malaysia to print some of these; I'd love to mount them on my walls one day!