Panoramas – a wide-angle view or photograph of a physical space – open up new ways of viewing a scene that go beyond simply being wide. Images in a panoramic aspect ratio allow us to capture long, thin subjects without incorporating too much empty space in the frame. For the urban scene captured on these pages, which is
a common shot required by estate agents where more than one property needs to be shown in the same composition, using a wide-angle lens would have been impractical.
Shooting this row of townhouses with an optic between 14mm and 20mm would include excess sky and road at the top and bottom of the shot, while the buildings would become merely a strip across the middle of the frame. On the other hand, a panoramic shot captures plenty of detail in each house front while minimizing the negative space. The main challenge of this type of panorama stitch is the overlapping and repeating patterns, which can confuse software and cause failure in blending the multiple image segments.
