Speaking of stitched photos

[David]

A couple weeks back I hiked up to Mitchell Rock here in Clayton and then up to the Twin Peaks. The trip is about 1,200 vertical feet in about four miles, which resulted in me having to lie down and catch my breath about 0.75% of the to the top. But the exhaustion, elevation wooziness, and poison oak exposure that still has my legs looking like Jackson Pollock paintings were all worth it for some of the sights and photos. Unfortunately, though, as many stitches failed as did not because one of my lenses was vignetting very badly.


The Mitchell Rock trail winds up Twin Peaks (not like the TV show, I don't think), and up to Mitchell Rock. Much of the trail is through forest, but in places the trees part like combed hair and hikers can see across the Clayton valley. This shot, stitched together from about 12 images, maybe 15, looks across Clayton. For those of you following along on Google Earth, the long, straight road on the left is Mitchell Canyon, and the photo was taken at approximately 37 degrees, 54' 59.32" N by 121 degrees, 56' 29.83" W looking NNE.


From the same spot, or very near it, but turning perpendicular, the Quarry stands as a monument to just how much mankind can bitchslap mother nature. With the possible exception of mountaintop coal mining and the Pacific Ocean's plastic bag island, this quarry best exemplifies humanity's disregard for nature. Not really. That's just all over-the-top hyperbole. Quarries don't bother me because they leave nice lakes and, you know, I like gravel. Stitched from 18 photos, I think. It was a lot, and at 100% it's 19,000 pixels wide because, you know, someone might want to turn it into a billboard.


Mitchell Rock itself lines up nicely with Mitchell Canyon Rd, almost like a compass bearing. Eight or ten photos two across and four or five tall.


Of the stitched photos that turned out well (I also took one of a tree, but it was fairly uninteresting), this one turned out the worst. Eight, maybe nine photos, the distant DoF is okay but the bush is alternately in and out of focus. It may not be translate well on this post, but at 12,000 pixels wide (100%), it's as obvious as an opera goer in a clown suit. I suspect this was because I wanted the entire bush in focus, so I changed focus in each of the four or five photos it was in to try and capture it clearly. So Photoshop likely struggled with the different focal planes on the overlapping image sections. I think that technique needs some practice.

[Excalibur]

****The trip is about 1,200 vertical feet in about four miles, which resulted in me having to lie down and catch my breath about 0.75% of the to the top. But the exhaustion, elevation wooziness, and poison oak exposure that still has my legs looking like Jackson Pollock paintings****


You're cheating using a digital camera Now if you can take a helicopter back up to the position in shot 2 and retake it that's the one I like.