Hong Kong from a New Perspective - 27 Shot Panorama

[HKdave]

On Saturday, I took a walk up the West Tower of the almost completed Stonecutters Bridge. It's probably better to describe this as an assault on the summit of the West Tower. We climbed up 230m inside the tower from deck level to tower top (no lifts) - it was 34.5 C outside and considerably hotter inside!

However, it was worth it because the view was incredible - good weather for once. Here's the result - a panorama taking in a 170 degree view of the Hong Kong skyline made up of 27 shots (hand held) stitched together in CS4. Sharpening but no other adjustments.

Taken on a 400D with a 24-70 L.

C&C welcome.

http://hkdave.smugmug.com/photos/627529354_5GtpP-X2.jpg

[lunasicc]

thats awesome,what kind of sequence did you shoot them in?

[hslxsmd]

wow!

[chopperdave]

nice. very nice.

[Dave Mac]

Incredible photo(s).

So much more blue sky in Hong Kong lately with so many factories in South China closing in the last 18 months

[chinoamigo]

very nice! you planning on going back up @ night/sunset/sunrise?

[stuman16]

Very nice. I have a couple suguestions... It looks like it is sloping down to the left. You might try bringing the exposure down a little in post as the bright parts of the clouds are a little blown out, if you shot in raw then the recovery option in ACR will probably fix this. This would be a great image for zoomify or deepzoom presentation. I'm sure the full res image is really impressive, but that is hard to appreciate with a smaller version like you posted.

[Mr. Plow]

It's rough waiting for that one clear day a year in HK to take such a nice photo...way to stick it out.

[Bencooper21]

Congrats! How long did it take to stitch 27 shots together? It was certainly worth the effort.

[MrKz]

wow , great shot for handheld ..

wow

[HKdave]

thats awesome,what kind of sequence did you shoot them in?

Thanks for the comment. Sequence? Uh, left to right :D. All were shot in portrait and I used a big overlap - probably 70-80% overlap. I've found that you get better results with a larger overlap when doing hand held panoramas. All shot in RAW. The shots were all f11, manual focus.

wow!

Thanks for the comment.

nice. very nice.

Thanks for the comment.

Incredible photo(s).

So much more blue sky in Hong Kong lately with so many factories in South China closing in the last 18 months

This photo was taken on a very rare day - the very next day you'd have been lucky to see the adjacent bridge tower. Having said that, this year there have been a few more clear days - still a lot less than 10 or 15 years ago.

very nice! you planning on going back up @ night/sunset/sunrise?

Access isn't really that easy - sunset maybe okay. Night time probably not possible.

Very nice. I have a couple suguestions... It looks like it is sloping down to the left. You might try bringing the exposure down a little in post as the bright parts of the clouds are a little blown out, if you shot in raw then the recovery option in ACR will probably fix this. This would be a great image for zoomify or deepzoom presentation. I'm sure the full res image is really impressive, but that is hard to appreciate with a smaller version like you posted.

Well spotted. I've adjusted it with the focus on the towers in the centre of the picture. The exposure in the clouds looks okay on my screen. Slightly bigger image posted - it is the biggest I'm comfortable posting. The original resolution file would be good for zoomify but smugmug does not have that capability as far as I know.

It's rough waiting for that one clear day a year in HK to take such a nice photo...way to stick it out.

See comment above - I think there's been two days this year :lol:

Congrats! How long did it take to stitch 27 shots together? It was certainly worth the effort.

Took the computer about 20 to 30 minutes - don't know exactly because I was having a beer :cool:

wow , great shot for handheld ..

Thanks

wow

Thanks

Rotated image
http://hkdave.smugmug.com/photos/634170023_Uj26n-X3.jpg