Since I just got my 50mm 1.4 I thought it might be fun to try and shoot a bokeh panorama. This is a technique that has recently been made popular by New York wedding photographer Ryan Brenizer. Sometimes it is called the Brenizer method but it haas been around for a long time by his own admission. He has been doing some really cool low light stuff lately with very high ISO (which really is not a problem with this technique as the multiple pictures fills in the noise).
Anyway I thought I would give it a try and see how it looks and see if it is something I would like to work further on or just forget.
The basic idea is that you take multiple shots using an 85 or 50 mm lens wide open at 1.2-2.0. You really want a shallow depth of field. I took this shot of my daughter to start my bokeh panorama. It is shot with a 50mm 1.4 at 1.4
Then I shot 25 other frames first going down her body then up one side across the top and then back down the other side. All shot in manual with custom white balance. This is a situation where you don't want the camera making decisions for you because it will not stitch together in the end properly if you do. After taking the 25 shots I pulled them into lightroom just to make sure the white balance was the same on all of them I synced the shots again. Then I exported the 25 shots to photoshop to do a photomerge. If you decide to try this realize you only need to shoot in jpg and shoot set to medium or large possibly.
Here is the final result of the 25 shots stitched together. You can see the limited dof in the shot. Forgive the silly 11 year old pose this is just a test of the technique so I was glad for the willing volunteer.
I did another test this also 25 photos but was trying for more of a landscape orientation I did not feel it showed the bokeh as well. You be the judge.
I would love to hear you comments especially if you have tried this method. What you find works and what doesn't. It was fun I think I will try it again sometime. There is a little more info on my blog if you care to read it.
