WHY TO TAKE (OR NOT) PANORAMIC PHOTOS
When presenting my photographs on public photography portals, I quite often get asked why I took this or that composition "so complicated" when there are simpler ways. So what are the two basic landscape approaches to photography: 1) shooting a composition in single shot vs 2) shooting a composition in several shots (panorama).
ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF SINGLE-EXPOSURE SHOTS (“SINGLE SHOTS”)
The advantages are obvious - simplicity and speed in taking the shot. Especially if you own a wide-angle lens, it is not a problem to include quite a wide scenery in the composition, including foreground, middle and background. With such a single-exposure shot, we don't risk changing the lighting conditions and we make our work much easier in the subsequent post-processing on the computer. Single shots, however, are not only the domain of so-called wide-angle lenses, they are also very useful when working with normal lenses or telephoto lenses.
Disadvantages - first of all compositional limitations. Even though wide-angle lenses can cover a really wide area, they are still not without limit. We are then limited by what we can or cannot fit into the lens' frame. Not to mention the fact that not all of us own wide-angle lens.
However, wide-angle lenses have one major drawback, which is a significant loss of drawing and distortion of perspective. Often we can recognize a photograph taken with a wide lens at a glance, as the motif expands unnaturally, especially in the corners of the photograph, and very often the drawing softens. Another disadvantage of single shots is the subsequent possibility of cropping in post-processing and the associated loss of data and photo quality. For example, if we want to create a square photograph, which is so popular today, from a regular single shot, we have no choice but to cut off a large part of it. This not only loses part of the composition, but also significantly reduces the resolution of the photograph. This is closely related to the possibility of further use of the photograph. If our meta is higher than printing 10×15cm photos or displaying them on the Internet, then the loss of data (caused by cropping) when printing larger formats will be felt quite dramatically. This is despite the ever increasing resolution of DSLR cameras.
ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF PANORAMIC PHOTOS
First of all, let's talk about what panoramic photography is. Simply put, it is a picture that captures a large angle of view. However, it is made up of a large number of sub-photos that are stitched together in an editor. Panoramas can be taken horizontally, but they can also be taken vertically. Panoramic images covering a 360-degree angle of view are also popular.
Often we can take a horizontal panorama from a large number of superimposed images, which allows us to capture a very wide shot indeed. But the resulting panorama is very narrow and forms a “noodle” that does not engage the viewer, who is unable to perceive landmarks, elevation ratios, etc. in such a narrow photograph. The first elimination of this problem is a simple rule - always shoot horizontal panoramas with the camera vertically positioned! If even this solution is not sufficient, then we can shoot a multi-row panorama. This means that we choose the overall composition of the panoramic image and divide this composition into several rows. So, we will first take the top row of our composition (let's say it will consist of 5 vertical frames side by side) and then the bottom row following the top row. The result of our work in the field will be 10 photographs that we will compose into one panorama. There is no limit to the number of rows, we can shoot multi-row panoramas if our compositional creativity compels us to do so. However, we will go into more detail about multi-row panoramas in the following articles.
Illustration of the possibility of composing a multi-row panorama (3 rows).
The advantages are obvious. First and foremost is compositional freedom, as we can assemble the resulting panorama from as many frames as we like. We can therefore include any wide angle of view in the resulting photo, including 360 degree panoramas. By stacking the photos, we increase the data frequency of the resulting photo and thus the printability of the panoramas. Any cropping can be done in post-processing without worrying that the final photo will shrink to the level of cheap cell phone photos. The overall quality of the panorama is dramatically higher compared to the single shots from wide-angle lenses in particular, as we avoid all the aforementioned negatives of wide-angle lenses.
Disadvantages - clearly much higher difficulty of taking panoramas. The photographer should already be quite experienced, as they have to cover a wide range of activities. From setting the vision of the final composition, through the precise setting of the tripod, the correct metering of the exposure and focus, to the quick taking of the photos so that the lighting conditions do not change. Of course, the post-process is also much more demanding, as we have to combine a large number of photographs, often in two or three rows on top of each other. It is therefore not unusual to work with dozens of photographs (especially if we also take exposure variations from each shot). Early attempts at panoramic photography are often unsuccessful, especially when composing sunrises/sunsets in backlight, when the lighting conditions in the scene change dramatically (the outermost photos often do not take the sun and are quite different in exposure than, for example, the middle photos with the sun directly in the frame).
From my point of view, landscape photography is not about shoot, click, move on style. Each landscape photograph should be a kind of self-contained mini-project, in which the photographer demonstrates his creativity first and foremost through thoughtful composition. The photographer should also reflect in the final image some added value that the viewer does not have a chance to get in the case of other photographers - be it an unusual composition, shooting only in the most interesting lighting conditions, the resulting format of the photograph, etc. One of the added values is also the resolution of the photograph. The quality of a 1m x 1m photo image taken from several images is completely different from a photo image of the same size cropped from a single shot (not to mention that such dimensions are usually already far beyond the printing capabilities of single shots without drastic loss of photo quality).
SUMMARY
I don't condemn single-exposure images as such, and some compositions are not suitable for creating panoramas. Either the effort put in would not be "profitable" in terms of the result or simply whatever subjective or objective obstacles at a given place and time prevent us from taking a panorama. Still, in the vast majority of cases in my current work I prefer the path of multiple exposures. Not only would I often not achieve the intended composition with a single shot, but I consider the resulting technical quality of the photograph to be very important, especially in landscape photography.