Best way to shoot panorama?

How do I ensure that exposure is locked across different shots?

Got confused about several AE-L options!

Expose for what you consider to be either the focal point of the panorama or just an average area, and do it in MANUAL mode. Nothing will change on you, I promise.

One other tip I learned, every couple shots, do a foot shift realigning your body to where you're shooting. This will eliminate the bowtie effect.

You mean shooting in "M" mode? Can I not use AE-L button to lock exposure?

That's what I mean - M Mode. Yes, you can use AE-L, but with panoramas I find that I'm already focused on so many other things that I'm concentrating on (20% overlap, level horizon and movement, etc.) that keeping my finger on AE-L is just one more thing. And I also find that the exposure at the first frame of most panoramas isn't always best, so you have to lock the exposure where you want it metered, and then reframe for the first exposure and shoot. This is even more complicated by the fact that I like to shoot panoramas vertically.

My solution, set aperture the way you want it, meter and focus lock on the subject. Turn off autofocus, change to M mode and dial in the settings I got when I metered in A. Now I can concentrate on my framing.

Manual Focus, manual settings (ISO, aperture and shutter speed), set white balance to another setting other than auto

I'm shooting RAW, so I usually keep it in Auto and deal with it later. That said, with stitching it's best to set it to something static so you don't get variation across shots. Kelby talked about this a couple weeks ago and I believe he recommended setting it to shade, but I'd have to look it up to in his notes to be sure. Regardless of what you set it to, you're better off in something other than Auto just so get a consistent value across every shot in the panorama (something I always forget).

depends on the shot, I like to shoot row matrix, often two rows of 4 shots, overlapping by about 1/3, and the eposure varies enough that leaving the exposure locked would overexpose some areas and underexpose others.

That is perhaps why some folks use Auto, I manually will adjust since I still like that mode best.

You can shoot pano's while handholding your camera but using a level tripod is better. Also, I understand the need to use manual focus, but if you're shooting a pano at an f-stop of 6 or higher and the subject is over 250 ft away, keeping it on auto-focus is fine.

stmv said:

depends on the shot, I like to shoot row matrix, often two rows of 4 shots, overlapping by about 1/3, and the eposure varies enough that leaving the exposure locked would overexpose some areas and underexpose others.

That is perhaps why some folks use Auto, I manually will adjust since I still like that mode best.

Click to expand...

"Row Matrix" is a new concept that I hadn't considered. Thanks for the tip!