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...What lens did you use for those? How many photos per pano? Isn't it hard to do a stitched pano at sunrise with changing light conditions? What's your process?...
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Lenses used, in order of presentation in the above post:
- Tamron 150-600mm (Canon mount) - Composite consists of 8 vertical images stitched together.
- TSE-24mm Tilt Shift Lens (Canon mount), using the shift feature - 3 photos across/blending 15 exposures. Tilt/Shift lenses are wonderful creative tools and work beautifully for stitching wide angle images together.
- Sigma Art 35mm f1.4 (Nikon mount) - Composite consists of 14 blended exposures.
I shoot sunrise/sunset images using a gimbal on my tripod. This allows for very precise horizontal and vertical movement of the camera while maintaining a level base. This greatly aids accurate stitching in post. To keep exposures consistent, I use manual exposure mode and manual white balance (otherwise exposures will vary greatly, making blending/stitching inaccurate). Also, take vertical shots whenever possible—this provides much more "room" for cropping later and avoids excessively long, skinny panos. Aim for at least 30% overlap between images to aid in stitching. I have better results with 35mm shots and above. Shooting with wider focal lengths adds a lot of distortion to images and can complicate stitching and/or just make strange-looking composites. The exception is with the Tilt/Shift lenses, which make wider focal length panoramas possible.
I always shoot in RAW format (far more dynamic range and editing ability) and use ACR/Photoshop to process in post. Stitching software is MUCH better than it used to be and I've had excellent results taking handheld panos in non-low light situations. For sunrises/sunsets your really need to be on a tripod for optimal results.
I've been doing this for a few years and tend to be a "learn by failing" photographer. Believe me, I have failed in epic fashion many times—but I've become better because of those experiences. I have a similar approach with acoustic guitar.
Hope this helps!