Camera Doodles…

Well, I think it had been one hell of a "vacation" from blogging, to blog. Did I stay away from this blog for 3 or 4 weeks? I can't recall really. All I remember is that in a week's time, I had so much going on in my life that I could barely sit in front of the PC and do anything except of checking the so-called "social media" (which I pretend that I have). I had some allergy attacks, and a slip on the stairs ending me with a twisted foot and a pain in the tail (or rather the muscles around that tail bone). Meanwhile, I was already engaged in typing a blog post for my Arabic blog, which made me stop everything at that point. On a positive point, I did work on a tiny experiment with high speed, but probably I shall post about that later on as I'm following some chronological order in this blog and I'm supposed to post something related to the infrared shot I've made before and talked about in the previous post.
Meanwhile, I think I'll be busy as well doing an "inventory check" for images from 2022 and 2021 (and maybe even 2020) to see what I can prepare of them to be uploaded to the stocks. This is a tedious task specially when ti comes to the keywording process. I've tried to find a tool to help me out with keywording time and again, but failed to find a suitable one. Anyway, for this reason, I might be away from this blog for another 2 weeks or so (providing that I don't slip on the stairs again!).

Camera Doodles

This sit of images is quite quick, and thus this whole blog post might be short actually. This set of images was taken the day after the shots in my previous post were taken. Not much was done in these images except of fixing an infrared filter on the lens (I think it was Neewer's IR720) and moving the camera around (indoors where not much IR sources exist). Ironically, my aim was to test something outside and check if there are "hidden" clouds in the sky, but nothing interesting was there, so I came back inside and started to shoot randomly at light sources.

شُـهُـبْ
(meteors)

Generally speaking, the images were red (of course) but I added some twist to it to make it purple and interesting. Indoors, most of the lighting in fixtures comes from LED lights; Not a significant IR source but apparently IR720 do let in some of the spectrum from these lights. Anyway, I've tried various movements between shots, and some images like Meteors have been rotated to make it interesting somehow. Even though it is an abstract in general but seems to me that the direction of the "tails" in such images is important; I could've also made the tails going from the top and downward and probably would still be representative of meteors falling down. Anyway, abstracts are abstracts and those coming up won't have a direction most of the time as we'll see.

Camera Doodles 1

As for the next 2 abstract shots I can't quite remember what orientation were they when they were taken, but apparently I wasn't pointing the camera towards some light source like the fixtures in Meteors. Looking at it, it might be suitable for some background but I'm not quite confident that the stock websites would be accept such images, as it looks quite random. Camera Doodles 2 looks even more random than Camera Doodles 1. 

Camera Doodles 2

My guess or let's say I hope that such images would be accepted for their colors rather than their "composition" (if such word applies here). When I come to think of it, I think the hardest part is to assign keywords to such images right now, as they are completely random! Even though some websites state that something around 20 to 30 words are just about enough, I got into the habit of not feeling satisfied in less than 40 words (probably affected by that time when I had an Alamy account some years ago). One thing though about Camera Doodles 2, and that is that I think I've applied some inverse somewhere in the process but not sure how or when!

Moving Door

The last in this series (and I've skipped one here which I will post at the end) and probably my most valuable shot here is Moving Door where I've set the camera on a table and manually rotated it as the exposure was to be taken (about 6 seconds). It did require some trials to do it right though despite its simplicity; Just the right angle and the right spinning speed. The door here leads to guest room and then to the outside so I'm guessing some bits of infrared are seeping through. Worth noting that the place was busy with people and good thing none (I guess?) appeared here. I think Moving Door has this sense of horror movies despite the floral design on the door. Surely will be keyworded for upload to the stocks.

Finale

So this is a short and quick post for some quick abstract shots done with an infrared filter on 50mm lens. I think my plan for the next few days from now is to work on some images and prepare them for the stocks. This will take some time so I'm not sure if I have the time to post here but we'll see. Meanwhile, I'm also trying to dedicate some time and effort to shoot something (anything) and probably I should also think of a proper topic for my Arabic blog for August. I've already skipped June!
On the other hand there had been some problems on Instagram as I've been trying to upload a video of my latest shots (which I will hopefully talk about here in the coming weeks). I've been trying to upload the video daily, and for more than one week, and kept getting some error message which doesn't explain a thing. I've issued a ticket but I didn't get a reply, yet the problem was resolved few days afterward, so I'm thinking that they did respond to the ticket. Too bad though I didn't take a picture of the set when I did this high-speed photo shoot but I might reenact it, though it's not a big deal I guess.

Meanwhile, I've been also thinking about participating in photography contests (from which my inbox is flooded with), specially after the closure of Trierenberg Circuit lat year (or was it this year?). Anyway, I'm not sure what I would be aiming for in such contests; Like, I'm OK with the money but not sure if it is worth it much. On the other hand, would I get some recognition? Again, what for. Anyway, the idea is still flipping in my head, left and right, and couldn't reach  decision about it, but I might as well participate in few of these contests. We'll see…

In relation to the so-called social media as well it felt being so isolated in the past 2 weeks. Despite the fact that I spend most of my time alone, but I had that urge to talk to someone, anyone, just talk... but there was none. Neither on this social media, nor in reality (from which I'm escaping I guess). It felt as if there was something broken inside my head, staring aimlessly and just doing nothing, and having a nap after another, with total fatigue. Funny how this social media which is supposed to help you grow your circle or do something about the stupidity of the social norm, in fact locks you down further in wait for anyone to reply to your comments or look at your posts and nothing happens for hours and hours. Just the ridiculous life I'm leading…

Tunneling

Mustajdee…

Somewhat a relief from a toothache! Something I was planning to do within the first week of the new year and for that occasion I was planning (and did indeed proceed with) for a one-week leave off work, but now that I've fixed the tooth (hopefully permanently) I guess it is a chance to invest that one-week leave in something else; Well, beside sleeping of course!

Genies

I've talked in my last post about a new panorama which was done in, if I can call it so, semi-infrared environment. The panorama was done completely in the dark with only candles as the light source and with a modified Canon EOS 7D for infrared photography BUT without any infrared filter; Hence, because of the candles and the absence of infrared filter, I might as well call it a "semi-infrared" process.

جِنْ (Djinn) - Original

Anyway, I've stated also that I'm in the process of creating new projections and styles out of it, as I usually do with my panoramas. Let's call these derivations Genies. Working with these genies was no fun as with other panoramas because of the amount of stitching errors that I had to put up with; Meaning, I would need to fix these stitching errors with every production for one of these "Genies". Some of them I did notice and fixed (to the best I can) in the original, but it seems changing the projection styles do exaggerate some curvature and lines that some stitching errors get amplified visually; They are there, but I didn't notice them until I've changed the projection and the perspective.
Generally speaking, my choices were limited in doing some artistic work here mainly because of depicting myself in the panorama in 3 positions, and also having these 3 poses on almost one side of the room and not balanced across the room. I had my vision back then when I was shooting this panorama and of course my thought was all focused on the overall flat, equirectangular (spherical), look. Things change though when you try to make other projection styles. There are some specific points to care for as to the presence and absence of some objects in the scene or the curvature of some lines that might not help the overall look of the image and sometimes even checking for exhaustive or unsolvable situations with the nadir (and the zenith) points. For this reason, I had to give up many ideas here and almost satisfied myself with the 3 main styles: Planet, Tunnel, and Vertical. And just in case you are wondering what's with all these Arabic names, well, I've been naming some of my latest images in Arabic and I'm starting to like it; It's my native tongue after all, right?

Genie #1: Tunnel
Typically, I would go with the planet (or little planet) projection first thing when I do panoramas, but I kept that for later simply because I didn't like it much; Nothing out of the ordinary about it. However, I was reluctant to do the tunnel projection (which is the opposite or reverse of the planet projection).

اسْتِحْضارْ (Conjuring)

The tunnel projection of this panorama, namely استحضار - Conjuring, causes my "base" to be extremely large (ahem, larger than it already is), so I was reluctant about displaying such a distortion. However, the shape of the carpet and its ornament, making some sort of framing around the scene made this projection seductive (specially that I wouldn't have to deal with fixing the nadir point here). Moreover, there was some nice surprise for me there when I started tone-mapping this panorama from HDR (using Photomatix). As you can see here, the ornaments of the carpet got glowing and shining and I'm not sure why is that; It happened only here in this projection of this panorama!

Genie #2: Planet
So, things did not stop at just the tunnel, but also the planet (or little planet) projection which was least favorable for me since it does not have that dramatic look that a tunnel projection gives out. At this level, I've tried to tone-map the HDR panorama using Photoshop instead of Photomatix, which did not even give me any dramatic look either but it was fair I'd say. It almost kept the original look of the HDR panorama at 0EV level. I'm thinking that it is probably attributed to the asymmetry in the scene that such projection for this panorama did not yield pretty much of an interest. At least the nadir point was relatively easy to fix!

حُضورْ - Arrival

Genie #3: Vertical
This one was the least favorite one actually. No symmetry and no organization, just the fact that it is a vertical panorama (using Mercator projection). To do this projection, I had to actually exaggerate the width of the panorama and then crop it out in post-process. I had to tilt and rotate the panorama to make sure that none of my copies gets cropped in the stitching process. Tone-mapped using Photomatix, again, but I keep looking at it and just say "meh." Here, again, I had to work on the nadir point and patch it up.

اسْتِرْفاع - Levitation

Other than these 3 trials with projections with this specific panorama, I've tried to create a wide-view panorama (planet projection with a pitch change to 90 degrees up or down), along with other trials with some other projections, but the trials were not so good actually, lacking organization or symmetry and some point of interest. I think it is probably the flat (equirectangular) format which is the best suited for this panorama because this is how I originally envisioned it as I worked with it. The tunnel version is good as well but its point of interest is the framing and that strange glow in that frame, all made by the carpet, but deep inside that frame, the focus is so-so I'd say.
There could be a chance that I would try to stitch this panorama again but without the additives (the 2 copies of me on the bed and the sofa) and see how things would go. But I need some time to do that, as I'm already struggling with some ideas that I've already packed in my head, yet can't do much about them for the time being! Also, I need to examine this panorama further to see if it is worthy to be converted into a VR.

Beg Your Pardon?

In the realm of ideas, there had been one idea specifically that I wanted to do so much. The problem, as usual, nnot having a proper model and so I have to do it all on my own, which causes a lot of shattering in focus in fact. So, the final image you'll see here did not bring me satisfaction much but at least I worked on it. I'm afraid to be stamped with perfectionism though.
The idea of this image did actually come from an old poem I've composed, titled The Beggar of Nothingville. It was not hard to visualize the final image, sort of, but the hardships come with doing the required physical job (specially moving the gear around to a proper location). I guess I'm getting pretty old here.

المُسْتَجْدي (The Beggar)

Depending on the brightness of your display, some details in the black would show, and might not. As my monitor is calibrated and I work as per the histogram I can assure you that tiny bits of details only should show on the lower part of the image. Of course, المستجدي - The Beggar is not a single shot, but a composite. As I said,  Ididn't have many to help. Also, the place I was shooting in was barely one meter wide and it would be hard for 2 people to be there at the same time!
You may ask, what brought me to such a place? Like, aren't there any other places? Well, since I'm confined to home, I looked for a place that would give a texture for the background; Most of the walls inside the house are blank (and worth noting that I was planning for B&W image from the very beginning), so colors of the walls won't change much, but texture would. Beside that, and since I'm working alone and not bearing the hassles of stands and reflectors, I did need a small space just enough to give a slight bounced light off the walls. I have to say though that this one didn't work quite well because the wall is matte, but it added a tiny bit of reflected light though.

The space of the shoot. The speedlite was placed behind the bars on the upper-left corner. Total width is definitely less than 1.5m.

Voigtländer 20mm Color Skopar

I was planning to shoot with my trusty Voigtländer 20mm lens but then I changed my mind to my seldomly-used-but-awesome lens: Sigma 12-24mm. I thought, if the space is small, it would be better to have some flexibility here in the focal length, which happened indeed as I thought; I did zoom a bit more than 20mm on this lens. If I was to use the Voigtländer 20mm, then I would have to move the tripod instead; Not an optimal choice in such small space.
One more "element of design" here was to tilt the camera downward a bit. Since the topic is about a beggar, supposedly a low-class individual, then it is typical to look downward at such people; I mean, it is something done somewhat subconsciously.

Sigma 12-24mm f/4.5-5.6 EX DG HSM

It took me several shots to get the pose right and working quickly there (fun fact: kept a candy in my mouth under my upper lip to change my features a bit). Too bad I'm not a make-up artist to create more dramatic expressions with make-up, but well, I tried my best. After taking that shot, I've made several shots for my hand pose under the same conditions, as much as possible. I was going to flip the hand gesture horizontally but the lighting conditions here forced me to accept it as it is and just satisfy myself with positioning the gesture correctly and working on cloning out the traces of the fishing line that attached the heart to my hand (which was cut out from black paper by the way and taped to a fishing line and to my hand). One thing I was not sure of though is, whether I was right in adding that bit of halo around the heart to bring attention to it amid the dark tones of the image. Probably, if I am to upload this photo to some contest later on, I would remove this halo and keep it dark as it looks more "natural" despite the editing.

Close up comparison for the heart with and without halo. Might not be quite visible in close-up (click to enlarge) but it would be clear when viewing the whole image. If you focus enough, you can see the halo around the heart in the first image (left) and its absence in the second (right).

Finale

A year is ending here, and there is a plan to spend the first week of it just to my own. In hope that would recharge me up for the upcoming upheavals. News are up and down about the year. Speculations, predictions, and seriously all get on my nerves right now. Moreover, I'm having some hard time about my workplace and its future. If I want to leave, where would I be heading? Many questions play around with my mind and I'm trying my best to keep calm, and watch carefully as things unfold. Things are changing and it sounds as if I don't belong to this world anymore.
Anyway, I better invest a bit of my time in my camera this winter. I should try and push myself out like the old days. Maybe I can do that in my upcoming short leave. No specific ideas but I might raise my ambition a bit to the level of a nocturnal panorama.
Anyway, time is ticking on and on, and a year will be over soon and probably not much would change in my life as usual, but let's hope we all will be gliding smoothly through it. Merry Christmas to those who celebrate it (I'm typing this in Christmas time actually).

Hektisch II…

I'll try to wrap this quick. Well, happy new year first, and wish you all who read this (ONLY THOSE READING THIS!), ahem, a creative new year. A year that washes whatever pains that were there in 2014.
Currently, I've been celebrating my own triumph against one of the hardest panoramas that ruined my appetite for panoramas for some time, but now the appetite is all back of course! However, there remains the part where I MUST do the fixes for these newly generated panoramas, including the HDR tone-mapping which proved to be tricky - and we end the show with noise cleaning which proved to be an arduous task.

Casadh an tSúgáin
(twisting of the rope)

In fact, Casadh an tSúgáin is an Irish song title which I was listening to as I was doing the processing for this image, and seems it fits exactly the image's geometry! When I explored the variety of projections I've totally forgot about the usual flat panorama as it looked very regular and mundane. Hence, I've continued to explore the other styles. However, in Casadh an tSúgáin tone-mapping was troublesome and consequently it made for a hard time with the noise cleaning later. The leader of the photography group liked the small version of this panorama, and asked me to include it in the next set of images to be sorted out for future uses by the group (a usual procedure); however, I'm not sure how would the large version sustain the critique with such noise and spots that would need another round of cleaning. In this projection, I've noticed how the close pillars (to my left and right on location) could have formed a straight line. Originally this panorama was 90^o counterclockwise but I decided to put it as seen above making the symmetry line horizontal and adjacent to the major pillars - while keeping the corridor up and down to form some sense of ground at least, specially with some of the buildings.

Herculis Cuniculum
(tunnel of Hercules)

Next on the list was the tunnel projection, Herculis Cuniculum. This one had even harder work done to it and yet it is suffering still, in the original large version at least. The main problem here was to cropping and distort to ensure some degree of symmetry. Anyway, it seems I did achieve some degree of symmetry along the central vertical axis but not the horizontal one unfortunately; and this is what you get when you screw things up on location with symmetry and centralizing the tripod in the middle of location! The noise level here was significant but not troublesome as much as it was in the previous projection with Casadh an tSúgáin, which is something I don't understand so far, but probably it is related to the degree of distortion that each projection bears. The main nuisance in this panorama specifically comes from the night sky and the buildings of the city; those are the main sources for the high noise level.

Planeta Laternis
(planet of lanterns)

At the end we have the typical planet projection, Planeta Laternis. Originally, this panorama was 90^o clockwise. However, it did seem to be more balanced with keeping the buildings of the city up, while the corridor would spread left and right. Anyway, the rotation process was done later, after all the fixes and the trials to "gain the symmetry" back with a lot of distorting processes. Since I didn't shoot the nadir, I had to fill the space of that block with a solid color and seems it fits perfectly (after adjusting the hue and saturation to match its surrounding tiles). All of these adjustments of course were in HDR mode and before tone-mapping, but the hardest part was to distort such a large file in HDR mode and make it fit specific proportions and perfectly centered. For this reason I mostly do large stitches because I know I will crop them a lot later on, and the good thing about Planeta Laternis is that the edges (where the roof of the corridor itself lies in this projection) contains not many interesting details beside some stitching errors; Thus, cropping this area out was a big relief and a solution which shortened the processing time significantly.

How my Photoshop looks when working with these panoramas.
Notice the guidelines all over the place to ensure a symmetrical distortion and cropping.
click to enlarge

Finale

One year is over now and a new one coming even though I don't care much about it. After all, generally speaking, I'm not supposed to celebrate it! However, I do wish all readers a happy new year with all the best wishes to be fulfilled within.
My plans for now is to use the winter to my advantage as much as possible and go out at night often. I know when summer comes, it's all but a dead season. I just hope my body would cope a bit further with this, specially with the hectic life style and responsibilities thrown on my way.
As for my plans for the new coming year, all what I want for the time being is, to be more careless actually, and have further fun. Lot of fun…

Ikaros 2014 II

QTVRs ahead, please give some time to load. This post won't be viewed properly on iPhone or Android systems. A proper QuickTime plug-in must be installed to Quick Time Virtual Reality (QTVR) scenes. QuickTime plug-in for your browser shall be installed automatically when you install the free QuickTime player. 

Now, this post is supposedly the second part for last week's post with the rest or some of what's left so far from my photo shoot on Failaka island, and specifically on the second day of my stay there, and just before leaving the island.

First things first they say, but I will discuss what I've done secondly on that day, since the first thing done back then is the complicated and the lengthy part of this post! But as a hint, it includes a panorama.

Στην Κορυφή
Rokinon 8mm fisheye, f/?, HDR, ISO100.

In the past two weeks and during my vacation the clouds were persisting only in the morning time, thus I didn't want to miss the chance of shooting some dramatic views that morning from the island, as I once did almost 5 or 6 years ago! The problem was, I didn't have a clear vision of what I really wanted to shoot that morning (after finishing the panorama first in the court of Ikaros hotel). I just started the engine and drove a little; everything was quiet, such a beautiful breeze and weather that literally made me hate the idea of going back to the mainland (except for the fact that there is no wireless service at all in that place unless you have your own!). Anyway, I've just noticed the first place I wanted to shoot here, which is the same spot that I've been doing long exposure the night before, but this time, getting even closer since I'm using my Rokinon 8mm fisheye lens to include as much scenery from the sky as possible. I've changed my position several times and got many shots, and not until sorting out the images back home I've decided that the angle of Στην Κορυφή is the best for my intentions.

Processing-wise, there had been many hassles with Στην Κορυφή. Generally speaking, the issues were related to noise, color cast, sharpness and softness of some details, saturation and vibrancy; but the most persistent problem I had to cope up with, surprisingly, was the crop. Cropping had to be done elegantly and carefully – because as I was trying to keep the perspective of the image (3:2), I had to remove some undesired details or parts that may get attached to the corners or the edge of the frame. The problem rose when I couldn't match the two requirements, thus I had to do one on the expense of the other, hence you can see a small green bush or grass on the lower edge. As for the noise cleaning, there was no way I would do it without losing a great amount of details thus I had to get to the layer masks, not only for cleaning the noise, but also to sharpen some details in the image. Generally speaking, the noise filtration was done to the skies (and sea), while sharpening was done to the landscape features, including the wall of course.

Φοβία (Phobia)

I have to say that my later strolling on the island was somehow in vain trying to look for inspiration, but as I've stated before, my strolling was more like exploring. One of the spots that I really wanted to catch (again) was a spot where I did shoot some images before, of some calcified rocks in low tide time; like Φοβία (Phobia). Unfortunately, I didn't find that specific spot, besides the fact that the tide was high apparently. Anyway, I kept on shooting but this time, I had an idea of trying some scenes for 3D anaglyphs (and lot of that will come when we talk about panoramas in a while).

3D Ruins

3D Trash

Usually, it would be one of the hardest tasks to do a 3D anaglyph with images taken with fisheye lenses, mainly because of the great distortion. There were, however, some successful attempts in the past. This time, I got the idea that we as humans do see the difference in displacements in closer distances to our eyes, and as the distance gets further away from our eyes, the lines would converge to some point in the horizon; technically this is what they call the vanishing point, and it is one of the basics for artists. Thus, in some of these shots taken with Rokinon 8mm fisheye lens, like 3D Ruins, I've decided to align the further away features (the desk). To my eyes, the effect is handsome and truly 3D - though I regret now that I didn't do a panorama in that small space (don't trust a fisheye in judging the space!). On the other hand, 3D Trash which is taken just few meters away from the first location, has most of the features almost in the same image plane, for this, I kind of had the freedom to align any feature in this anaglyph, which in here, was the heap at the center almost. 

10
Canon EF 50mm, f/1.4,
640^-1, ISO100

After going back to the hotel and sorting the images out (and packing some stuff) I just noticed the simplicity of my room's door - and I just couldn't neglect it. Despite the shot being bracketed, I've chose only one shot and worked it out in RAW editor (ACR). There were some branches of some plant beside the door, but they were relatively easy to close out. The main obstacle in 10 was to show that the board with the number "10" is not part of the white wall! This is a mistake from my side with the exposure (and I didn't want to open another image of this door and do the whole adjustments again). A good exposure is a must, and a photographer should not rely on Photoshop to fix his images. Bad exposure, is equal to a wasted shot.

For the time being, I would stop at this - there are other shots that are still under investigation (from this day and the night before even), but I'll stop here to move to the major even that day - a panorama in Ikaros Hotel.

Panorama Ikaros

I have to admit that when I asked the receptionist about taking photos inside the lobby, he said that I do need a permission. Anyway, the panorama here was done in the court (which probably required a permission too!) but since I'm not doing any commercial benefits from this, I think it would be OK. It might be even a free advertisement through my blog! 
Anyway, to organize this matter now, I think I will start with the regular stuff: regular panorama(s).

Regular

That morning, and since the place was relatively quiet, I decided to work out a double panorama (so later I would try, again, doing a panaglyph). Here in the regular part, most of the panoramas that you will see ahead are the right portion, because this was the first panorama to be taken anyway. 

Ikaros Hotel (flat)

The right panorama, or the first one to be taken is special because of the light quality. Both panoramas, anyway, were taken with fluorescent WB; but I guess the magical atmosphere is more apparent in the right panorama rather than the left (second) panorama simply because of the light level and the position of the sun (which was still rising then). To tell the truth, the flat version of the panorama was NOT the first panorama I did stitch, but quite the opposite - it was one of the last ones done. Yet, it is just the "protocol" I guess. The first one to be stitched was in fact a tunnel projection panorama...

Ikaros Loop (tunnel)

The reason that made me jump directly to this projection is, the checkered ground; besides the fact that the nadir (as usual) was something hard to eliminate here. Where there are crossed lines (squares and the like), a flat perspective is not artistic enough!
I was reluctant to work on other projection of this panorama because of the nadir point and the hardships that I already knew will happen to eliminate the parts of the tripod showing in the panorama (something normal in panoramas really). However, I had nothing to lose in fact (except of time on expense of other images), thus I decided to work out a wide view panorama this time (planet projection looked boring!).

Doors and Windows (wide view)

The beauty in Doors and Windows here lies in the vanishing point tendency and the repetitive patterns on left and right; well, the helix stairway disturbed the symmetry a bit but the extension of lines going to the horizon straight are a stronghold. Probably the colors, specially the blue tones, are the magic in this image after all. If the sky was to be obvious in this scene with details in the clouds, I would have probably thought of doing a black and white version of this scene - yet it is something to be tried still!
The hassle in removing in the tripod parts by patching parts of the flooring was, to some extent, successful, despite the apparent disturbance in the ground if you have noticed that already. To patch this part, I had to lasso-select (selecting using Lasso tool in Photoshop) the tripod parts (which formed a semi-trapezoid) and then stretch this selection to make it larger with the same ratio of dimensions. After that, the selection was moved to the area under that space and the tiles were copied from that space and then dropped and minimized according to what's needed. The lines didn't match up exactly (and probably more work was needed with distortion tools at this point) but after all, I have to say this result is far better than previously done. It is always easier to take panoramas on a seamless ground which has patterns that can be cloned out easily prior to the stitch even, but such grounds rarely do make an interesting artistic look! Well, unless, of course, the roof is the one we're talking about.

Panaglyphs

Typically, the issue with panaglyphs, or panorama anaglyphs were not an easy task with this type of panorama, specially that it's not only a 360^o panorama, but a full spherical panorama. This means the arousal of one specific issue: vertical misalignment.

Ikaros Hotel Panaglyph (I)

Notice here in Ikaros Hotel Panglyph (I) how the blue shades (which are supposedly viewed by the right eye with red-cyan glasses) go below the main object; and of course this displacement increase as the distance from the main center of interest (the focal point of the panaglyph) increases. In the beginning I lost hope and thought it can't be done. However, it simply ticked in my mind that the alignment is actually centered around the focal point (at the center of the image) - the plant pot here. This means, I can divide the image into two halves: left and right, and work on solving this problem. After all, it's only a problem of displacement or shifting of perspective; and the Skew transformation was the right tool for this task.

Skewing method around the center of the image.

Ikaros Hotel (Corrected)

The corrected version of the panorama proved somewhat promising with reduced ghosting effect and more reasonable depth just by pulling the "wings" of the panorama up a bit to match their corresponding features. This, however, won't be perfect for all the features in the scene and I do believe that this is natural, even in regular anaglyphs. The important point after all is, to reduce the vertical misalignment as much as possible; and it happened!

Ikaros Loop Panaglyph

The situation was repeated then for the tunnel view panorama, and the same correction was applied even though the situation is a bit tricky here since it is a polar panorama and not a flat, spherical one. Thus, technically, I can't really state that the misalignment was on the vertical axis, but nevertheless, the method worked just fine, to some extent. However, the wide-view projection (Doors and Windows) was the most persistent and despite applying the same method, yet the ghosting effect was not enhanced further as in the ones mentioned here. Probably another type of distortion was due; more investigations are due.

QTVR

At this occasion I had several trials of QTVRs done, since we are talking about panorama, and panaglyph. As you may know probably, QTVRs are done only with flat panoramas, thus there is no more talk about other projections - but there is a further talk about anaglyph QTVR. 



This QTVR was done smoothly with not much hassle, and the nadir of course (if you can see it) is an added simple logo to the panorama.
At this point, and after doing the first panaglyph (without correction), I got encouraged somehow to do another QTVR and see what will come out. I was sure though that it won't be aesthetic!



As you can see if you rotate for 180^o from the starting point (towards the door behind the pillars, opposite the plant pot), you will see that the cut is obvious, as this is the two ends of the original panorama, and the shift between the Red and Cyan made it worse. No surprise here. But then I've worked out around the shifting problem as I've mentioned above (by skewing the panorama) and tried to do the QTVR. I'll put it here for comparison as well...



I'd say the seam line is almost hard to notice with normal view, but it gets obvious when viewed with 3D glasses (red-cyan) - and yet, this is the best it could get I believe. Much better than the previous version at least. 
You might have noticed how the original QTVR is dark a bit with vibrant colors while the other two are light in color. This is normal since the second panorama (for the left eye that is) was taken with a change in light level from the first one, and the court yard was getting much brighter during the second take.
I don't know what to consider an anaglyph QTVR; is it really a 3D environment? or would I call it a 4D environment (supposedly that a QTVR is originally a semi-3D representation of space)? Anyhow, the name is not that important right now nor the philosophy behind it - the experiment just adds a new dimension to my experience...

Finale

Click to Enlarge

This week we got the news that our group, BPF, won one of the gold medals in Austria's international photo contest, or the so called Trierenberg Circuit. We have to wait now for July to come to receive our copies of the catalogs, and a ceremony is supposedly to come in October. I'm not sure how the awards are distributed but it's like there are many subcategories and fine details for which gold medals are rewarded. I'm proud to say as well that a number of Kuwaitis (other groups and individuals) did win various gold medals as well in other categories. The full list can be checked out in here. 
In the meantime, as I'm typing this, my shipment is ready for pick-up; I've ordered some books and items that I might post about here but it's just not the time for this. I do have a plenty of photos that I do need to work out and talk about in the future. I've been pretty busy writing this blog (which I'm trying to finish as early as possible) and my other Arabic Blog which is dedicated to beginners. Despite the fact it's in Arabic, the word flow is not a match for my flow in English when typing this blog post! Anyway, the fact is I'm trying to "arabize" as much as possible to enable those who see foreign languages hard to read (because of many reasons) would be able, as much as possible, to learn. I do have higher level topics like HDR in my mind, but the time for this isn't up yet. Been days now I'm taking 2 laptops (old and new) with me to work just to work on the text for both blogs. Don't know how long this will take, but it is surely better than sitting bored and sick of the maltreatment in this work place...