Im wondering if I should use a small amerpture (22f ish) for large mountain views to get everything in focus.. Is that generally the right way to do it?

i wouldnt go that far, first of all it will mean getting a lower shutter speed compared to an f/8-f/11 shot, and also you lose quality due to defraction over the apperature at that small of an apperature. finally, f/22 will make all the dust on your lens/sensor show up really well, so only if you want a long exposure with a huge depth of field, then i'd go at such a small apperature. mountains will only be in the range of 100-infinity for focus usually so with a 20mm lens or so that you'd want to shoot mountains with you'd have ample depth of field at f/11, just make sure to focus about a 1/3rd of the way into the shot, rather than on the closest object, or at infinity.

then.....i'd normally bracket 3 pictures or so by .7-1 f/stop, so later i can put 2 of them together to get a proper exposure on the sky, and the dark spots in the mountains. hope that helps, also try panoramas, they're fun

Thank you.
I cant do panoramas...I have a film camera.
And im assuming that a polarizer is also a good idea for mountain type shots?


And Carl, just out of curiousity; you had a shot a while ago i remeber, it was a wide angle mountain shot with like a vapor trail in the sky or something...did you use a fisheye lens? Cuz it looks rounded. (one of my favorite shots!)

Why can't you do panoramas with a film camera?

that would be alot of work ;), but yes a polarizer would be very good, especially with film where you cant post process much, and with film, you dont need to worry so much about bracketing, its just if the mountains are snowy, to make them exposed proper over expose the picture by .5-1 fstop to make it a bit brighter.

since carl ignored your question, i will try and answer it. I believe the one you are talking about he stiched together.

I've always just tok three sets of three side by side images and past them together in Corel or photo shop.

I must respectfully disagree with Carl. A Polarizer should NOT be use with your panorama image. A Polarizer is only effective when it is used at right angles to the path of direct sunlight. If you can picture, in your mind, for one moment a panoramic that you desire to photograph. Think about it for a moment. There will be only one frame that will be at a 90 degree angle (right angle) all of the other frames will have a diminished effect of the filter. If you attempt to "stitch " these frames together you will find that there is NO WAY that you can match up the densities of the sky. Your beat bet is to do your panorama with out he Polarizer and darken the sky after you upload it into your program.

Another hint. Take a series of meter readings across the area the you wish to photograph. Find an average exposure, Take your camera OFF of automatic and set the manual exposer to the average reading that you determined. Again, there is a problem with he sun. If you attempt to use your automatic exposure you will get different densities from each exposure making it nearly impossible to get a [panoramic that looks correct without going batty.

Lastly, any f stop can be used for a panoramic. If you are photographing a wide scene you focus will be set to infinity. That means that all items in that plane will be in focus. If you have something to frame your image in the foreground then you will need to think about f stops.

Just so you know that I am not getting this information out of a book look at my posted image Spanish Peaks. This image was captured as F2.8 at 30th of a second, manual set up. I'll bet you that you cannot tell how many frames that it took to capture this image.

Fotobob

mm.. 2 frames?

Tony is shooting film, good luck getting a panorama together with that :P, unless you're gonna get a scan of it which isnt all that great of quality.

robert, about spanish peaks, why would you shoot that at 2.8? your lens will be better, and there is some depth to the picture that at least 5.6 or 8 should have been used? i found 5 seams in the picture, therefor there were 6 vertically framed shots you used. did you change your focus, or wait for a time between shots? because there are parts that are blurry, while the next image looks clearer. were you using autofocus? i dont mean to be rude with all this, i'm just saying :P

also, i dont see why a polarizer would mess up the sky so bad, sure it would make more of an effect in one part of the sky, but as long as you dont include the sun in the picture, the polarizer wont rotate, so why would it make a different effect in the consectutive pictures? they should line up the same

the biggest problem i run into is using autofocus on panoramas, if the focus changes you get focused streaks on the seams, which are the hardest to edit out, but seriously, if you're doing a good job, dont focus on infinity, focus 1/3rd to 1/2 of the way into the picture, you'll notice a difference

could you guys explain a little more about a polarizer? It keeps getting more complicated the more i learn about them. What did you mean (Carl) when you said "but as long as you dont include the sun in the picture, the polarizer wont rotate" ?

Read this Tony. From the filter maker themselves.

the polarizer wont rotate for any reason, its just if you have the sun in the frame you'd have such high contrast in the sky with a polarizer that the sun would still be washed out while the rest of the sky would be dark dark blue if you did a wide panorama, which probably wouldnt be very nice

Carl,

No offense taken. That is why we have these discussions. If you feel strongly about a subject you should be able to challenge anyone in this forum for an answer. My first answer is wrong! Not even close to the number of frames that was used to capture this image. the f2.8 was selected because at that time of day the correct exposure with a ISO of 100 left me with little choice as in my minds eye I wanted to overexposed the image enough to simulate lighting that would have been found about an hour earlier. Now before we get into a discussion about lighting angles and the likes let me say that I am aware of the shadows changing as the sun move toward the west. What I am attempting to stimulate is the "brightness" of that hour earlier.

You are correct , there are blurry parts in this image. Although I had my camera mounted on a tripod. I still must touch the shutter button. I have had Parkinson's Disease for almost four years and it is getting harder to maintain a steady hand . I do not inject that here for pity or an excuse just explaining why this image has some camera movement in it. I do not need any advice on how to correct this problem as I have used cable releases , even the soft touch ones. I now have gone to using the self timer to eliminate touching the camera after the shutter is released. Of course my action images are now a thing of the past. Anyway I digress. Sorry, let me get back to the subject at hand

No I did not use autofocus. Your 1/3 to 2/3 rule is almost as old as i am. It is the basic formula for Hyperfocal Distance. Now without "trying to be rude", you just answered your own question. If focused on infinity and using the hyperfocal scale on your lens barrel you have maximum depth at the given f stop chosen.

Lastly, I made this statement, " A Polarizer is only effective when it is used at right angles to the path of direct sunlight." if this is a true statement how in the world would the sun appear in an image? I might suggest that you might like to read the article that MAYNE suggested that Tony read. I have read it and found it extremely well written.

Thank you for this debate Carl. This is the type of dialog that keeps us all fresh and honest. I hope that I haven't ruffled any feathers as you have not offended me.either.

caedes has a point

Panoramas can be made with film cameras. Over the past 61 years of my photocareer I have used 4x5, 6x6 and even 35mm frames to construct panoramas. In the early "days" the image was laid on a heavy board and then pasted down with Gum Arabic. The next frame was then overlapped , the edge torn and then the backing (paper) was removed using sandpaper. This continued until the image was complete. It was then copied and the master negative was used to make the final print. I think the term Cut and Paste must have been named after the old procedure. Today with the wide selection of scanners on the market it should not be a problem for anyone to make a panorama from a film camera.

I would recommend that a program that will stitch your images together be used to save many headaches, While I use PS 7.0 for all of my work I have the basic PS Elements installed in my computer, it has a very good stitch program.

fotobob

8| ?
I didn't understand that...sounds to complicated...

Well I think nowadays you would just scan the photo or the negative, and stitch them the same way as you would a digital image.

Another way it could be done would be by placing your 35mm prints together in the proper way. Then Stepping back and taking another photo of the "stitch" (as done with photomontage) then printing the new image. Loss of quality on the new enlargment should even help hide your seems :)

I always thought seeing the seams between 35mm prints (pasted together) gave an interesting effect...