could someone recommend a good, simple stitching program for me?

[allegretto]

I use LR 5.2 and a plug-in of some sort would be great. I'm pretty good at learning algorithms but don't want to waste time and effort on a dud.

Thanks in advance, as always.

[ErikKaffehr]

Hi,

I am using either Photoshop CS5, or Autopano Pro. The version of Autopano Pro I have doesn't work as a plugin, one of the reasons I often use Photoshop. Autopano Pro is in my view the better program but in simple cases Photoshop makes an excellent job.

I use stitching more since I started MF,  on the Hasselblad I don't have zooms and I often get into a situation where the subject just doesn't fit in the frame. So I shoot 2-3 images with some offset and stitch.

Best regards
Erik

I use LR 5.2 and a plug-in of some sort would be great. I'm pretty good at learning algorithms but don't want to waste time and effort on a dud.

Thanks in advance, as always.

[wolfnowl]

I do most of my stitching in Autopano Pro as well.  You CAN make it complicated, but you don't have to, and it delivers good results.  Some people prefer PTGui; they both have free trials.

Mike.

[DavidJ]

+1 for Ptgui

[Jack Hogan]

Microsoft ICE.  Besides being pretty good it's free :-)

[Alan Smallbone]

it is not a plugin but PTGUI works the best for me.

Alan

[Ken Bennett]

Several people on this forum recommended PTGui when I had this same question, and I've been using it happily for a year or so. It's relatively easy to use, and produces good results. I usually export 16-bit TIFF files, and let PTGui work on those, then produce a 16-bit TIFF flat pano which I re-import into Lightroom for final cropping and adjustments.

PTGui works well even on an older iMac with only 8GB of RAM.

[fike]

PTGUI seems to be the current king of the hill.  I have used it for several years and it works very well.  blends exposures well.  can do HDR stitching. 

[kirkt]

Another nice feature of PTGui is the "template" system it uses.  You can export small JPEGs from whatever program you use to process your images (LR for example) and work with those small JPEGs to create your stitch.  Once you have set up your stitch, you can then save it as a template and apply it to the full res set of images.  This saves time and memory and works especially well for laggy systems.  It also works well for setting up HDR stitches - you can use mid-exposure JPEGs to create the stitch and then apply the template and change the set up to full res HDRs, etc.

kirk

[JRSmit]

AutoPano Pro 3 . Simply the best and intuitive to use. I tried a while ago a few cases in Photoshop CS5 and it was not nearly as good as AutoPano.

[Jim Kasson]

AutoPano Pro 3 . Simply the best and intuitive to use.

I agree, and the program is really good at taking advantage of all the processor cores you have.

BTW, is there a way to tell it to find the panos by looking for contiguous file numbers, rather that looking at the image timestamps in the EXIF data?

Jim