Pages: [1]   Go Down

Author Topic: panoramas- is a nodal rail really necessary?  (Read 2419 times)

Eric Brody

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 487
    • http://www.ericbrodyphoto.com
panoramas- is a nodal rail really necessary?
« on: March 07, 2022, 12:19:27 pm »

How important is a nodal rail to getting good results?

I do not have a lot of experience with panos. The few I've done, on a tripod, in the landscape, seem to work. I have a friend who's even done them handheld.

The prices of the rails seem to range from US$30-40 on into the hundreds. I've no plans to do multilevel exotic setups.

Advice would be appreciated.
Logged

mcbroomf

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1534
    • Mike Broomfield
Re: panoramas- is a nodal rail really necessary?
« Reply #1 on: March 07, 2022, 12:31:03 pm »

It depends VERY much on whether you have a significant foreground object and how close it is.  If your panos have been let's say far/infinity then they will likely have been OK. 

I use a cheap'ish rail when I need to take panos with nodal point properly set.  Nothing expensive.
Logged

Adam Schallau

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 44
    • www.AdamSchallau.com
Re: panoramas- is a nodal rail really necessary?
« Reply #2 on: March 07, 2022, 12:37:09 pm »

I agree with mcbroomf. For several years I made my panos without a nodal rail, but all of my panos were of distant landscapes without a close foreground subject. I now use a nodal rail on the Acratech Panoramic Head for single-row panos.
Logged

Peter McLennan

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4690
Re: panoramas- is a nodal rail really necessary?
« Reply #3 on: March 07, 2022, 06:21:12 pm »

It depends VERY much on whether you have a significant foreground object and how close it is.

Absolutely true.  I shoot 90% of my panos hand held.  The longer the lens, the easier this is.

Logged

Rand47

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1882
Re: panoramas- is a nodal rail really necessary?
« Reply #4 on: March 12, 2022, 08:32:33 am »

As others have said above, depends on how close a foreground element will be, and to some degree on how many “overlapping vertical elements” there will be in the composition.

In this example, no nodal rail was needed because of the distance to focus, and the lack of potential overlapping elements:



In this example, the lower right of the image was very close to the lens, while other elements and many potential overlapping elements were in the mid to background.  This shot would have been impossible without the nodal rail:



Rand
Logged
Rand Scott Adams

Eric Brody

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 487
    • http://www.ericbrodyphoto.com
Re: panoramas- is a nodal rail really necessary?
« Reply #5 on: March 12, 2022, 11:17:53 am »

Thanks to all. I might just get and learn to use an inexpensive nodal rail for use in the field.

I recently realized I could probably use my RRS Macro rail as a nodal slide.

It's a bit heavy for long hikes but will work for other things.

Logged

BobShaw

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2218
    • Aspiration Images
Re: panoramas- is a nodal rail really necessary?
« Reply #6 on: March 13, 2022, 01:28:03 am »

It depends VERY much on whether you have a significant foreground object and how close it is.

Absolutely true.  I shoot 90% of my panos hand held.  The longer the lens, the easier this is.
I have climbed mountains and shot handheld distant scenery and blown them up to 1m wide. Software is pretty  good these days.
Logged
Website - http://AspirationImages.com
Studio and Commercial Photography

Bart_van_der_Wolf

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 8913
Re: panoramas- is a nodal rail really necessary?
« Reply #7 on: March 13, 2022, 05:55:08 am »

I have climbed mountains and shot handheld distant scenery and blown them up to 1m wide. Software is pretty  good these days.

I agree that software can solve many issues (I'm a PTGUI Pro user, and it has very clever seam blending with masking possibilities), but it doesn't hurt to not rely on it for 100%. Anything with details in the foreground will eventually cause problems, when you can least use it (once in a lifetime shot/light, or a deadline).

Whenever I shoot from a tripod, I'll try and use a NPP (No Parallax Point) setup. When handheld, I make sure to rotate the camera through the NPP, rather than turning my head with the camera in front of it. I try walking around the steady lensposition.

Cheers,
Bart
Logged
== If you do what you did, you'll get what you got. ==

mcbroomf

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1534
    • Mike Broomfield
Re: panoramas- is a nodal rail really necessary?
« Reply #8 on: March 14, 2022, 09:39:13 am »

If using Lightroom this is a good and brief set of tips/overview from Julieanne Kost together with a few other links.  If new to panos and using Lightroom I'd recommend a read.  Also covers HDR in the 1st section.
https://jkost.com/blog/2021/09/19408.html
Logged
Pages: [1]   Go Up