8mm Fisheye Lenses &
the Pitch Variation Method
- Using an 8mm fisheye lens with any ASPC sensor dslr camera the pitch variation method makes it possible to take 360°x180° panoramas with just 4 handheld pictures.
- The information here is based on Bruno Postle's original wiki.
8mm fisheye image size
This figure is based on a Canon 1.6 crop sensor and shows how, in portrait mode, small amounts at the top and the bottom are missing.
360° x 180° from 4 tilting pictures
The pitch variation method covers these gaps by pitching upwards for 2 pictures and downwards for 2 pictures.
A suitable amount of pitch is 15°.
The 4 pictures and the tennis ball
First up, second down, etc
Above and below: The tennis ball effect showing how the 2 up pictures (black lines) overlap at the top and the 2 down pictures (white lines) overlap at the bottom.
And click here to visit the centre of this sphere.
4 kinds of panoramas from the 4 pictures
1 Spherical, interactive panorama; also known as VR, click here for the SPi-V version (requires the shockwave plugin) or here for a quicktime version.
2 Equirectangular panorama; 2:1, above or large.
3 Stereographic panorama; above.
4 A recursive panorama based on a Pierce-Quincunial projection.
