For this tutorial I assumed you photographed the ball from straight above.Ĭonverting the picture to an equirectangular imageįirst of all flip the image horizontally, because it is mirrored. Photograph it and load up the resulting photo in Photoshop. To get the least amount of distortion, be sure to point the hanging mechanism of the ball on the opposite side of the camera. Optionally you can also use the Flexify plugin from Flaming Pear for the conversion. Of course you need the Panorama tools too. Even better, add it your procedure to this tutorial. If you do not have it, follow closely what I do and find a way to do it alternatively. You can perhaps do it just as well with other software than Photoshop. Basically any version of Adobe Photoshop will work, as long as it supports the Panorama Tools Plugins. A tiny ball will generally give you a bigger FoV and it can give the viewer of the panorama the feeling that he is a tiny person in a weird big world. It will also allow you to position your camera further away from the ball. Using a big ball will give your panorama a better resolution. Of course it should be as reflective and color free as possible, but it also helps a lot if the reflective layer is the top layer of the ball. The christmas ball should be as perfectly round as possible to minimize distortion. Also, the larger the Field of View (FoV) of your resulting image will be. The further away the camera is, the less it blocks the view. Since you are photographing a mirror, the camera and its tripod (or you) will be in the reflection. What matters only, is that you'll probably want to use a camera with some zooming capacity. You can of course use a digital camera or you can use an anolog one and scan the results. To make your own christmas ball panorama the way I do it in this tutorial, you'll need a christmas ball, a camera and some software. The easiest source for a mirror ball is probably the collection of christmas balls on your attic, so that is what we are going to use in this tutorial. One of the cheapest and easiest ways to create a full spherical panorama is by photographing a mirror ball.
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