- When did you start taking 360 ° panoramic photos and why?
- The first time I tried this genre about 10 years ago, then I received an order from a construction company in Montenegro. Until that moment, I had never seen spherical panoramas, it was a relatively new format, but it impressed me greatly, and I almost immediately decided to change my specialization. Usually photographers and videographers have the opportunity to capture only a small piece of space, in this sense their funds are limited. 360 ° photography provides a complete view of the object and can show the architectural structure in context.
With the advent of the digital imaging era and the Internet, new opportunities have opened up for photographers, and I've always loved being at the forefront of modern technology. For example, among photographers, I was one of the first to create my own website, back in 1999. There is always an element of witchcraft in the process of shooting on the usual transparencies. The secrets of this craft are largely lost these days, but making panoramic images requires the same discipline.
I consider myself not just another virtual tour maker who owns a camera and a computer, but a digital media artist who draws light and shadow using pixels. I use my experience and skills from traditional photography to breathe atmosphere into panoramic images. I try to "tell" about the appearance of the building from the point of view of the architect himself.
Could you tell us about the stages of creating such images? How long does it take to work, what programs and equipment do you use?
- I do everything manually: I shoot and stitch together fragments, make full-fledged virtual excursions out of them. Thanks to this, it is possible to achieve high image quality with a resolution of 288 megapixels - an incredible amount of fine details can be seen in the image.
I work with a 50MP Canon DSLR camera, fisheye lens and a Nodal Ninja panoramic tripod head. This gear allows you to rotate the camera in 60 ° increments around
The "entrance pupil" of the lens and helps to eliminate parallax. I also shoot the ground or floor under the tripod (nadir) and the roof of the building (zenith). When, in the end, all the fragments are added together, a spherical panorama is obtained in an equidistant projection.
For image processing I use Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop and various "helpers" for mixing HDR content (with high dynamic range - approx. Archi.ru). I stitch pictures together using the program
PTGui Pro. It takes about an hour to shoot each 360 ° image and takes more than four hours to process. Sometimes it lasts longer if you need to mask the "blur" due to the movement of objects or to remove unnecessary shapes in the frame.
And finally, the creation of a virtual reality-enabled tour takes about a day or more: it depends on the functionality of the interface, the complexity of the voice acting, text, maps, compass. In addition, they have to be tested.
What was your biggest challenge while filming the new building of the Tate Modern?
- Time restrictions and weather conditions. Lilo as if from a bucket, Switch House was full of visitors. Therefore, on the first day, I only did a survey of the area, so that next time I knew exactly where and how to shoot.
The Swiss architects Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron initially wanted to build a "non-pyramidal structure" of glass, but then decided to work with bricks that match the exterior of the former Bankside power plant of the 1950s (it houses
the main spaces of the Tate Modern gallery. The building was reconstructed for the needs of the gallery by the same architects in 2000 - approx. Archi.ru). Ultimately, they came to a compromise - for two materials - solution. Now daylight fills the inner space of the building through glass windows and fragments of openings covered with bricks, while at night, on the contrary, light flows from the inside. I tried to capture this unique feature of the building by shooting it at dusk, when the light levels fluctuate between night and day.
From the open terrace located on the 10th floor, I managed to shoot a panorama of London, which, by the way, is constantly changing. The weather did not favor me either: it turned out to be a typical English cloudy summer day with a strong wind. So I had to tinker with camera stabilization. In addition, there is a delicate balance of colors and tones when taking HDR photography. It is very easy to "overexpose" a picture, and as a result, the image will turn out to be unnatural and even surreal. I wanted to present London as modern, full of harsh realism, speaking for itself, and it seems that I succeeded.
What is the future for this type of photography, in your opinion?
“I don’t have a crystal ball for fortune telling, but I was not so wrong ten years ago when I predicted evolution in media and began to move away from traditional photography. Spherical panoramic images are evolving rapidly, as is virtual reality. Photo agency
Getty Images now offers 360 ° imagery and has opened a virtual reality department. Facebook and YouTube now support this format as well as many other sites.
Today there are cameras that record in 360 °, but they are only suitable for creating amateur pictures, service
Google Street View, for forensic experts to capture the crime scene. You can even shoot on an iPhone using the free Google Street View app, but, of course, compared to completely manual technology and professional equipment, the difference is palpable. My method is, of course, time consuming, but manual work will always give the best result.
From 12 to 16 January, Roderick Edwards is planning a visit to Moscow, where he hopes to work with Russian architectural firms. It offers services for photography, video filming and creation of 360 ° panoramas. Filming is possible not only during these five days: Roderick is ready to fly to Russia again - and more than once. The photographer can be contacted by email at [email protected] or via www.rodedwards.com. Translation: Alina Izmailova.
