Review of REALVIZ Stitcher 5

Review of REALVIZ Stitcher 5
by Jeff Mottle - CGarchitect.com

A few years ago I reviewed Stitcher 3.1, but with version 5 having been recently released, I thought I would take a look to see what had changed.

Upon first opening the application nothing too drastic has been modified, but they have moved the main navigation buttons that used to run across the top to a vertical flyout system that runs down the left side of the application window. The icons have been more logically grouped into the stitching process and general workflow.

The major and most notable updates for Stitcher 5 are the addition of the fully automatic stitching engine, manual stitching control points, 3D stencil tools, Live Preview and Panorama conversions.

Stitcher Interface

To refresh myself with the system, my first step was to head to the help file, which sadly has not received the same attention that was given to the user interface. I seem to recall this same problem the first time I reviewed Stitcher. While they have added a few more graphics to help explain some of the processes, the help file still needs a major overhaul and more graphics to explain what they are referencing.

Fortunately Stitcher ships with a pretty decent PDF getting started tutorial. I spent the time going through the tutorial and felt pretty comfortable with the new features and workflow.

To get the general impression of this new workflow, I will briefly walk through the process and comment on the various features.

Importing Images

The very first step is to import your series of panoramic images into Stitcher. All of the standard file formats are supported. In version 3 of Stitcher the images were only seen in the image strip at the bottom of the screen. Version 5 has a new thumbnail row that displays them directly on top of the stitching window. I presume this was done to give users more working space and remove the need to have the image strip open. A nice touch, but with some changes to the thumbnail preferences I was able to make it a bit more useable. The default settings resemble that gimmicky application launcher you find on Mac OSX, the one where the icon grows as you scroll across them. I found it to be distracting and somewhat of a pain to use. Once I was able to turn that off, I was much happier.
 

Thumbnail Image strip

 

Automatic Stitching

This is where Stitcher has significantly improved. While Semi-automatic stitching still exists, the addition of automatic stitching has made things quite a bit quicker. With your images loaded you simply select the Automatic stitch button and your images are automatically stitched for you. This even includes the automatic detection of your focal length. While your scene might have enough detail in every shot to complete the process 100%, it’s likely it will only get you 90% of the way. If Stitcher does not have enough detail between two images to stitch them it will leave them unstitched, but this is where the second new feature comes into play, manual stitching.

Manual Stitching

Manual stitch points are very similar, if not identical, to the PTGUI product that many are familiar with, and allow you to accurately stitch images together using defined control points in each image. The process requires you pick 3-4 common points in adjacent images allowing Stitcher the link the two together.

Manual Stitching Interface

Image Alignment

With the images all stitched together a clever alignment tool enables you to draw lines on several known vertical elements in the stitched image set to ensure the final panorama is aligned vertically.

Image Alignment Interface

Stencils and Masks

If you have ever tried to shoot a panorama in a busy street or a landscape with moving clouds you will have likely run into the problem of faded or blurred artifacts in the final renderer panorama. The addition of a stencils and masks is a welcome addition. Within Stitcher you can now choose any individual image and stencil out an area that you want to remove from the final render. For example, a moving car might appear in two images, but in two different locations. If you stencil the car out from one of those shots, only one of them will render in the final panorama, leaving a nice artifact free panorama.

Stencil Interface

This technique is also useful for removing blurs and misaligned objects when shooting a series of shots without the aid of a panoramic tripod head. The result is image distortion that will normally not allow a clean stitch without some stencil work first.

For more detailed masks you can also export any image to a PSD editor, like Photoshop, to create a much more defined and elaborate mask. The result is effectively the same as the stencil tool within Stitcher, but obviously gives you much more control when you can leverage Photoshop’s editing tools.

Photoshop Mask Interface

Rendering

Final image stitching interface has also been given a nice facelift since version 3 and walks you through the process of setting all of the various properties of the final render. The projection formats vary from Cubic and Cylindrical QTVR to Snapshot images and Cubic, Cylindrical and Spherical image outputs.

Rendering Dialog Box

 

Panorama Conversion

The last new feature added to Stitcher 5 is the panorama conversion tool which allows you to take existing rendered panoramas and export them to a different format. This is useful for editing a panorama in an external image editor or converting to another format. Something that required several third party conversion tools in the pas, is a nice touch to have included.

Conclusion

Overall I was pretty impressed with the new features and workflow. For most applications Stitcher is a solid tool, but I think the help files are in need an overhaul and some of the features could use some better explanations. I’d also like to see more in-depth tutorials on more advanced applications and how to deal with more complex situations. While Stitcher works well, if an image does not stitch as expected neither the tutorials nor help file really shed a lot of light on how to resolve them. You can however purchase support or head over to their support forums.
Those of you who had used Stitcher’s batch command line tools in the past will find them sadly missing from this release, although I have read that the older version of the utility will still work and they are working to bring it back in a future release.

To really get solid results it’s also assumed that you have a panoramic head rig. While the tutorials allude to being able to shoot a panorama free hand without a pano head, I think the situations where it is usable are limited. At least in the examples I tried shooting. If your lens is too wide or the subject matter is too close to the camera, or both, you are not going to get very good results. The interface is streamlined, efficient and much improved from version 3. The features work well together and are logically placed in the interface. Stitcher 5.0 retails for $580 US which is a pretty hefty price tag when you consider that PTGUI sells for just over $70 US with many of the same features. If you are in the market for Stitching software, REALVIZ Stitcher should definitely be on your list of products to evaluate as they have a solid history of being a player in the panoramic imagery marketplace.

For more information on REALVIZ Stitcher and to download a demo, please visit www.REALVIZ.com

What's New in Stitcher 5.0?
REALVIZ Stitcher Online Tutorials

 

 

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