Welcome to my photo blog, I guess you can tell from the title: I love New York, I love panoramas and I love high res images.
Visit luminous-newyork.com if you’re interested in my fine art panoramas and prints or contact me directly if you are interested in my professional photo services (architectural, interior, panoramic, VR, urban landscape, day and night photography).
All the panoramas you see on this website are my work, please respect my copyright on them and do not use them in any way without asking me first.
If you have a killer view from your deck/balcony/rooftop here in The City, I would love to hear from you and come by with my cameras. Early morning or evening and night are the best times for dramatic panoramas.
Why:
I love how 360 degree panoramas play with our perception. Left, right, front and back are not valid concepts any more. Combined with long exposures at night, they can show us things the brain and eyes can not normally see and they make us think about spatial relationships in a given environment. The high resolution shows us details of the city which aren’t visible with the naked eye.
How:
All panoramas are merged from many individual shots taken with a Canon DSLR, stitched together with PTgui, and edited in Photoshop. Most panoramas you find on my sites are multi-row, multi column panoramas, ranging from 20 to 250 segments (100 megapixel to over 6 gigapixels, shot at 12 to 200mm focal length). This well established technique lets me create those very large prints that you see on Luminous New York and in the galleries. Only a few artists and photographers work in those size ranges (250-500cm or 96-180in width). They are printed at full 300 DPI on a OCE Lightjet on photopaper and mounted against plexi-glass (diasec mount). In most cases I have to actually scale the images down for printing, since the source files are much larger. And to even increase the image quality, I employ a technique called exposure fusing, where 3-5 (or more) different exposures (brackets) are combined into one. This enables me to show incredible details in the shadows, while maintaining highlights that are not completely burned out.
Panorama head setup 2010
History:
Over the last years I was looking into creative and economic ways to produce high resolution panoramas. It began with scanning and stitching fisheye shots from my old 35mm Olympus SLR, but was unhappy about the resolution (around 2004). The next step was shooting with a cheap digital camera, with slightly better results. But the resolution&quality wasn’t where I wanted it to be. Medium film looked promising. I got a 6×9 Speedgraphic with curtain shutter on eBay, and modified it heavily to make it a medium format fisheye camera. It looked promising for about 3 months, then it got too cumbersome to scan the negs, deal with dust, color matching etc… too much work with not so great results. But one learns. The setup above gives me much more flexibility, speed, and a great image quality that is the equivalent to a 24×10 view camera, if such thing exists.
Self-modified 6×9 medium format Graflex fisheye camera
If you are interested in my work, please drop me a line at pano[at]newyorkpanorama.com or just leave comments or ratings.
Again, if you have a killer view from your deck/balcony/rooftop here in The City, I would love to hear from you and come by with my cameras. Early morning or evening and night are the best times for dramatic panoramas and I need about 2 hours of your time.
About,
15 comments
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Matt Rasmusson
May 20, 2007 at 17:43 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Tremendous site and outstanding images!
Bokehman
February 9, 2008 at 0:58 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Simply Stunning Images. Your pictures inspire me to try panoramas one day. If I have any questions, I would know who to look for… I have added your link in my blog. Cheers!
Jess Guim
February 24, 2008 at 20:45 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Thanks for your visit and comments on my web site. You have very professional shots of New York City in your blogs. My pictures in bigapplecity.com are more from an amateur photographer, and taking the shots from the point of view of a tourist. Best regards.
Doug Grosjean
March 18, 2008 at 17:23 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Greetings,
Wonderful work! Just beautiful….
I’m already shooting panos with a Widelux and a 100 y/o Kodak Panoram, and am curious about what photo-stitching software you use?
Thanks,
Doug Grosjean
wayne powell
May 24, 2008 at 11:58 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
hey there Joergen,
just wanted to say I’m enjoying your blog now, too.
I like the stories,
and the comparison of images.
again, have fun in yosemite
talk to you later.
wayne powell
Michael Day
May 27, 2008 at 20:57 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Hello, Joergen. My name is Michael Day. I was one of the stagehands working for Scott Tucker. Just wanted to say that it was a pleasure to meet you and that I am enjoying your work on your websites. New fan. Take care, and hope to see you at the show. M
idris erba
May 29, 2008 at 18:56 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
beautiful work. i was wondering if you have any knowledge with other panoramic cameras. i was thinking of getting a linhof or a horseman. besides the high pricetags, are they good panoramics ?
Matt Riey
October 10, 2008 at 18:49 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Hi Joergen. This is Matt from Great Britain. Just wanted to send you a quick note to say your work is fantastic. I travel to the city every year and your photography really brings home how much I miss New York, my home away from home., when I’m in England.
Take care and thanks, regards Matt.
Ashwin Ragunathan
October 17, 2008 at 23:15 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Hey there, Your blog is pretty good. I am loving the photos.
I am a huge fan of the big apple myself.
Keep up the good work. I visit this place from time to time.
Tony Dunne
October 20, 2008 at 11:39 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Terrific images. At first I thought they were taken with a Panoscan camera. Have you ever used a Panonscan? It is primarily used for 360 photography meant to be viewed on the web; though when printed it produces results similar to some of your images. It also utilizes HDR and produces incredible resolution.
Tony
Lofbirr
October 18, 2009 at 12:29 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
im just amazed, have no worlds to describe my feelings about Your panoramas
im trying too make some panoramas, but at first not in citise, not in nyc, not even in us, second im totally noob compared to You. but still im having fun making it. take a look: panoramy.biernawski.com. cheers !
custom software
October 28, 2009 at 4:13 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Cool,
These are some amazing images and the information that you have written is very interesting,
I hope to see more from you,
Thanks for writing about it
panorama virtual tour
November 23, 2009 at 1:49 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Nice site!!
photos
August 8, 2010 at 18:38 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
greatb pictures ! thanks !
Clay
September 25, 2012 at 21:43 (UTC -5) Link to this comment
I sure enjoyed our trip the other day in Telluride, you 2 are great folk. Let me know when you get some shots posted I will love to see them! Clay the 4×4 guy;-)