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Europe Trip 2008 Panoramics

I have finally pieced together photos of our Europe Trip that covered London, Venice, Milan, Florence, Pisa, Rome and Paris between May 7th and June 10th. The photos were taken with a Casio Exilim EX-Z1050 (10MP) digital camera and pieced together using Adobe Photoshop.

London was the first city we visited but we did not visit any high points in the city that would allow for panoramic city photos.

Venice was the first Italian city of our trip and from the Bell Tower in San Marco (Campanile di San Marco) you get a wonderful view of the city, the water and the islands that dot around Venice.

Venice

Venice

Leaving Venice we took the train to Milan but like London, there were no good free high points that allow you to take panoramic photos. From Milan we went to Florence, where the blue skies, green grass and small city made for breathtaking views. The photos below was taken from Cimitero Delle Porte Sante on our way to Michelangelo Piazza.

Florence

From Michelangelo Piazza the city is a bit closer.

Florence

Florence

Karen and I both believe that Florence had the best view during our trip.

Leaving Florence we went to Pisa for one day where the most obvious thing to do is to visit the Leaning Tower. However, going up the Leaning Tower is quite the experience. I think it is the best way to fully appreciate the lean. You also get a great view from the top.

Pisa

Pisa

The final Italian city for us is none other than Rome.  Rome is full of history and two of the most popular places include the Vatican City and the Colosseum.  At the Vatican City we went to the cupola (top of St Peter’s Basilica) and I had enough photos for 2 panoramic, possibly more if I wanted to put the rest together. In addition to those two sites, I compiled a panoramic photo of some ruins along Via dei Fori Imperiali between Colosseum and Victor Emmanuel II.

Rome

Rome

Rome

Rome

The final stop on our trip was Paris and the most obvious place for panoramic photos would be at the top of the Eiffel Tower.  There’s absolutely no doubt in my mind that the view from the Eiffel Tower was spectacular but at such a great height (300m above ground) some of the detail is lost.  However, it is the only monument open late into that night allowing for pictures of the “City of Lights”.  Before revealing the photos from the Eiffel Tower, we first went to Notre Dame, the site Victor Hugo’s Hunchback of Notre Dame.  From here you can see large portion of Paris and its surrounding area.

Paris

Paris

The night of our boat cruise we also went up to the Eiffel Tower because the weather was finally starting to clear and we didn’t want to miss the opportunity.  When we arrived at the top, the sun was setting.

Paris

Paris

That’s a wrap for all the panoramic I currently have.  I am still selecting which photos from each city I will upload and share.  Expect that to happen in the coming weeks.

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Reader's Comments

  1. Shawn Knight | June 24th, 2008 at 2:15 am

    Great job on the panorama shots! I tried this a few times but had very crappy results. How exactly did you do it in Photoshop?

  2. Simon | June 25th, 2008 at 5:24 pm

    Thanks Shawn.

    These panoramas were compiled manually, they’re not as nice as the Automated PhotoMerge feature in Photoshop. I’ll probably print a few of those.

    As for the photos above, I create one large canvas and copied the first two pictures on. Using free transform, click on one layer and press CTRL-T, I stretched and rotated the picture until it matched the other. I then copied the next image to the canvas and free transformed it until it also matched the layer below. A professional would then blend the colors until they matched but that would take way too much time. Each of the pictures above took on average 30 minutes to piece together. A labour of love you could say.

  3. Simon Lau » Europe Trip 2008 Photo Collection | July 28th, 2008 at 10:27 pm

    [...] Panoroama – Self Stitched Panoroama – Adobe Photoshop Photomerge London Vence Milan Florence Pisa Rome Paris [...]



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