Assignment #2
Instructor: Roberto Bocci
Panorama

In this assignment you will create one or multiple photographic composite panorama images.
The assignment will be introduced in class with a videotape screening featuring the work of English painter and photographer David Hockney. For this project you are strongly encouraged to use a digital camera but you may also use a regular 35 mm camera or a video camera.

The goal of this project is to shoot a subject of your choice (landscape, city-state and/or interior) seen from a 360∞ viewpoint/angle. To achieve this you will have to shoot multiple frames of your subject and progressively scan your subject/space from left to right and top to bottom. You can either mount your camera on a tripod or shoot hand-held (Hockney uses both these techniques. The final work should include a sequence of different view-points that you will import into a large Photoshop file. If you are shooting with a digital camera I advise you to start out with low resolution images so that you can move them around easily and focus on the composition of your image. When you have a more focused idea shoot your images at the highest resolution and save them as tiff files.

If you use a 35 mm SLR camera with black and white or color film (positive or negative) the process will be a bit more involved. You will have to shoot your film, process and scan every individual frame. A 35 mm film camera will generate sharper and higher resolution files but the process is more expensive and time consuming.

When you have shot your panorama source images create a dummy Photoshop file 42” wide and 24” tall at a resolution of 150 dpi. The size of this file depends on the resolution and size of your source images. In class I will give a demo to show you how to choose an appropriate dimension for your master file. Keep in mind that if you want to use the full potential of the Epson 9600 printer your images will have to be 42” wide (the Epson 9600 can print on roll paper 44” wide). When you have finished creating your composite panorama image save it, flatten it and prepare it for output to the 9600 Epson plotter. During class we will set up the printer and output your files.