Anyone have any recommendations for a program that can handle these? I want to both take photographs of overlapping images and merge them together into a single image, and take multiple (faint) photographs of a single object and merge them into a single (brighter) image. In my ideal world, this would be a single piece of software, rather than two separate ones, just to keep the number of tools I use for handling photographs to a minimum (I use Photoshop for detailed hands-on editing, so a plug-in would work pretty well). While I'm listing ideal characteristics, it would be nice if it could handle the operations reasonably well entirely on its own, but also allow me to adjust settings and handle aspects of the merger manually if I want to take the trouble or if the automatic settings aren't perfect. It would also be nice if it ran under Windows. I'm willing to pay for it, though if someone knows of a freeware piece of software that can handle this kind of operation, that would be even better. Any recommendations?

I'm not sure exactly what you are trying to do, but I use a program called Astrostack for astrophotography ( http://www.astrostack.com/ ). If you take about 150 pictures of an object, the prog combines them to produce a single image much better than any of the originals. I think it works by "adding" parts of the image which are similar and "subtracting" parts that are different (like noise).It also aligns the images. It is better to take a few hundred digital images of an object and combine them this way than try to take a long exposure with a CCD camera as you get less problems with digital noise and it reduces the effect of poor seeing....and the demo version is free!

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Thanks, that looks pretty decent. It's exactly half of what I'm looking for, and if need be, I'll use two separate tools. The other half of what I'd like is software that would take two photos that only partially overlap, use the same types of techniques to align them precisely, add them together (using the parts that do not overlap unchanged, and interpolating in the parts that do overlap so there's a smooth transition), and return a panorama shot. Does that make sense?

Grey, have you given Registax a shot?

I have not, though it looks like that's also just the stacking part of my question. Anyone have any suggetions for the other part, putting together a panorama from several images?

Does your camera not come with software to do this allready?

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the ego has crashed landed

Canon has a pretty good program called Image Stitch or something like that. I think it's free for download at their site too.

I've used it a few times and it does a fairly decent job, to my untrained eye. It'll take multiple images (I've done up to 4) arraigned in various order (line or grid) and combine them like you're asking about. It also did color and brightness balancing good enough that I couldn't detect a difference even though two photos I used once were slightly off of each other (I think I accidentally turned the polarizer at some point). This was for a landscape panoramic.

Huh, I’m finding all the other software other that that one… go figure.

[edited to typo a correct]

No, and to be honest, the software that comes with most cameras usually isn't robust enough to make me happy. I use Photoshop for most of my image processing needs, and I might just shell out the money for Photoshop Elements or CS, which includes a panorama tool, but I thought I'd see if there was something less expensive or particularly nice first.

AutoStitch was recommended by a poster in the GIMP forums.

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That looks well worth trying out. Thanks!

Before my disc wipe I had ADG 4.0 which did 360 panoramas to add a degree of interativity.

I have discovered that my save copy would not install, and they have made the ADG 5.0 into one you have to pay nearly $40 to obtain.

ADG 4.0 was free

Any suggestions for a freeware replacement?

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Wow. Awesome! Low-res, but free, and it does the trick!