Images of Azeroth: 50,000 Words (14/50)

The Greymane Wall

Grain

A lot of my recent work, both with a camera and with WoW screenshots, I have been playing with stitching images together to create panoramas. There are a couple of reasons for this; firstly, my camera, while very good, is quite old and the largest file size is actually very small compared to cameras that are very commonly available these days, and by stitching together a number of different images I can create larger files and therefore larger and higher quality prints. The other reason, of which both of these images illustrate, is that by stitching images together a photographer can create effects that are otherwise impossible -- or at least very difficult to do without specialized equipment.

In The Greymane Wall I have created a distortion effect that is similar to what you would get from a extreme wide-angle "fisheye" lens. Whilst in Grain I have gone for a Hyperfocus look where everything in the image is in crisp focus (oddly similar to how WoW displays images, like I talked about here). This is actually very difficult to do in camera, and almost impossible when an object is very close in the foreground. However, by stitching different images with each element properly focused, it's much easier.

Angelya over at Revive and Rejuvenate has come up with another Challenge that I, as a Photographer and self-styled Visual Artist, am very excited about. It's IntPiPoMo, or International Picture Posting Month. As a picture is worth 1,000 words, the goal for this challenge is to post 50 pictures during the month of November. I will be posting 25 Images of Azeroth and 25 photographs or art projects that I have been working on personally (and no baby photos, sorry ladies). As well, I will be posting commentary and context with each image.

Please note that all World of Warcraft screenshots are copyright Blizzard Entertainment. The photographs are copyright Brad Stover and should not be reused without permission..