Autostitch for iPhone Review

Joined
Jun 15, 2009
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Location
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Your Mac's Specs
2.8GHz, 4GB RAM 15" MBP (Late 2008)
Aphus's Autostitch Review

Ever since I discovered Photomerge on Adobe Photoshop Elements 4, I've been intrigued by panoramas. I loved the excitement of taking photos on location, then bringing those back to my computer and stitching them together. However, far too often I'd end up with horrible results. My photos didn't overlap quite enough. The stitcher software couldn't figure out perspectives. The whole process was much too complicated and error prone to be worthwhile.

Then, one day while listening to TWiT Live with Leo Laporte, he mentioned the new app called Autostitch. I decided to check it out on the iTunes store, and to my surprise it only cost $1.99. Surely, no quality photo stitching software could only cost two bucks, so I checked out some reviews online. Reviewers say this thing is flawless, so I decided to go ahead and buy it. Let the testing begin!

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The first thing I wanted to do was see how this new app compared to my previous method of using the included software in Photoshop Elements 4.0. So I used the same set of images, taken with my iPhone, in both programs and saw which one provided better results with less time and effort.

I took 18 photos of my Sunroom to compare the two programs. 3 rows of 6 photos across, all taken in portrait mode with the iPhone 3g.


Time Test:

To put this photo puzzle together, my iPhone 3g using AutoStitch took 4 minutes 21 seconds from start to finish. Photomerge only took 58 seconds to put the photos together, but let's face it, photomerge had a 2.8 GHz processor and a dedicated graphics card behind it. What did the iPhone 3g have on that? Not much. Let's look at the results.

Panorama_Test_by_Golfie.png


Oh how hideous! You can see that just by telling each program which photos to use and keeping the result shows AutoStitch's immediate strength. It automatically calculates and adjusts white balance, perspective, and lens curve so the user doesn't have to. Could that be what took so much more time? Let's find out by tweaking the image in Photomerge a little more...

Well, it took about 3 minutes longer for the program to poop out on me and say "could not create a cylindrical map" which left me with a horribly transformed image that still looked extremely patchy even after turning on "advanced blending". Thanks Photomerge, but my new program cost $78 less and fits in my pocket.

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In conclusion, I was greatly pleased with the AutoStitch app. Not only does it produce amazing results with barely any intervention, but it produces these results consistently, provided you have some basic knowledge as to how to take a proper panorama. The best feature about AutoStitch is the fact that I can create a panorama on site, review it, and redo it if I screw it up. No computer needed.

Now go to the app store and pick up the AutoStitch app to support the guys at Cloudburst Research.
 
Joined
May 18, 2006
Messages
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Location
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Your Mac's Specs
Macbook Pro 15-inch: 2.66GHz
I've been meaning to try this app ever since Alex brought it up on Macbreak Weekly. Perhaps this Independence Day weekend will give me a good excuse.
 

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