What: Extreme Handheld Pano, shot in one attempt at the Estonian parliament at Long Hermann Tower, on top of which the Estonian national flag flies (pan up on the VR).

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Long Hermann, sometimes called Pikk or Tall Hermann (pikk means tall or long and is a popular name for Estonian landmarks) is the highest defense tower and the main surviving feature of the 14th century castle built by the Knights of the Sword. It still bears the scars of shell damage received in the 16th century. The view is spectacular and gives a sense of what an important military stronghold this once was. The pink neo-classical building houses the Estonian parliament

Who: Photographer Andrei Bodrov of Ebeling Data, a design/programming company in Tallinn and digital.tallinn.

Why: Andrei says it was a spur-of-the-moment decision.

How: While it appears that Andrei was suspended in mid-air to take this shot, or used some type of mechanical arm, it was much more simple and basic: he just lay down on top of the 1.5m wide roof while a friend held on to his legs as he took the shots.

He used a Canon 300D and Sigma 8mm to take six horizontal, ground and sky shots and then one shot back from a slightly different position. He shot it in RAW and didn’t need any HDR manipulations. The stitching was done with Helmut Dersch’s Panorama Tools and one day Photoshop work was needed to remove some unnecessary details. Andrei removed the flare from the sun quickly but restoration of the window under the flag took more time. He performed a lot of postproduction work but only to remove stitching problems. Good weather conditions provided good contrast and color that didn’t need correction.

View a pano of Andrei here.
Email: rey[at]ebeling[dot]ee