Stitch and then stack, or stack and then stitch? Recommendations?

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bill2penn
Posts: 29
Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2023 2:42 pm
Location: Philadelphia, PA

Stitch and then stack, or stack and then stitch? Recommendations?

Post by bill2penn »

Is there a consensus of whether it is better to stitch and then stack images, or is it better to stack and then stitch? Or does it not matter, or does it depend on what you are trying to image?
Thanks
Bill

Adalbert
Posts: 2427
Joined: Mon Nov 30, 2015 1:09 pm

Re: Stitch and then stack, or stack and then stitch? Recommendations?

Post by Adalbert »

Hi Bill,
I often stitch my stacks.
First the stacks are calculated,
then the finished stacks are stitched.
Best, ADi

UncleChip
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Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2023 1:56 pm
Location: Uk

Re: Stitch and then stack, or stack and then stitch? Recommendations?

Post by UncleChip »

Let’s say you have an 8 panel x 100deep stack,

Stack then Stitch
Raw edit and export into sub folders,
Run each sub folder set of 100 images through the stacking program editing each set,
Stitch final 8 images and correct any stitching errors
Final edit

Stitch then stack
Raw edit and export
Sort exported images into stitch sub folders, that’s 100 folders and a huge task,
Run stitching software, you will need one that batches (photomatix) check all 100 images for errors and correct,
Collect all final images into 1 folder and run in stacking software
Final edit

Logistics of file handling says stack and stitch
Error control, the stitching will introduce the most error corrections so it’s edit 100 images or 8 for the stacking program so again stack and stitch wins out,
You also have more chance of a parallex effect in the stitch if anything if off axis by just a touch, to fix this 100 times would be a big task,

So my inexperienced vote would be stack then stitch

rjlittlefield
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Re: Stitch and then stack, or stack and then stitch? Recommendations?

Post by rjlittlefield »

I have just now added this section to the FAQ: What is "stack-and-stitch", and how can I do it?
In most cases, it is better to stack first. The main reason is that the stitching process figures out how to align the tiles based on their image content, and that process is likely to make slightly different decisions for each stitch. If you stitch first, the variability in aligning tiles often results in warping the various focus layers in ways that cause smaller features to be misaligned during the focus stacking process, and those misalignments in turn cause localized smearing, ghosts, or echoes. In principle a similar problem can happen if you stack first, where variable alignment in stacking can cause parallax errors in the stitch. This latter problem seems less common, but in difficult cases you may have to try it both ways and see what works the best.
--Rik

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