As part of my death-defying pursuit of pictures from cars in motion I have for some time wanted to be able to take action panoramas while driving. I think I may have hit on a semi-safe way to do this. I'd like to run my idea by the camera mechanics on the list. It's fairly simple actually. I'm thinking of mounting 3 or 4 digital cameras so that they would encompass a wide angle of view, shooting them all off at once and then combining the images in photoshop. It would be nice to use Nikon D1s but until I get my grant I figure on using 25 dollar digicams (there are such things!). I've thought of a few possible difficulties. Any comments on them or anything else that occurs to anybody would be gratefully received. I anticipate mounting the cameras on some sort of semicircular rail. This would give me some flexibility in terms of positioning them. I understand that this sort of geometry might result in some sort of parallax issues. I think these are likely to be at a level that I can deal with post-exposure, judging from the results I've been able to get combining even hand held images (satisfactory to me). Likewise, while it won't be as much of a problem when I get the D-1s, I plan to deal with distortion through post processing. Again this has been feasible in my experiments with panoramas so far. I would like to be able to set all of the cameras of at as near the same time as possible. Also my wife would like me to be able to do this without taking my hands off the steering wheel. I've seen devices for attaching cable releases to cameras without the proper fitting and it seems that a similar mechanical system might work for this application (though it might end up being foot operated!) Another possibility given that these are mainly electronic cameras, would be some sort of electrical arrangement. Since I've got the possibility of using $25 digicams, it might be possible to sacrifice one. It would be nice to have some inside information, so to speak, on these cameras. I haven't really worried much about waterproofing, hood mounts, how to explain to the highway patrol, et cetera. There's a time for everything. Thanks in advance for helping me "stay alive at 55!" -- Alan P. Hayes Meaning and Form: Writing, Editing and Document Design Pittsfield, Massachusetts
