Can PTGui be used to register images?

[JoeS]

I have a pair of images I'd like to register (align), and it seems
PTGui would be just the ticket. The PTGui control points could be
used as the alignment points in a point mapping type workflow (I
think).
Has anyone used PTGui for image registration before? How would I go
about setting it up and saving the transformed image?

[John Houghton]

If you just want to align two images containing nominally the same
view, see http://www.ptgui.com/support.html#9_14 (second half). Use
lens type rectilinear and focal length 50mm. say. Then go to the
Panorama Editor window and use the Fit Panorama button to set the
output view. The projection should be rectilinear. Then go to the
Create Panorama tab and use the Set Optimum size button to set the
size to maximum. Then set the Layers option to "Individual layers".
Select the file format to be tiff or jpeg if you want separate files,
or PSD if you want all the layers in a single file for Photoshop.

John

[JoeS]

Thanks, John. I probably should have been a little clearer.

The images I'm trying to align are raster hand-drawn maps over raster
satellite maps. I can scale them to be approximately the same, but
the hand-drawn image will need some sort of rubber sheeting and
transformation using control points to get aligned.

This may better explain the workflow:
http://www.mathworks.com/access/helpdesk/help/toolbox/images/f20-14791.html

It seems PTGui may be suited to this task - I could kill two birds
with one stone if I could get it to work, since PTGui is already a
part of the workflow.

[Erik Krause]

PTGui itself can be used to set control points. However, it doesn't
support morphing. But the panotools12 library respectively PTStitcher
does. If you have it installed (get it from
http://photocreations.ca/panotools/ install it and set the path to
PTStitcher in Options->Panorama Tools) you can use morphing directly
from within PTGui: On Create Panorama tab select PTStitcher in "Stitch
using". Then on Panorama Settings tab "Morph-to-fit" is available.
Select "All control points" there. You must set plenty control points to
get this work. Be prepared for much experimenting. Morphing is a seldom
used feature...

There might be problems using panotools inside a 64bit version of PTGui.
You can use a 32 bit version parallel.

John has a tutorial about this too, but this refers to a very old PTGui
version: http://www.johnhpanos.com/morphtut.htm

--
Erik Krause
http://www.erik-krause.de

[JoeS]

Thanks, Erik. That may be just what I'm looking for. I'll give it a
try.

[Erik Krause]

Am 21.02.2010 17:30, schrieb JoeS:
> Thanks, Erik. That may be just what I'm looking for. I'll give it a
> try.

If you get it working, could you report here or write an article on the
panotools wiki?

-> http://wiki.panotools.org/

[JoeS]

I'll follow up here.

[John Houghton]

Morphing probably won't do quite what you want. The snag is that you
cannot fix one image and morph the other image to fit it. Both images
get rubbersheeted, as you put it.

John

[JoeS]

Yes, that's what I found.
The "Layers" drop down becomes greyed out as soon as PTStitcher is
selected, it's not possible to save the individual layers.
So close...

[Erik Krause]

Am 21.02.2010 19:19, schrieb JoeS:
> The "Layers" drop down becomes greyed out as soon as PTStitcher is
> selected, it's not possible to save the individual layers.
> So close...

Choose "Multi image TIFF" or "Photoshop without feather" in the File
Format dropdown. See
http://wiki.panotools.org/PTStitcher#Example_Script
for details.