I am continuing to play around with Photoshop’s panorama capability, mainly to figure where it works best and how best to use it. The picture below shows Frank Gehry’s famous Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown Los Angeles on the right, along with the ongoing construction of The Grand, a billion-dollar mega-development, on the left.

As a photo this isn’t much, but as a demonstration it’s great. This is a full 180-degree view taken from the middle of the crosswalk on Grand Avenue looking south, and there’s no other way to get this view. If you back up—which you can’t anyway—you’ll lose the angle that shows the fronts of both buildings. If you don’t back up, you can’t include the whole scene even with an extreme wide-angle lens. You could do it from the Goodyear blimp, I suppose, but only if you happen to have the pull to get a ride.¹

As always with any extreme wide-angle shot, the price you pay is distortion. You can fix a lot of it, but never all of it. Grand Avenue, for example, is a straight line but displays as curved. The near building under construction is obviously distorted even though I corrected much of it. And the concert hall—well, it’s such a mish-mash of curves and angles that you can’t tell if it’s distorted or not. In any case, this picture provides a good view of what’s actually going on, something that’s all but impossible to get any other way.

¹If you do, please let me know. I’d love to get a ride on the Goodyear blimp.

September 19, 2020 — Los Angeles, California

WE'LL BE BLUNT:

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate