Focus stacks and merge to Pano

Question

I create multi row panoramas in LR, and would like to know if LR, while merging the files to create the pano. also employs focus stacking technology to use the sharpest areas of each individual file in the pano.  I'm mostly concerned about eliminating potential soft corners/edges of files rendered with some lenses.  Also, if I change the focal point of each row of images (not every image, just row by row) to increase DOF, will "merge to pano"  recognize what I'm attempting to do and provide the desired result.  This is a different take on "Focus Stacking", in that each image isn't identical with differing focal points, but rather a series of overlapping images, with the focal point changing with each row.  Thanks for your feedback!  Ron

D Fosse · Answer

That's a good question. I don't know the answer for Lightroom, but Photoshop does have a stacking function that supposedly chooses the sharpest frame where there is overlap. And consistently does a very poor job of it. Often a corner or obviously upsampled area is preferred over a center-frame area.

Still, you have much more control over the process in Photoshop. You can run auto-align first, with nudging to fine-tune the overlap - and then simply delete areas you are certain you don't want to use. When running auto-blend to merge them afterwards, you actually need very little overlap. So you can pick the best areas. Granted, a little more work, but for critical purposes it's worth it.

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