⚠️[UPDATED 8-23-2021] Ricoh Theta Sticher 3.0 - Standalone Stitcher is OUT. Download here: bit.ly/3yGC499 (old workflow still work but this is way better)
I've just purchased Affinity Photo to handle my 360 photos because I'm only a hobbyist and Adobe's prices are in no way justifiable. This tutorial was great, thanks for sharing!
Good choice! Don't fool by the price - Affinity is a professional level photo edting software and AI removing is better than Photoshop any day - I use the both even I have Photoshop full subscription.
Absolutely stunning this video is. Love how you cover so many of my spherical panos I needed help with. Qoocam 8K, DSLR and Mavic Air 2. So many good advices, thanks for doing all this!
Hey Hugh, I want to tank you for this Tutorial love you way of lesson, i also made the switch to Affinity package much cheaper and better for photo editing. Thanks for sharing 😁👍
After waiting a long time to get into 360 photos, I finally got the Theta Z1 and started following your tutorials. They are great! Just after editing a few photos I already start to feel confident with the workflow and I am speeding up my process. I wonder though, I have the Topaz Denoise, should I still do the denoising before Develop or just skip that part and use Topaz Denoise after Develop and Ricoh Stitching?
Thanks again bro. For regular photo editing I prefer photoshop 100x over affinity but the 360-editor in affinity is great 👍 Imao I think a pro should use both.
Happy holidays! Will work on that next year lol! It will come very soon. Want to spend some time on it to make it as professional sounding as possible :)
Amazing!! I just was thinking subscribe both Photoshop and Lightroom, but now you can tell me I just only buy Affinity photo instead of those PS and LR to done same result!! Thank you Hugh!
Wicked i was stressing about if i needed photoshop because of its 360 workspace , but looks like Affinity has it sorted it out and are not behind, i thought they would be behind , just got a theta v and starting 360 the journey ... planning to do 360 livesteaming but was stressing on how to make overlays so this video will help alot, anyway cheers dude
Your content is always great and I appreciate the insight along with humor Thanks for the Adobe alternative! Just what I was looking for! 👍👏 Yes, please 3DVista would be great...Even better if no Adobe products.
Thank you ! have been using affinity for a while now and always good to see your take on the software! and of course, we want you to cover the DSRL workflow canon R5 and the giant lens are my next purchase !
Nice! Good to know you are interested! This give me confident to say I am in the right direction in content making and not making everyone lost b/c getting way too advanced lol.
@@hughhou My honest opinion is that you are in the perfect direction you always provided the best free content and better quality and information than the pay courses i own, you are a leader in the 360, VR community and you will thrive as it gets bigger with the years i am always looking forward to your next content! And if you decide to ever produce a master class on 360 videos or anything regarding 360 i will be your first client ! Thank you again for all you do and provide to the community!
Excellent Presentation! You had showed very good understanding of Richo's Product when you told us to edit ini file! Darktable is not able to read the HDR file from fisheye plugin. I managed to open the file with rawthrapee. I changed the border in Rawtherapee to zero, did the auto level and shadow/highlights according to your recommendation in another youtube. Everything works well for me! Thank you very much!
Hugh best man! A few questions: 1. If we don't care about the price, would you still prefer affinity over photoshop and/or lightroom for 360° photo editing for Theta Z1? 2. Is the stitcher of 3d Vista any good for the Theta Z1? 3. I still have a kolor autopano giga licence from the old days. That was my favourite stitcher back then. Did you have any experience related with Theta Z1 or you wouldn't advise?
Hi hugh thank you so much for all the videos that you do I definitely appreciate it. I am a subscriber and follower and liker. Could you make a video on the best settings for the Theta Z1
@@hughhou Also can you send me the link to your videos that shows how to make a virtual tour going through the mountains with your girlfriend. With the Theta Z1 Thank You so much
Hi Hugh, thanks for the tutorial. It is great as always. How do you edit and then paste the setting of a single panorama in batch using Affinity? Is there anyway to do it, something like lightroom?
Ok Hugh!! Just got my new Theta Z1 finally😊😊. So being a beginner at this I have a bit of questions: Do I go ahead and download the app Richo to my Mac and will the app help me edit photos to create a tour? Do I get the affinity instead or do I need both?
The App is for stitching. VR tour you need 3DVista. And this tutorial is focusing on the photo editing workflow which is AFTER stitching and BEFORE 3DVista. More tutorials are coming :)
Great video I have used AF for some time but havent fully switched.. nice hack on topaz.. One thing I hate and have been stung a few times with is when your done with the pano you need to remember to go to Layer -> Live Projection -> Remove Projection.. I dont know how many times I forgot this and exported my photo.. I wish they would pop up a dialog when saving to remove it incase you forget (can happen with late night).. cheers and keep up the good work!
Oh I hear you! I don't know them - but I wish I can talk to their engineer directly - I got a list for them to improve. Still some essential feature that are way advanced still better in PS.
Yes I do! And this tutorial details exactly how I remove the drone in the sky with Affinity Photo - same workflow as the drone attach 360 camera as it will be even easier (smaller drone smaller area need to AI remove)
Hi Huge! Thank you for the videos!! I followed your instruction to add Topaz plugin to AF, but after added, yes, there is Topaz plugin in the menu, but it still grey, means I can’t choose that.... Could you tell more detail how to add plugin in Mac? (The path is different from PC, that’s why I couldn’t find collect way). Thank you.
Hi Hugh, I have carefully followed your above video where you show (at 4:15) how you drag and drop TIFF files exported from Affinity Photo into Ricoh Stitcher software on a PC. I have followed the same process on a mac, however this doesn't appear work. I just get a box saying 'The DNG file was not found - OK'. Do you know what the problem might be? Have you checked this works on a mac? Thanks, S.
Stupid question Hugh when you are with the impaint tool how do you go back to live projection mode and then export it. Thank you. When I export it I only get the image of the floor. I just want to be able to rotate but I can't go back to viewing the rest of the panorama. Thank you a tone, you are changing lives :)
So good tutorial, thanks! One question, since gear 360 is discontinued and the app doesn't stitch anymore which software do you recommend to use? I tried the Ricoh Theta sticker but it asks for a dng file that I don't have... Thanks in advance
Thanks for the workflow I merged 9 bracketed photos and then did my fine tuning but I can’t seem to drag and drop the image into the stitcher and I missing a step is it possible with 9 different dng photos taken for one shot?
when I open the theta z1 hdr dng file in afinity photo, it looks very bad - pink and weird compared to adobe lt room. However when i open dng file (not hdr) it looks normal. can the theta z1 hdr dng files ( the ones that take several photos) be edited in afinity photos ? I am very new to photo editing. I found that you help me alot and i trying to learn how use afinity photo instead of adobe light room. I recently purchased theta z1 camera and now I am a google 360 photographer. need editings skills. thank you for your work on youtube.
Yes it is the DNG format - use a third party free app to convert that DNG it will work. Please file this bug to Afinity Photo so they can support it soon as I don't know them and they never write me back. Enough user complain about it they will fix this bug! Thank you!
Hi Hugh, what an excellent video, thank you. However, I cannot get to first base as I am unable to see the Ricoh Theta Stitcher file in my 'Application Support' file, so have not been able to modify the Ricohthetastitcher.plist. Are yo able to explain why it's not in the 'Application Support' file, or where I might find it? I have of course installed Theta Sticher on my Mac and can see in my applications. I would love to not have to use Adobe. Any guidance would be much appreciated. Many thanks, Stuart (UK)
Do you have any suggestions for Matterport alternative? I bought the new insta360 one x2 for virtual tours but unfortunately the virtual tours quality ins't professional yet. According to matterport support team, they are working on the software, because the virtual tours with one x2 are very noise in bad and good lightning situations. However when i take a 360 HDR picture with the insta360 x2, they look great! The bad quality only occurs with the matterport app! Perhaps you could do a video showing that on matterport! Hope you can reply, thank you.
A lot of questions about DualFish eye HDR workflow with Affinity Photo. Unfortunately, at the time of this video, Affinity Photo does not support DNG ver.1.4 - it mean it will look purple-ish if you directly open the HDR DNG in Affinity Photo following my other Z1 tutorial. You can neither stick to LR or use a third part LR alternative: www.darktable.org (credit Sam Rohn ) to convert the DNG 1.4 into something Affinity Photo can understand. If anything change, I will make a DFE dedicated tutorial on Affinity Photo! Thank for being patient! Oh and good news here: Topaz AI denoise / sharpen / Gigapixel / everything else has a holiday discount: bit.ly/3mzEyQQ (30% OFF - the biggest sale ever! Don't miss out)
Hello from Tokyo, thanks for you r great tutorial Learning a lot with you. I just downloaded the Z1 basic app and also the stitcher,. Since I did not buy yet the camera I can not download the dual fish yet as I have to plug the camera to the PC. Having said that I follow your step to get the stitch location , but it says I have no application to open it....Is this because I don 't have the dual fish eye plu gin yet??? Really appreciate your support. I guess after my X mas present will have to buy that camera since the result with my one x is really not great as far as picture at least.Thanks again for your answer.
Hi Hugh, Can you clarify for me, today I took a 360 photo using the DFP (9 shot bracket), RAW and JPG, I then connected the Z1 to my MacBook Pro and transferred the 9 DNG and JPG files to a folder on the desktop. I then opened Affinity and used "New HDR merge" to create a HDR file from the 9 DNG files (without any purple cast). I made some adjustments to the HDR image and then saved it (to the same folder as the original files) using the first file name and adding "-hdr" to the name, original file "R0020010.DNG" saving it as a tiff file (as suggested in the video), as R0020010-hdr.tiff. I then dropped this file onto the Ricoh theta stitcher and the file was stitched. Ricoh theta stitcher didn't create a new file, it just overwrote the original fisheye file saved from Affinity Photo and created a equirectangular image that I then opened in Affinity photo, without any purple cast. Is this due to any update from Affinity photo ?? Would love an Affinity photo tutorial, and perhaps a full iPad Pro workflow, if that's possible !!
Hi Hugh, thanks for the great video, I am trying to follow the steps for insta one x2 raw photos, but I cannot get the exported images from affinity photo to theta stitcher ( different dimension than zeta 1 ), is there any other program I could use to get raw dng back to affinity or at this stage only lightroom maybe ? Thanks again
My Z1 workflow is for HDR 360 photography - which is next level. Affinity photo can replace the photoshop part. But you need to add a third party (free) RAW conversion to get Dual fisheye into the DNG Affinity Photo can read to do further grading. So it is coupled hoops you need to jump tho. Let me wait on both Affinity Photo or DualFisheye update to see if this change. So I can make a follow up tutorial.
Is it possible to download the new Stitcher (PC) and try this without wrecking a working Lightroom/stitcher workflow? I want to try this since I own Affinity Photo (just bought it!), but I cannot have any downtime on my only PC.
I just tried opening one of my Dual Fisheye DNG images in Affinity Photo and it has a pink hue to it. Are the RAW files created by the DFE plugin not compatible?
it is the DNG format support. Something Affinity photo need to fix. Pin them as I don't know them. But DFE DNG you can also use other free RAW processed to covert to 16-Bit TIFF first before process. I am working on DFE workflow for Affinity - but for now, Lightroom still needed (not very long tho - stay tuned)
Yes - it is b/c of the RAW format. You can easy convert it with many free RAW converter ./ LR alternative to solve this issue. But really Affinity Photo should have an update to fix that bug - which they should be soon.
Gen fill does not understand 360 yet and it has resolution limitation - 360 photo in general it is huge so I will wait till out of beta to revisit it. Great tool but not for 360 photo yet. It does not understand curve photo neither.
@@hughhou thanks for answer, yes i was try the feature and the resolution that they give was terrible, but it was ok-ish to remove small people/small area, after i clean up the people and stuff i dont want, i couldnt upload to gsv they did not recognize it, the pixel was still the same, i dont know whats wrong, did you know how to re-stitch it or make the photo recognize by the gsv as individual 360 photo?
To facilitate the use of the real time projection, I have added shortcuts to the layer items. Follow the tutorial below. In Affinity Photos ↪ Edit ↪ Preferences,... ( Shortcut for Preferences: Ctr+"," (Windows) / Command + "," (Apple). ) ↪ Shorcuts In Shorcuts, select: ↪ Photo ↪Layer ↪Select type of projection action put YOUR SHORCUT
In Affinity, I'm working in this way: Edit real time projection Alt+Shift+H Delete real time projection Alt+Shift+J Equirectangular projection Alt+Shift+G First I open the photo, use Alt+Shift+G, then review the photo, 2. copy the nadir which is in another window, go back to the 360 photo 3. set "Camera Rotation" to 180 degrees 4. Paste the nadir 5. With the alignment tools I centrally align the nadir, when it is in the center, I copy the nadir(This serves me for later photos, because I skip step 2. and paste the nadir directly), 6. Then I use the command Ctrl+E to flatten the layers, 7. then Alt+Shift+J to Exit the projection, 8. then I export the photo. I also wanted to use Affinity's Macro Option, which allows you to record your actions and save them to automatically perform them later. But I got crashed out of the program, I guess I don't have much RAM.
I'm struggling Hugh..:0( Theta sticher goes through the short install process but nothing is there. I tried with the debug text added and without... What am I doing wrong my friend. I now have invested in a computer.. a Z1.. affinity photo.. davinci resolve. Also thinking of getting 3d vista. (Expensive)..:0) I'm nearly ready to start but can't ha ha
Wait which process you got stuck? The plugin is originally a lightroom classic plugin. But it should work if you follow this instruction in this video :)
Hi Hugh, I'm running Win 10 and having issues locating the ini file for the stitcher app. I can't locate the Appdata file. I looked in both program directories; found the Ricoh Theta stitcher file but no ini there. It's probably me missing something. Any help.
@@hughhouThank you for responding. It is the newest version, I checked. I'll give reinstalling a try, if this doesn't work, do you have any other suggestions. Thank you again.
Would love to see a DLSR tutorial. Sure hope I can get by not buying a $3650 lens though :P. Hoping I can get by with the QooCam for photo and video as I learn more. Still think the Theta Z1 is king of virtual tours for one shot cameras?
Yes, Z1 is still the King. You can use any lens BTW, I will have a tutorial to show you how coming up. I just use Entaniya as I am lazy - want to minimize shooting and not worry about Nadar and Zeinth :)
Im on BIg Sur and Im unabel to locate the application support plist folder. I do however find it under 'show package contents' under the actual folder for the stitcher. BUT! the script you show is not there. Any ideas?
Great video! The latest version of theta stitcher for pc version 2.20.1 doesn't allow this work around. You add the time file and then it asks you for dng file followed by an error message. Any ideas on this?
When I HDR merge bracketed photos for my Insta360 X3 in Affinity Photo it looks good. However, when I export to jpeg as best quality the highlights are blown out. Please can you help me?
Maybe I missed a step but could use some guidance. I installed the stitcher app, modified the .ini file (windows), opened and exported a DNG as a 16bit tiff file in the same directory. When I drag the tiff file to the Stitcher.exe it asks for the location of the DNG file and when I select it nothing happens, the stitcher app never opens and there are no errors or warnings and nothing in the logs. Any ideas? Thanks, the video is amazing just wished it would work for me.
Awesome one. You think you could add the Theta stitcher as a plugin for affinity like you did for topaz? I'd like to see the dslr tutorial too. You the man.
[Updated 12-8-2020] Setup Ricoh Theta Stitcher as a standalone application 💡MAC: Location - Macintosh HD/User/Library/Application Support/RICOH THETA/RicohthetaStitcher.plist 💡PC/Windows: C:/User/[YourUserName]/AppData/Roaming/RICOH/RICOH THETA/RicohthetaStitcher.ini ADD the following codes at the BEGINNING: [debug] ENABLE_LAUNCH_EXC_LR=1 Credit: Yuqing Guo
Also do not double click on the app to launch it, it will reset your plist changes and not allow you to edit.. Drag and Drop image.. Drag and Drop Image.. did I say that twice :) I found a lot of people ran into this issue fyi.
@@IBareItAll Great feedback thank you Steve! I made that same mistakes many many time. Affinity Photo work faster on my PC with multi-thread so I use Z1 Stitcher on PC - lucky PC does not do that.
@Ryan Mitchley It should NOT be. You don't need LR for this. You need to DRAG AND DROP the file on top of the EXE file to open it. Also, you need to be in latest Theta Stitcher.
@@hughhou I added [debug] ENABLE_LAUNCH_EXC_LR = 1 to the RICOH THETA Stitcher.ini file and then I tried to insert a tiff, jpg and dng image but nothing still throws a window where he wants the dng extension but he can't open it here
Professional 360 photo ONLY by FULL FRAME cam+lens (fish-eye)+pano head+stitching soft (PTGUI is best). This cams in 360 photo are toys and low amateur quality. Especially Theta.
Glad to know. There are some free solution as well but Affinity just save time. Photoshop I still have the older version which work great - just don't update - honestly who need all those new fancy features Photoshop recently has lol
Hi Hugh and thank you for this tutorial. I'm trying to compare the result of the 2 workflow you've documented : adobe vs affinity. So I try to use a HDR-DNG file (shoot as you told us here : ua-cam.com/video/hg1m-GlYnuI/v-deo.html). But when I open it in Affinity, it goes wrong (and magenta in fact). Can Affinity open HDR-DNG file from Z1 (and not only the normal DNG-file)? Do we have to convert it first ? with Adobe DNG converter ? (I've done it and I could open the file with Affinity... but I don't know if I lost informations...) Thank you for your lights you spread on us !
Sorry forgot to mention in the tutorial. This is not for HDR workflow. Dual fisheye for HDR generate different DNG RAW type current has a bug in Affinity Photo. Until they or Dual Fisheye fix it - you need extra step of using any LR alternative (free) to convert the DNG to regular DNG before Affinity Photo.
Yes you need to convert it using FREE lightroom alternative raw development and cataloging app - www.darktable.org - it should work! DNG ver.1.4 is not support in Affinity Photo yet.
![I Replaced ALL my ADOBE APPS with these [free or cheaper] Alternatives!](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/5EfqHg49kMk/mqdefault.jpg)
⚠️[UPDATED 8-23-2021]
Ricoh Theta Sticher 3.0 - Standalone Stitcher is OUT. Download here: bit.ly/3yGC499 (old workflow still work but this is way better)
I've just purchased Affinity Photo to handle my 360 photos because I'm only a hobbyist and Adobe's prices are in no way justifiable. This tutorial was great, thanks for sharing!
Good choice! Don't fool by the price - Affinity is a professional level photo edting software and AI removing is better than Photoshop any day - I use the both even I have Photoshop full subscription.
Amazing Video , what I need 10min to explain , you achieve that in seconds! Congrats!
Lol - it does take me hours to figure out the PC tho :)
Melhor tutorial mesmo 🤙
Appreciate this video a lot, Hugh! Big thanks from the 360 community.
Any time!
yes to 3DVista, need a comprehensive pro view.
Working on that next :)
yes
HOLY SMOKES! I only need this 1 program. Excellent tutorial!
Glad it help. Yes, it’s all you need for 360 photo.
Absolutely stunning this video is. Love how you cover so many of my spherical panos I needed help with. Qoocam 8K, DSLR and Mavic Air 2. So many good advices, thanks for doing all this!
Great to hear!
Brilliant! The best workflow w/o PS available! Congrats!
Glad you like it!
Hey Hugh, I want to tank you for this Tutorial love you way of lesson, i also made the switch to Affinity package much cheaper and better for photo editing. Thanks for sharing 😁👍
Great to hear! I have new tutorial coming as well on the latest version of Affinity Photo - more tips and tricks :)
Brother, your setup is off the hook!!! Dude your background and lighting is totally lit!! Hope to run into you one day. Take care man. Frank
Awww thank you Frank!!
Thank you very much for this honest review. Just subscribed.
Awesome, thank you!
After waiting a long time to get into 360 photos, I finally got the Theta Z1 and started following your tutorials. They are great! Just after editing a few photos I already start to feel confident with the workflow and I am speeding up my process.
I wonder though, I have the Topaz Denoise, should I still do the denoising before Develop or just skip that part and use Topaz Denoise after Develop and Ricoh Stitching?
I do it after. But before with DNG is also great! You can call the plugin within Affinity Photo.
Thanks for taking the time for showing other ways of doing 360 content. 👍
Any time!
Thanks again bro. For regular photo editing I prefer photoshop 100x over affinity but the 360-editor in affinity is great 👍 Imao I think a pro should use both.
Agree! I do have both :) The new Theta Stitcher update just makes it possible to only choose one lol.
Thank you for this video. I look forward to future videos pertaining 3DVista, Affinity Photo and 360 Photo editing
Coming soon!
Wow! Indeed an early XMas present from you! Would LOVE for you do show us what you can do in 3DVista. Have a great XMas!
Happy holidays! Will work on that next year lol! It will come very soon. Want to spend some time on it to make it as professional sounding as possible :)
Amazing!! I just was thinking subscribe both Photoshop and Lightroom, but now you can tell me I just only buy Affinity photo instead of those PS and LR to done same result!! Thank you Hugh!
Happy to help!
Wicked i was stressing about if i needed photoshop because of its 360 workspace , but looks like Affinity has it sorted it out and are not behind, i thought they would be behind , just got a theta v and starting 360 the journey ... planning to do 360 livesteaming but was stressing on how to make overlays so this video will help alot, anyway cheers dude
Oh yes! That is great timing!! Like this one is made for you lol!
Thank you so much for this awesome review of Affinity Photo - absolutely great!!!
Very glad you think so. No many ppl know about this amazing software. I hope more ppl can discover this video
Thanks for the amazing video Hugh 🔥🙌🏼 Would love to learn 3D vista from your videos too 🥂💪🏼😎
Those are coming!
This tutorial is a life saver! Can´t thank you enough.
Glad it helped!
Awesome video! I spent all day trying to figure out how to straighten pictures until I found this movie!
Glad I could help!
Your content is always great and I appreciate the insight along with humor Thanks for the Adobe alternative! Just what I was looking for! 👍👏 Yes, please 3DVista would be great...Even better if no Adobe products.
Awesome, thank you!
Hugh..!! I want to learn 3DVista from you!! Thanks for making these great videos!
Any time!
Great, fast but very useful - thank you
Glad it was helpful!
Thank you ! have been using affinity for a while now and always good to see your take on the software! and of course, we want you to cover the DSRL workflow canon R5 and the giant lens are my next purchase !
Nice! Good to know you are interested! This give me confident to say I am in the right direction in content making and not making everyone lost b/c getting way too advanced lol.
@@hughhou My honest opinion is that you are in the perfect direction you always provided the best free content and better quality and information than the pay courses i own, you are a leader in the 360, VR community and you will thrive as it gets bigger with the years i am always looking forward to your next content! And if you decide to ever produce a master class on 360 videos or anything regarding 360 i will be your first client !
Thank you again for all you do and provide to the community!
Excellent Presentation! You had showed very good understanding of Richo's Product when you told us to edit ini file! Darktable is not able to read the HDR file from fisheye plugin. I managed to open the file with rawthrapee. I changed the border in Rawtherapee to zero, did the auto level and shadow/highlights according to your recommendation in another youtube. Everything works well for me! Thank you very much!
Glad it was helpful!
Thanks Hugh. It would be great if you would do a tutorial on 3DVista and on making high quality 360 photos using DSLR or mirrorless cameras.
Coming soon!
@@hughhou @Hugh Hou Is this out yet???
Interested in the 360 tutorial with DSLR cameras and how to stitch them
Great video! I started out with Affinity Photos, thought of picking up PS but gave up 2 hours later, the learning curve and price was steep
Great to hear! Learn Affinity Photo - you can go really deep on that software as well.
Another awesome video. What drone and camera did you use for that gigapixel image? Love it.
Great video, thanks. Super helpful since PS is doing away with 3D option.
Now, RIGHT NOW! you are the best 360 techiniques popularizer on youtube! or can someone contradict me? make your best shoot!
Awwww thank you!
Totally agree. 💪👍
Hugh best man!
A few questions:
1. If we don't care about the price, would you still prefer affinity over photoshop and/or lightroom for 360° photo editing for Theta Z1?
2. Is the stitcher of 3d Vista any good for the Theta Z1?
3. I still have a kolor autopano giga licence from the old days. That was my favourite stitcher back then. Did you have any experience related with Theta Z1 or you wouldn't advise?
I still prefer PS - I don't use LR that much. Giga can not stitch Theta Z1 or Z1 does not need Giga to stitch.
Genius!
Thank you!
Hi hugh thank you so much for all the videos that you do I definitely appreciate it. I am a subscriber and follower and liker. Could you make a video on the best settings for the Theta Z1
Thank you! Sure!!
@@hughhou Also can you send me the link to your videos that shows how to make a virtual tour going through the mountains with your girlfriend. With the Theta Z1
Thank You so much
Hi Hugh, thanks for the tutorial. It is great as always. How do you edit and then paste the setting of a single panorama in batch using Affinity? Is there anyway to do it, something like lightroom?
It should be. Can’t remember on top of my head tho.
Ok Hugh!!
Just got my new Theta Z1 finally😊😊. So being a beginner at this I have a bit of questions:
Do I go ahead and download the app Richo to my Mac and will the app help me edit photos to create a tour?
Do I get the affinity instead or do I need both?
The App is for stitching. VR tour you need 3DVista. And this tutorial is focusing on the photo editing workflow which is AFTER stitching and BEFORE 3DVista. More tutorials are coming :)
This is amazing information
Great video I have used AF for some time but havent fully switched.. nice hack on topaz.. One thing I hate and have been stung a few times with is when your done with the pano you need to remember to go to Layer -> Live Projection -> Remove Projection.. I dont know how many times I forgot this and exported my photo.. I wish they would pop up a dialog when saving to remove it incase you forget (can happen with late night).. cheers and keep up the good work!
Oh I hear you! I don't know them - but I wish I can talk to their engineer directly - I got a list for them to improve. Still some essential feature that are way advanced still better in PS.
Great Hugh. Do you use the same workflow with Xphase? Do you have solution to remove drone from the sky when you attached a 360 camera?
Yes I do! And this tutorial details exactly how I remove the drone in the sky with Affinity Photo - same workflow as the drone attach 360 camera as it will be even easier (smaller drone smaller area need to AI remove)
@@hughhou very cool 😉 thanks 👍
thanks!!
You're welcome!
Hi Huge! Thank you for the videos!! I followed your instruction to add Topaz plugin to AF, but after added, yes, there is Topaz plugin in the menu, but it still grey, means I can’t choose that.... Could you tell more detail how to add plugin in Mac? (The path is different from PC, that’s why I couldn’t find collect way). Thank you.
If it is Grey it mean your path is correct. Did you check the unknown plugin checkbox?
@@hughhou Yes, I checked it, but still grey... I did sevral time but couldn't fix it.
Hi Hugh, I have carefully followed your above video where you show (at 4:15) how you drag and drop TIFF files exported from Affinity Photo into Ricoh Stitcher software on a PC. I have followed the same process on a mac, however this doesn't appear work. I just get a box saying 'The DNG file was not found - OK'. Do you know what the problem might be? Have you checked this works on a mac? Thanks, S.
On a Mac might be little different. You need to make sure DNG and all the original files to be the SAME folder of your new file!
Thanks for yet amazing and detailed tutorial video.🍹👍
My pleasure 😊
Great video Hugh! Been using 3DVista for a year now and its a great tool, would love to see what you do with it.
Thanks! Will do!
Stupid question Hugh when you are with the impaint tool how do you go back to live projection mode and then export it. Thank you. When I export it I only get the image of the floor. I just want to be able to rotate but I can't go back to viewing the rest of the panorama. Thank you a tone, you are changing lives :)
So good tutorial, thanks! One question, since gear 360 is discontinued and the app doesn't stitch anymore which software do you recommend to use? I tried the Ricoh Theta sticker but it asks for a dng file that I don't have... Thanks in advance
For Gear, I will just use PTGui
讲解很好！很清楚！拍摄技巧很好👍！
Hi Hugh, I managed to find the plist file (in a different location on my Mac) so should hopefully be okay now. Many Thanks!
I was just thinking about getting affinity photo and designer
Haha I read your mind!
Thanks for the workflow I merged 9 bracketed photos and then did my fine tuning but I can’t seem to drag and drop the image into the stitcher and I missing a step is it possible with 9 different dng photos taken for one shot?
Theta Z1 merge for you internally in the camera you don't need to do anything.
when I open the theta z1 hdr dng file in afinity photo, it looks very bad - pink and weird compared to adobe lt room. However when i open dng file (not hdr) it looks normal. can the theta z1 hdr dng files ( the ones that take several photos) be edited in afinity photos ? I am very new to photo editing. I found that you help me alot and i trying to learn how use afinity photo instead of adobe light room. I recently purchased theta z1 camera and now I am a google 360 photographer. need editings skills. thank you for your work on youtube.
Yes it is the DNG format - use a third party free app to convert that DNG it will work. Please file this bug to Afinity Photo so they can support it soon as I don't know them and they never write me back. Enough user complain about it they will fix this bug! Thank you!
Hi Hugh, what an excellent video, thank you. However, I cannot get to first base as I am unable to see the Ricoh Theta Stitcher file in my 'Application Support' file, so have not been able to modify the Ricohthetastitcher.plist. Are yo able to explain why it's not in the 'Application Support' file, or where I might find it? I have of course installed Theta Sticher on my Mac and can see in my applications. I would love to not have to use Adobe. Any guidance would be much appreciated. Many thanks, Stuart (UK)
Great tutorial!
Thank you!
Do you have any suggestions for Matterport alternative? I bought the new insta360 one x2 for virtual tours but unfortunately the virtual tours quality ins't professional yet. According to matterport support team, they are working on the software, because the virtual tours with one x2 are very noise in bad and good lightning situations. However when i take a 360 HDR picture with the insta360 x2, they look great! The bad quality only occurs with the matterport app! Perhaps you could do a video showing that on matterport! Hope you can reply, thank you.
That is def planned.
@@hughhou Didn't understand your point!
A lot of questions about DualFish eye HDR workflow with Affinity Photo. Unfortunately, at the time of this video, Affinity Photo does not support DNG ver.1.4 - it mean it will look purple-ish if you directly open the HDR DNG in Affinity Photo following my other Z1 tutorial. You can neither stick to LR or use a third part LR alternative: www.darktable.org (credit Sam Rohn
) to convert the DNG 1.4 into something Affinity Photo can understand. If anything change, I will make a DFE dedicated tutorial on Affinity Photo! Thank for being patient!
Oh and good news here: Topaz AI denoise / sharpen / Gigapixel / everything else has a holiday discount: bit.ly/3mzEyQQ (30% OFF - the biggest sale ever! Don't miss out)
can i use this process for m50 with 7artisans 4mm 2.8 without using ptgui? i love your tutorials!
Hello from Tokyo, thanks for you r great tutorial Learning a lot with you. I just downloaded the Z1 basic app and also the stitcher,. Since I did not buy yet the camera I can not download the dual fish yet as I have to plug the camera to the PC. Having said that I follow your step to get the stitch location , but it says I have no application to open it....Is this because I don 't have the dual fish eye plu gin yet??? Really appreciate your support. I guess after my X mas present will have to buy that camera since the result with my one x is really not great as far as picture at least.Thanks again for your answer.
Thank you! You need to drop in the TIFF file that actually shot on Z1 to use it.
@@hughhou thank you
Hi Hugh,
Can you clarify for me, today I took a 360 photo using the DFP (9 shot bracket), RAW and JPG, I then connected the Z1 to my MacBook Pro and transferred the 9 DNG and JPG files to a folder on the desktop.
I then opened Affinity and used "New HDR merge" to create a HDR file from the 9 DNG files (without any purple cast).
I made some adjustments to the HDR image and then saved it (to the same folder as the original files) using the first file name and adding "-hdr" to the name, original file "R0020010.DNG" saving it as a tiff file (as suggested in the video), as R0020010-hdr.tiff.
I then dropped this file onto the Ricoh theta stitcher and the file was stitched.
Ricoh theta stitcher didn't create a new file, it just overwrote the original fisheye file saved from Affinity Photo and created a equirectangular image that I then opened in Affinity photo, without any purple cast.
Is this due to any update from Affinity photo ??
Would love an Affinity photo tutorial, and perhaps a full iPad Pro workflow, if that's possible !!
Wow this is new! Let me check and get back to you. Thank you for bringing this to my attention!
Hi Hugh, thanks for the great video, I am trying to follow the steps for insta one x2 raw photos, but I cannot get the exported images from affinity photo to theta stitcher ( different dimension than zeta 1 ), is there any other program I could use to get raw dng back to affinity or at this stage only lightroom maybe ? Thanks again
For ONE X2 - you generate stitched DNG directly from Studio. And then you can just edit everything in Affinity photo :)
@@hughhou Thanks a lot for the answer, cheers.
So do you think Affinity can replace your light room/ photoshop tutorial on the ‘z1 zero to hero’?? Very interested to know your thoughts there.
My Z1 workflow is for HDR 360 photography - which is next level. Affinity photo can replace the photoshop part. But you need to add a third party (free) RAW conversion to get Dual fisheye into the DNG Affinity Photo can read to do further grading. So it is coupled hoops you need to jump tho. Let me wait on both Affinity Photo or DualFisheye update to see if this change. So I can make a follow up tutorial.
@@hughhou ok. I actually have both but need to remove my subscriptions! Understand the RAW conversion part. Thank you!
Check out my pined comment - you just need to bypass the stupid DNG 1.4 to do a simple conversion - not that hard to make it works!
Is it possible to download the new Stitcher (PC) and try this without wrecking a working Lightroom/stitcher workflow? I want to try this since I own Affinity Photo (just bought it!), but I cannot have any downtime on my only PC.
I just tried opening one of my Dual Fisheye DNG images in Affinity Photo and it has a pink hue to it. Are the RAW files created by the DFE plugin not compatible?
it is the DNG format support. Something Affinity photo need to fix. Pin them as I don't know them. But DFE DNG you can also use other free RAW processed to covert to 16-Bit TIFF first before process. I am working on DFE workflow for Affinity - but for now, Lightroom still needed (not very long tho - stay tuned)
Affinity does not appear to work with HDR.DNG files (dual fish eye plug in) We still need lightoom?
Yes - it is b/c of the RAW format. You can easy convert it with many free RAW converter ./ LR alternative to solve this issue. But really Affinity Photo should have an update to fix that bug - which they should be soon.
I would also use Photoshop to add things into the spherical panorama, such as signs, screens etc.. Is that possible to do in Affinity Photo?
hi hugh hou, with new gen fill feature photoshop, did you gonna use generative fill with photoshop or just delete manually via other software?
Gen fill does not understand 360 yet and it has resolution limitation - 360 photo in general it is huge so I will wait till out of beta to revisit it. Great tool but not for 360 photo yet. It does not understand curve photo neither.
@@hughhou thanks for answer, yes i was try the feature and the resolution that they give was terrible, but it was ok-ish to remove small people/small area, after i clean up the people and stuff i dont want, i couldnt upload to gsv they did not recognize it, the pixel was still the same, i dont know whats wrong, did you know how to re-stitch it or make the photo recognize by the gsv as individual 360 photo?
Fantastic as always. Is there any way to get Affinity to work with DFE HDR-DNG files?
Not yet b/c of DNG format. But you can use free RAW converter to make it into 16-BIT Tiff before Affinity Photo
What should export settings be for a file to play on any 360 viewer after converting from Raw?
The video explain the Facebook 360 Jpg version export - it should basically work on anything
To facilitate the use of the real time projection, I have added shortcuts to the layer items.
Follow the tutorial below.
In Affinity Photos
↪ Edit
↪ Preferences,...
( Shortcut for Preferences: Ctr+"," (Windows) / Command + "," (Apple). )
↪ Shorcuts
In Shorcuts, select:
↪ Photo
↪Layer
↪Select type of projection action
put YOUR SHORCUT
In Affinity, I'm working in this way:
Edit real time projection Alt+Shift+H
Delete real time projection Alt+Shift+J
Equirectangular projection Alt+Shift+G
First I open the photo, use Alt+Shift+G, then review the photo, 2. copy the nadir which is in another window, go back to the 360 photo 3. set "Camera Rotation" to 180 degrees 4. Paste the nadir 5. With the alignment tools I centrally align the nadir, when it is in the center, I copy the nadir(This serves me for later photos, because I skip step 2. and paste the nadir directly), 6. Then I use the command Ctrl+E to flatten the layers, 7. then Alt+Shift+J to Exit the projection, 8. then I export the photo.
I also wanted to use Affinity's Macro Option, which allows you to record your actions and save them to automatically perform them later. But I got crashed out of the program, I guess I don't have much RAM.
I'm struggling Hugh..:0(
Theta sticher goes through the short install process but nothing is there. I tried with the debug text added and without...
What am I doing wrong my friend.
I now have invested in a computer.. a Z1.. affinity photo.. davinci resolve. Also thinking of getting 3d vista. (Expensive)..:0)
I'm nearly ready to start but can't ha ha
Wait which process you got stuck? The plugin is originally a lightroom classic plugin. But it should work if you follow this instruction in this video :)
Hi Hugh, I'm running Win 10 and having issues locating the ini file for the stitcher app. I can't locate the Appdata file. I looked in both program directories; found the Ricoh Theta stitcher file but no ini there. It's probably me missing something. Any help.
Have you tried wipe the problem and install the latets Theta stitcher again? Sound like it is an old program you need to update
@@hughhouThank you for responding. It is the newest version, I checked. I'll give reinstalling a try, if this doesn't work, do you have any other suggestions. Thank you again.
Would love to see a DLSR tutorial. Sure hope I can get by not buying a $3650 lens though :P. Hoping I can get by with the QooCam for photo and video as I learn more. Still think the Theta Z1 is king of virtual tours for one shot cameras?
Yes, Z1 is still the King. You can use any lens BTW, I will have a tutorial to show you how coming up. I just use Entaniya as I am lazy - want to minimize shooting and not worry about Nadar and Zeinth :)
@@hughhou Looking forward to it! :) What do you think is the recommended minimum degrees fisheye lens for 360 photo? 180 degrees?
Any lens will work - you just need to take more photos
Im on BIg Sur and Im unabel to locate the application support plist folder. I do however find it under 'show package contents' under the actual folder for the stitcher. BUT! the script you show is not there. Any ideas?
Try re-install it and check again?
I actually didn’t need to change script. It just worked.
Hi Hugh, I can't find the tutorial recommended at 17:40. Please help. Thanks
Great video! The latest version of theta stitcher for pc version 2.20.1 doesn't allow this work around. You add the time file and then it asks you for dng file followed by an error message. Any ideas on this?
When I HDR merge bracketed photos for my Insta360 X3 in Affinity Photo it looks good. However, when I export to jpeg as best quality the highlights are blown out. Please can you help me?
Did you pull the highlight down first?
@@hughhou Hi yes. It looks fine in the app. But the problem is when exported.
Using the 2021 version of the Stitcher....I cannot locate the plist file on my MAC to make the stitcher work as a standalone.
Cheaper and easier to use too.... BUT - I also use GIMP - specifically for sharpening the photos - and GIMP is free :)
Thanks for the tips!
Maybe I missed a step but could use some guidance. I installed the stitcher app, modified the .ini file (windows), opened and exported a DNG as a 16bit tiff file in the same directory. When I drag the tiff file to the Stitcher.exe it asks for the location of the DNG file and when I select it nothing happens, the stitcher app never opens and there are no errors or warnings and nothing in the logs. Any ideas?
Thanks, the video is amazing just wished it would work for me.
Awesome one. You think you could add the Theta stitcher as a plugin for affinity like you did for topaz? I'd like to see the dslr tutorial too. You the man.
Not working that way now but sure the workflow will get easier soon :) I will continue to make tutorial if anything change :)
Oh, now i see a previous reply answers my question - thank you.
Hi Hugh - this text edit does not seem to work anymore? Any ideas? I still get asked to open up lightroom
Thanks a lot for your inspiring uploads. 🙏😉 would it be possible to work with 360 photo in iPad version also? 🤔
Yes!
Perfect. 👍 if you post at video on how to work in iPad version too, I'll become an even bigger fan. 🙏😁
I willl work on it. Getting a new iPad for Christmas lol
@@hughhou Perfect thanks. 🙏👍 not much Christmas surprise for you. 😁 happy Christmas. 🎄🤶🎅 greeting from Denmark. 🇩🇰
[Updated 12-8-2020] Setup Ricoh Theta Stitcher as a standalone application
💡MAC:
Location - Macintosh HD/User/Library/Application Support/RICOH THETA/RicohthetaStitcher.plist
💡PC/Windows:
C:/User/[YourUserName]/AppData/Roaming/RICOH/RICOH THETA/RicohthetaStitcher.ini
ADD the following codes at the BEGINNING:
[debug]
ENABLE_LAUNCH_EXC_LR=1
Credit: Yuqing Guo
Also do not double click on the app to launch it, it will reset your plist changes and not allow you to edit.. Drag and Drop image.. Drag and Drop Image.. did I say that twice :) I found a lot of people ran into this issue fyi.
@Ryan Mitchley did you make the text changes and did you drag the image onto the icon vs double clicking the app to launch?
If you opened up the app by double clicking on it you need to make the text changes again.. only drag the image onto the icon
@@IBareItAll Great feedback thank you Steve! I made that same mistakes many many time. Affinity Photo work faster on my PC with multi-thread so I use Z1 Stitcher on PC - lucky PC does not do that.
@Ryan Mitchley It should NOT be. You don't need LR for this. You need to DRAG AND DROP the file on top of the EXE file to open it. Also, you need to be in latest Theta Stitcher.
awesome video - very instructive
but it doesn't work for qoocams 8k :( someone has already tried it? some FW number when it works thank you
What do you mean does not work for Qoocam 8K? It work on any DNG or JPG - does not matter what camera you use :)
@@hughhou I added
[debug]
ENABLE_LAUNCH_EXC_LR = 1
to the RICOH THETA Stitcher.ini file
and then I tried to insert a tiff, jpg and dng image but nothing still throws a window where he wants the dng extension but he can't open it here
Thanks for your supper hard work
Yes please 3dvista 👍
You got it - working on that :)
Could you make a Workflow with Insta360 x2?????,... PLEASSEEEEE
Sure!
@@hughhou WOW!!! Thanks!!!
dslr&fisheye lens pleassssse ..
It is planned :)
Yes please to 3D Vista
Will soon!
thanks for the video . I couldnt finish it cause it keeps loading. all other videos on youtube loads at 720 or 1080 by default except yours. 144p !
But mine is a 4K video :(
Professional 360 photo ONLY by FULL FRAME cam+lens (fish-eye)+pano head+stitching soft (PTGUI is best). This cams in 360 photo are toys and low amateur quality. Especially Theta.
What's your opinion about pano5+1 and gopro hero for 360 photo shots?
What is Pano5+1? GoPro Hero is not for 360 photo - you better off use Z1.
@@hughhou ok thank you 🙏 I just want to get more resolution with cheap price
The Affinity Photos is not free. Am I wrong?
Yes, but very cheap compared to Photoshop.
@@hughhou Thanks for your answer :)
3D Vista, please!
Hi Hugh can I see your 3D Vista video
my guy,I skip any program that has no purchase option, Affinity Photo it is not an alternative but competition.
Glad to know. There are some free solution as well but Affinity just save time. Photoshop I still have the older version which work great - just don't update - honestly who need all those new fancy features Photoshop recently has lol
@@hughhou yep
👍🏼🙌🏼
🙏 THX
bolioooo boli sda min zailaacheee ywtsguu muu har al
Hi Hugh and thank you for this tutorial. I'm trying to compare the result of the 2 workflow you've documented : adobe vs affinity.
So I try to use a HDR-DNG file (shoot as you told us here : ua-cam.com/video/hg1m-GlYnuI/v-deo.html). But when I open it in Affinity, it goes wrong (and magenta in fact). Can Affinity open HDR-DNG file from Z1 (and not only the normal DNG-file)?
Do we have to convert it first ? with Adobe DNG converter ? (I've done it and I could open the file with Affinity... but I don't know if I lost informations...)
Thank you for your lights you spread on us !
Sorry forgot to mention in the tutorial. This is not for HDR workflow. Dual fisheye for HDR generate different DNG RAW type current has a bug in Affinity Photo. Until they or Dual Fisheye fix it - you need extra step of using any LR alternative (free) to convert the DNG to regular DNG before Affinity Photo.
Yes you need to convert it using FREE lightroom alternative raw development and cataloging app - www.darktable.org - it should work! DNG ver.1.4 is not support in Affinity Photo yet.
I appreciate the effort but can unly understand about 1/2 the words
Awww - try to turn on caption - it might help.
I like your content but please work on pronunciation