What is the definition of a panoramic photograph?
A panoramic photograph (also referred to as a panorama) is an image with at least a 2:1 aspect ratio. It captures a field of view comparable to what the human eye can capture while still maintaining detail across the entire picture.

How do you make panoramic photographs?
You can use a dedicated panoramic camera which professional panographers believe is best for this purpose. You can also shoot a series of images on a standard format camera and join them together using a Digital Stitching technique.

Panoramic Cameras
There are three types of panoramic cameras: Flatback, Swing Lens and Rotational. Popular Flatback cameras include Hasselblad XPan, Fuji GX617, Horseman 612 Pro, Linhof Technorama 612, and Linhof Technorama 617. Swing Lens Cameras have a swing lens with a narrow slit that moves across the film. Noblex 135S, Noblex 150FS, Horizon 202, Eyescan 624, and Widespan Pro 140 are some of the popular Swing Lens cameras in the market. Rotational cameras such as Seitz Rounshot and Globuscope are able to produce images of 360 degrees.

Digital Stitching
Digital stitching is a technique of shooting a series of pictures to show a scene that the human eye captures. The scenes are 'stitched' together with the help of digital software, making a smooth and seamless panorama that imitates images created by panoramic cameras.

Digital stitching can be done manually one-by-one to produce more creative effects, or by using the automatic merge options in software packages, an example of which is the Photomerge tool in Adobe Photoshop.

Software options include Photoshop or specially designed packages for creating panoramas such as PhotoVista, Panorama Maker, Picture Publisher, PanaVue Image Assembler and Panorama Factory.