Patent ID: 8368720

Claim:
A method, comprising: generating, by one or more computing devices, a panoramic image file for rendering a panoramic image of a scene from two or more input component images, wherein said generating the panoramic image file comprises: automatically generating image alignment information for the two or more component images, wherein the image alignment information indicates how each of the component images is positioned relative to the other component images in the panoramic image; automatically generating at least one blend mask for the component images, wherein a blend mask is generated for each component image that is in front of at least one other component image in the panoramic image, and wherein each blend mask indicates how a respective component image is to be blended with at least one other component image that is behind the respective component image in the panoramic image; generating at least one adjustment layer for the component images, wherein each adjustment layer indicates an adjustment to correct for an exposure difference between a respective component image and the other component images in the panoramic image; and storing the image alignment information, the two or more component images, the at least one blend mask, and the at least one adjustment layer in the panoramic image file, wherein the two or more component images, the at least one adjustment layer, and the at least one blend mask are each stored as a separate layer of a layer stack in the panoramic image file; wherein said generating a panoramic image file does not modify the two or more input component images stored as separate layers in the layer stack.