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Hugin Changelog

What's new in Hugin 2013.0..0

Jan 8, 2014
  • Changes Since 2012.0.0:
  • The greatest change is the redesign of the (Graphical) User Interface (GUI). The user interface now consists of three modes: Simple, Advanced and Expert. The Simple interface is for the beginning panorama photographer and offers all tools to create your panorama. You can also use this mode if you have a simple, straightforward panorama. The Simple interface mode uses the "Fast Preview" window as its main workflow window. The Advanced interface mode offers you more options to improve your panorama. It uses the Panorama Editor as its main window. The Expert mode gives you access to all options and functions that Hugin has to offer. This is where you can optimize your complicated, multilayer, mosaic, multi-stack, you name it, panorama. It also uses the Panorama Editor as its main window.
  • The Hugin build for Mac OS X has switched from Carbon to Cocoa and is now fully 64bit.
  • New tools added:
  • pto_var ( change image variables inside pto files)
  • pto_lensstack (modify assigned lenses and stack in pto files)
  • geocpset (set/add geometric constraints for multirow panorama with featureless images)
  • Other Improvements:
  • Many more improvements and bug fixes.
  • Languages:
  • Most of the translations have been updated for this release.

New in Hugin 2012.0.0 (Jan 8, 2013)

  • The lensfun library for reading and writing lens parameters from/to a database was integrated.
  • A new "pto_gen" tool for the generation of pto files from image files was added.
  • Various improvements were made to "cpfind".
  • An option to keep exposure fused stacks was added.
  • "pano_modify" gained an HDR autocrop option.
  • There were many other improvements and bugfixes.

New in Hugin 2011.2.0 (Oct 5, 2011)

  • A Python scripting interface and a Python plugin interface were added.
  • A new lens calibration tool was implemented.
  • Several other improvements were made.

New in Hugin 2011.0.0 (Jun 13, 2011)

  • Despite some known issues (see section KNOWN ISSUES below) this release brings many major new features. Hugin's own control point generator CPFind has been significantly improved; the last project from the 2010 Google Summer of Code has been integrated; many general improvements have been made.
  • Improved Built-in Control Points Generator:
  • CPFind's detection ability has been significantly improved, especially for wide angle (> FOV 65°) images, fisheye images, and rotated images. Anecdotal evidence shows it to be more accurate than any other CP detector ever used with Hugin. A thorough, scientific comparison against other CP detectors is welcome. If you have well formed comparison results, please publish a link on the Hugin mailing list.
  • Improved Fast Preview:
  • An Overview pane has been added to the Fast Preview window. Users can now interact with the panosphere like in a virtual reality viewer in real time and visualize all areas of the panorama with little distortion, including the zenith and nadir that are typically excessively distorted in the flat preview.
  • It is now possible to drag individual images or arbitrary groups of images on the panosphere in the fast preview.
  • A new gray point picker has been added for visual white balance correction.
  • Registration of Stereo Images
  • align_image_stack is commonly used for the alignment of slightly misaligned images, e.g. for creating a High Dynamic Range image from multiple exposures when the camera was hand held.
  • It has been extended with additional functionality for the registration of stereo images.
  • Other Improvements:
  • Man pages are now compressed and the generation is integrated in the CMake process (Linux/BSD/Unix).
  • New Thoby projection modeling 10.5mm Nikkor fisheye lens.
  • Improved support for some keyboard shortcuts.
  • New Preferences: output file format (LDR only).
  • This release has the usual bugfixes and adds minor features.
  • Libraries and Build Improvements:
  • CMake 2.8 or newer is now required.
  • Support has been added for gcc-4.6 compiler.
  • Libpano13 needs to be at least 2.9.18.
  • Languages:
  • Many translations have been updated for this release.

New in Hugin 2010.4.0 (Feb 14, 2011)

  • Improved Unattended Operation:
  • The Batch Processor has been improved and can now automatically detect projects.
  • The Assistant is now batchable as well, so more operations can be automated and run unattended.
  • More robust Makefiles to drive the stitching process (see Refactored Makefile Library below).
  • Improved Interaction and Functionality:
  • Masks have been extended with two new types to support stacks in the Masks tab.
  • Numeric Transform now supports translation (mosaic mode).
  • Photos are now loaded in a background thread. This means that Hugin projects can be used immediately without waiting for all the photos to be read.
  • The Stitcher tab is now rearranged with less jargon to clarify the process.
  • Better compliance with native user interface guidelines on Windows, OS X, and Linux.
  • Hints in the Preview window now suggest improvements.
  • Improved Reporting of Stitching and System Information:
  • System information is shown in About window.
  • Stitching now reports more information about the current system.
  • Stitching log can be saved for better bug reporting.
  • New Command-Line Tools:
  • cpfind is a command line interface to Hugin's native 'patent-free' control point detector.
  • icpfind uses the different control point detectors and heuristic control point detector strategies from the command line. It does not introduce new functionality; it allows running the different control points detectors with a unified command structure from the command line.
  • Refactored Makefile Library:
  • Hugin stitches panoramas by chaining together individual commands. The stitching process is driven by make, a tool known for automatically assembling software, not images. The list of targets and the commands to reproduce them are described in a declarative language called a Makefile. Hugin leverages the benefits of make for the stitching process. Makefiles make the process easy to stop and start, postpone or continue on different machines, and generally makes everything very flexible and efficient. If a panorama has been only partially edited, the Makefile ensures that only those steps that have changed are computed again. Make enables advanced application such as automated stitching and distributed stitching.
  • With this release, the stitching logic has been recreated with a new C++ library for creating Makefiles. This should enable better and more precise control over the various stitching tools and scripting of other aspects of panorama creation.
  • Libraries and Build Improvements
  • Hugin uses the wxWidgets GUI toolkit. Support has been added for wxWidgets 2.9. It is still experimental. Hugin still supports wxWidgets 2.7 and recommends 2.8.
  • Hugin defaults to saving TIFF files with LZW compression instead of PACKBITS. This requires a libtiff with LZW support.
  • On Linux/Unix systems, libraries are now installed in a private location. This simplifies things for users who want to run multiple versions of Hugin simultaneously.
  • Migration to Launchpad:
  • Tracking of bugs, patches, and features requests for Hugin has switched from SourceForge to Launchpad. Hugin's needs have outgrown the SourceForge tracker. The project is grateful to SourceForge for providing it with a nurturing infrastructure since inception. We hope that the more modern and feature-rich tracker on Launchpad will enable the project to work through the backlog of over 200 tickets and process an increasing amount of tickets more efficiently.
  • New Visuals
  • Hugin has had the same logo and icon almost since inception. Unfortunately, the source files have gone lost in time. Cristian Marchi contributed SVG files of new logo and icons that are an evolution of the original artwork by Dr. Luca Vascon. To celebrate the first feature-complete release of Hugin the project has adopted a new visual appearance. Moreover all artwork source has been collected into ./artwork-src. To facilitate contributions from graphic designers the generation of the actual buttons and icons has been streamlined and scripted.
  • Languages
  • Most of the translations have been updated for this release:
  • This release has the usual bugfixes, adds minor features, and provides some more command-line tools for scripting panorama projects.
  • Control point generators
  • Hugin ships now with its own 'Patent Free' control point generator. You can still install and configure one of the following control-point generators as 'plug-ins'

New in Hugin 2009.2.0 (Oct 2, 2009)

  • The last release in July 2009 introduced several major new features, but took a long time to arrive. This release follows quickly with the intention of tracking development better with more frequent releases, even so we still have some great new features and smaller improvements:
  • Hardware accelerated stitching:
  • Hugin ships with nona for reprojecting and distorting photos. Nona will use multiple processors in parallel on a 'multi-core' system, but now it can use the GPU of your graphics hardware instead - Potentially many times faster and freeing your computer for other tasks. This GPU accelerated stitching is still experimental and requires a modern graphics card.
  • Control point creator presets:
  • Hugin aligns images by matching features, known as 'control points'. These control points can be created manually in the Hugin Control Points tab or automatically by a 'control point creator'. Due to patent encumbrances in the USA, Hugin doesn't ship with an internal control point creator, but makes it possible to use an external tool such as Autopano-SIFT-C or Pan-o-Matic as a 'plug-in'.
  • Hugin now comes pre-configured with typical settings for common plug-ins and lets you add your own. Switching between tools is now simple - Even allowing you to match different parts of a single project with different plug-ins.
  • Exposure layer fusion:
  • Hugin uses two related tools for joining reprojected photos together. Usually any 'bracketed stacks' are first combined with enfuse into a single image using the best exposed bits from each, then these 'exposure fused' images are 'seam blended' with enblend into the final panorama.
  • This works very well, but what if your camera doesn't have a bracketing mode? In this case you have to take an entire panorama, change the EV setting, then take the panorama again, so there is no guarantee any of the shots will line up into 'stacks'. Hugin now has an extra stitching mode where photos with similar exposures are grouped and seam blended into 'layers' with enblend, then these layers are 'exposure fused' into a final panorama with enfuse.
  • Visual control points:
  • The last release introduced the Fast Preview window for manipulating the panorama visually in real-time - Coming soon to this window will be some great new features to help you manage every aspect of panorama creation.
  • This release has a taster of these new features, with a new mode to show control points in the Fast Preview window itself.
  • EXIF metadata display:
  • Photos produced by digital cameras contain useful hidden metadata such as: date taken, camera model, shutter speed, aperture and focal length. In the Images tab Hugin now displays some useful metadata for the currently selected photo.
  • Languages:
  • Most translations have been updated.
  • New version naming:
  • It is often noted that with version numbers like 0.8.0, Hugin looked like pre-release software - In reality Hugin is very usable for anyone, from holidaymakers just wanting to stitch a single panorama, to professional photographers and scientists needing a day-to-day workhorse.
  • So in practice, Hugin reached version one a long time ago. With this release we are switching to a date based system similar to many other Open Source software projects. This is the second stable release this year, so we are calling it 2009.2.0, the next stable release this year will also be even-numbered 2009.4.0 and so on. Snapshots of the development trunk would have odd-numbers, e.g. 2009.3.0.
  • Other improvements:
  • There are many more improvements to Hugin in this release: More options in the preferences, better error messages for when things do go wrong, fixes for lots of reported bugs, and better support for packagers on BSD, Linux, OS X and Windows.
  • Control point generators
  • Hugin doesn't yet ship with a 'Patent Free' control point generator. So you either need to pick control points manually - Not as difficult as it sounds - or install and configure one of the following control-point generators as 'plug-ins': autopano-sift-C; panomatic; match-n-shift; Autopano-SIFT; Autopano freeware version.

New in Hugin 0.8.0 Beta 1 (Feb 28, 2009)

  • OpenGL preview available from View -> Fast Preview
  • Celeste sky identification available in the Images tab
  • Batch processor available from File -> Batch Processor
  • New projections, including orthographic, equisolid, panini, biplane, triplane (requires libpano13-2.9.14_beta1 or later)
  • New button icons, some better than others
  • Lots of bugfixes, lots of new bugs