Issue with Photomerge in CS5

[rlriii13]

Have you used any Lens correction before transferring to CS5? In my opinion this looks a lot like a vignetting problem on the individual photos.

No lens correction was applied. I have been using the Photomerge option to remove vignetting.

Also I assume that you used manual focus on all of the shots. No changes in between?

I was definitely in autofocus. If I get to reshoot, I'll do everything I can manually and keep them consistent through the shots. I've merged shots with autofocus before without issues though, so I didn't worry about it when I was shooting the first time. Could that be contributing to my problems?

Your pc gives an error when trying the 6-shot panorama? Or does it just deliver bad results.

No error, just subpar results.

A few years back I found that Microsoft Research's ICE (Image Composite Editor) did the best stitching by far of anything I had access to. It can't hurt to try it out.

Thanks for the recommendation David. I know there are other options out there, but I've been using Photoshop for panos for a while and this has never happened before, so I guess I'm just playing detective now. I want to know why! I'm fooleshly hoping someone else has gone through my pain and knows exactly one small, easy change that will solve everything. (Also, forums are a great historical troubleshooting guide. If a solution is found, it could likely help others in the future.)