Why photos fail to align, and the fix
Zoom Buzz builds a zoom by finding the same scene in every photo you upload, then lining them up. When it cannot find that scene with enough confidence, it stops rather than render something wrong. This is what causes that, worked through with the same rules the alignment help page gives you at the moment it happens.
What a set that aligns actually has in common
Every photo in a working set shares four things: the same subject, roughly the same standing position, a frame that shows a little more or a little less of the scene than its neighbours, and a subject that is sharp and visible in every shot. The St Pancras, Musée d'Orsay and Eiffel Tower sets all hold to this, which is exactly why they align cleanly.
The four real causes of a failed alignment
A different place, or a different day. A photo of a different scene, even one that looks similar, gives Zoom Buzz nothing to match against the rest of the set.
A change of position between shots. Walking between photos, even a step or two, shifts near and far objects against each other from the camera's new angle. The photos stop describing the same view, and the gap grows with distance walked.
A subject or a scene that changed. A cloud crossing the sky behind your detail, a person who was standing in front of it a moment ago, or the light shifting hard between the first photo and the last, can all move what Zoom Buzz is trying to track.
Too big a jump between two zoom levels. The three-times rule: go much more than three times closer in a single step and the closer photo can end up sharing no visible detail with the one before it, so there is nothing left to line up between them.
The fix, in order
- Find the odd one out. It is usually one photo, not the whole set: the one of a different subject, or the one taken from a different spot.
- Remove it, if the rest still connects. A set of five that loses one weak photo often still runs cleanly from wide to close.
- Add a bridging shot, if removing it leaves a gap. A photo framed between your closest and your widest reconnects the two, following how many photos a smooth zoom needs.
- Reshoot from a single session, feet planted. A fresh set taken in one go, from one spot, with the subject near the middle of every frame, avoids all four causes at once.
Try again
Once you have fixed the set, upload it again from your zoom's page. There is no separate step: the same upload and Make Zoom flow the how-to-create-a-zoom guide walks through handles a retry exactly like a first attempt.
Full details on each cause, and what to try, are also on the alignment help page, which this article expands on.