1. A method of improving quality of a panoramic image comprising: utilizing a panoramic camera with a quadric reflector to capture a panoramic scene including a real-world object; the quadric reflector distorting light striking an image sensor imposing an annular optical gradient on the real-world object; the image sensor converting the light into a digitally encoded electronic signal, wherein the converting is an analog to digital transformation of the image that is effected by the annular optical gradient from the quadric reflector, wherein the annular optical gradient causes a non-uniform distribution of image detail per square unit of the light striking the image sensor; defining a fixed smoothing function based on sensor geometry of the image sensor, on a pixel degradation curve, or on a combination of the image sensor and the pixel degradation curve, wherein the fixed smoothing function is specific to hardware used by the panoramic camera; creating a donut image from the digital encoded electronic signal, where the donut image has an aspect ratio divergent from that of the real-world object; converting the donut image into a stereographic image having an aspect ratio approximately equivalent to that of the real world object; and applying the smoothing function to modify the stereographic image so that the modified image shows substantially uniform image detail per image region.