A Timelapse with my 1Dm4 - DPChallenge Forums

09/01/2011 10:53:45 PM · #1

I had nothing to do except go pick up a jacket I forgot at work downtown. Instead of beating myself up for ruining what was suppose to be a 'sit on the coach and watch season 3 of The Big Bang Theory' day, I decided to make the best of it and take my camera out for some time-lapse fun.

Osaka : Umeda Time Lapse

A side note: The opening title was actually the longest I've ever spent on a 'title'. If any of you are After Effects fans, you'll understand the 'render error' issue is a PAIN and a HEADACHE!

I plan on doing much more, hopefully of the Kansai region.

Let me know what you think.

Melethia

Canon EOS-80D

Sony 24-70mm F4 Vario-Tessar T* FE OSS

09/01/2011 10:57:49 PM · #2

VERY nice! I really enjoyed that! Can you provide some details? Is this "video" or a series of single exposures? How long and how long inbetween exposures? I trust you were tripod mounted, so the panning down - how did you achieve that so smoothly? How big of a card did you need for this?

What fun! So glad you forgot your jacket!

Bear_Music

Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra

09/01/2011 11:25:42 PM · #3

You know what blows my mind? The number of young men wearing short-sleeved, white shirts and black slacks... Lovely work, heavy guy.

R.

salmiakki

Apple iPhone 16 Pro

Sony Sonnar T* 35mm F2.8 ZA

09/01/2011 11:37:00 PM · #4

That's excellent - really well done. You must have spent a lot of time putting it together. Like Deb, I'd love to know the technical stuff, like how many exposures etc.

Message edited by author 2011-09-01 23:37:29.

ShutterRev

09/01/2011 11:38:36 PM · #5

That was fantastic! Can't wait to see more.

tanguera

Nikon D750

Nikon AF-S Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8D IF-ED

09/02/2011 01:18:09 AM · #6

Fabulous!

09/02/2011 01:23:18 AM · #7

For the technical portion:

These are all from still images.

Things you'll need:

Your camera (duh)
A couple of memory cards (Depending on what you're shooting and how much of it you want to work with)
A sturdy tripod
An intervalometer: The one I used is Canon's TC80N3 Timer Remote Control. It's more expensive and there are plenty of 25 dollar timers on ebay.
Your lens (Or lenses) of choice (I shot almost everything at 17mm)
Plenty of water (To keep yourself hydrated)
An ipod/iphone full of music and games (You need something to kill the time).

Find your scene: First, turn off auto-white balance as it can shift with the color temperature and cause a flicker in the images that isn't pretty). Manually set EVERYTHING: White balance, ISO, shutter-speed, aperture, FULL MANUAL. You don't want any of these to change as, again, it can cause image flickers. Once you've composed your shot, switch to manual focus so that the lens doesn't search for anything (Again, to avoid flicker).

Shoot in jpeg to start (This is only a personal opinion) so that you can get use to work timelapse stuff. Then move onto shooting RAW giving you more information to work with in post.

Turn off your 'display image' so that you can conserve power while shooting.

Take a test shot to make sure you like your composition.

In order to get that nice smooth timelapse, you're going to have to drag your shutter. This means a shutter speed of 1 or 2 seconds. Doing it faster will give it a different look (Not as smooth). Even at 1 second, with the lowest ISO and an aperture of f22, you might be over-exposed. That's where you bring in your ND Filters. I have a couple of vari-ND filters.

From some timelapse experts I've been told to keep your aperture all the way open (So on my 17-40 4L I had it set at f/4 all the time). Making those ND filters more necessary. You can play around with this. I haven't noticed much of a change.

With your timer hooked into your camera (Nikon owners, I think you have the intervalometer built-in, at least the D700 does), you can set your timer to take X amount of pictures ever X amount of seconds. I set mine to take 1 picture every 2 seconds. You can play around with this and get different results.

When you create a timelapse (At least the ones I've enjoyed) they usually play at 24 or 30 frames per second. That means every 24-30 shots is equal to only 1 second of video. Thus the need for entertainment while you're watching over your camera.

The easiest way to make the actual timelapse is to use Quicktime. File-Import Image Sequence. Go to where you have your images and click on the first one. It will import all the images that come after that. It's important to note that it will import in numerical order so if you delete even 1 photo in the sequence, it will import only up to that photo (As far as I know). When I capture one scene I'll stop the camera, move to another place, take a couple of test photos and then delete them when I've got things right. This separates and makes things easier to edit later on.

When Quicktime makes the image sequence it will be about 4x that of Hi-Def (So it won't play on your monitor). You have to downsize the video to play it. BUT, this is where you can have fun...

Instead of using Quicktime, you can do the same with Adobe After Effects. When the sequence is in the time line, it still only shows high def but instead of downsizing them, you can do panning, zoom out, zoom in, etc because the file size is so big resolution wise. And you won't lose any quality in the picture/video. So all the pan and zoom effects are done in After Effects tell it to start showing 1920-1080 on the left side and then slowly move to the right side over the course of X seconds.

I'm sure there are plenty of good tutorials out there for timelapse. Day to night or night to day timelapse is a little more difficult due to exposure changes. Astro-timelapse is wonderful. Here's a good example of someone who knows what he's doing (He's also using special motorized dollies etc for the movement of his shots) check out his trailer though, absolutely stunning.

TimeScapes: Rapture

Melethia

Canon EOS-80D

09/02/2011 02:04:25 AM · #8

Thanks so much for all of that! I don't know that I have the time (or equipment!) to try it, but I'd sure like to. And that link? Awesome stuff. Really amazing!

Art Roflmao

Canon EOS-6D Mark II

Sony Sonnar T* 35mm F2.8 ZA

09/02/2011 02:11:52 AM · #9

Phenomenal! After I watched the opening title, I though "well it's gonna be tough to beat that!" but the video was fantastic!

Thanks for the complete info! I bought a cheapo interval timer for my 7D off ebay and haven't done much with it, but I think I have to give this a shot. Biggest challenge looks like it will be with my A.D.D! :)

btw, I hate Vimeo - I have yet to watch a Vimeo vid that doesn't stutter all the way through - as was the case with both videos you posted. I wonder if anyone else has that issue. No probs with YouTube.

salmiakki

Apple iPhone 16 Pro

09/02/2011 05:43:48 AM · #10

Thanks for the info, that is awesome. So the Nikon built in intervalometer only goes up to 999 images, is that enough do you think for a very short video?

Canon EF 17-40mm f/4.0L USM

09/02/2011 07:21:32 AM · #11

Originally posted by salmiakki:

Thanks for the info, that is awesome. So the Nikon built in intervalometer only goes up to 999 images, is that enough do you think for a very short video?

My timer only goes to 99 but it will just keep on shooting. I think it's the same with the Nikon cameras.

When doing video, especially short videos transition from one scene to another, keeping them about 4-6 seconds in length is good. So that's about 100-150 per scene. If you go beyond that you'll have a whole lot more video to work with to do pans and zooms. If it really does go to 999 only: Stop it when you feel you've got the shot and then restart it on your next shot.

JonoTucker

Canon EOS-5D Mark III

09/02/2011 08:13:32 AM · #12

I love it

cgino

Nikon D810

Nikon AF-S Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 G ED

09/02/2011 12:35:51 PM · #13

Fantastic! Thanks very much for sharing it.

Tiny

Apple iPad mini 4

09/02/2011 12:48:32 PM · #14

Great stuff,thanks for that.

DrAchoo

Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5

Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6

09/02/2011 12:51:18 PM · #15

Am I imagining it or can you tether your camera to a netbook or laptop and use that as an intervalometer? I'm planning on doing this at the next Ducks game. I did a practice at Old Faithful a few weeks ago and it came out ok, but it was windy so it's a bit jumpy. I did without an intervalometer by taking 1 second exposures every...1 second (I just used the wireless remote and set it to continuous).

tholmir

Canon EOS-400D Rebel XTi

09/02/2011 01:07:56 PM · #16

Originally posted by heavyj:

In order to get that nice smooth timelapse, you're going to have to drag your shutter. This means a shutter speed of 1 or 2 seconds. Doing it faster will give it a different look (Not as smooth).

Could you please expand on that?
Is it to get the moving people/objects blurry?

DrAchoo

Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5

Pentax DA 18-135mm F3.5-5.6ED AL [IF] WR DC

09/02/2011 01:17:31 PM · #17

And another question related to tholmir. Did you do a 1 second exposure every 2 seconds for this piece or did you do 2 second exposure every 2 seconds?

tnun

Ricoh GR III

09/02/2011 01:55:52 PM · #18

Lovely piece of work. Nice sharing of the MO.

Strikeslip

Canon EOS-5D

Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS

09/02/2011 02:12:56 PM · #19

Wow, that's sweet!

robs

Canon EOS R6 Mk II

09/02/2011 03:03:45 PM · #20

That's really great... and thanx for the info. These have been on my list to try for a long time.

Q: What is that music playing.... I like it but cannot place the singer.