Wednesday 27 October 2010

How to shoot a time-lapse video

This is a tutorial on how to shoot a time-lapse video.
All the goodies are after the jump:



Ok, let's start from the middle:

I only shot time-lapse with Nikon cameras, so I'm gonna talk about Nikon here. If you have a different camera, you can still read this article, but for more info, you have to check the camera's user manual, or google your question.

Also, DISCLAIMER: I'm not exactly a pro. I'm usually pretty good in this stuff, but I could be wrong, because I never studied about time-lapses, or even photography. I self-tought myself, and there could be better ways to do things, but these were working for me, and got the job done.

I just want to share my "discoveries" for people like me, because if I would have read this article before I started the time-lapse shootings, I wouldn't have had so many headaches, and trial-and-errors.




Short Time-Lapse:

By short I mean sunset, or clouds in the sky, or something that doesn't require you to leave your camera out for days, and it's easily accessible if you need to change battery, or memory card.
What you will need:
I know that the D200 and D700 does interval timer shooting, but the D100 doesn't have that function. With the D100, you need to use a remote shutter cable that can do interval timer shooting. You can check yours by going in MENU > SHOOTING MENU > INTERVAL TIMER SHOOTING. (It's the last menupoint on the D700 and D200)
Next is to put your camera on the tripod, frame your subject, then:

MENU > SHOOTING MENU > INTERVAL TIMER SHOOTING. (make sure you are not on Live View mode on the D700, because that disables the interval timer shooting)
Choose start time: you can either start sooting right now, or set up a delay.
Interval: Here you can set the interval between the exposures. If there is a lot of motion, and changes in what you shoot, you might want to have a 1-5 second interval, or if you shoot like a sunset, or clouds, you can have maybe 5-20 second. It also depends on how long you want the footage to be and how fast. If you play them back 24 frames per second, you will have to have 1,440 frames to have 1 minute of footage. A calculator comes handy at this point.
Select intvls X no. of shots: You can set the camera to do up to 999 intervals, and up to 9 shot in an interval (that's basically 9 shots straight after each other)
Start: select ON and press OK to to start shooting.

There are a couple of things to look out for:


Autofocus: Don't use autofocus. just set your focus manually and leave it. When the camera autofocuses, it always changes a tiny-little bit, and because focusing is done by moving the elements in the lens, it can change the focal length just a bit, which will result in some in-out jumping in the compiled footage.

Shutter, ISO and aperture: You should never shoot time-lapse in P(rogram) or S(hutter-priority auto). If you use these settings, your aperture will change from shot to shot, and so does your depth of field. This result in some unwanted flicker, and is very distractng. Do not use auto ISO. Use M(anual) mode, set your exposure, and there you go. Or, you can use A(perture priority auto) if you MUST. like when the light on your subject changes, like goes from daylight to night, or when there is blue sky with nice fluffy clouds, which sometimes cover the sun, sometimes not. One important thing, is if you shoot inside, by incandescent light, don't use fast shutter speeds. The incandescent light flashes on and off 50 times a second. That's fast enough to be invisible to the eye, but if you shoot with faster than about 1/100 shutter speed, sometimes you will catch the moment when the incandescent bulb is "off", which results in flicker, which we don't want.

Picture Quality: I always shoot time-lapses in jpg, fine quality. If you plan to tilt, pan or zoom in post-production, use large jpgs. If you don't plan to do such things, the smallest jpg is just a tiny bit bigger than full HD footage (1080x1920), so that will be enough. I don't recommend that though, just in case if you need to crop the frame later, or something.

The 999 limit: I think it's just dumb to limit the shots, but whatever. When the camera reaches 999 you have to re-start shooting.

Battery: The D200 drained the batteries every 1,5 - 2 hours. The D700 lasted for 3 - 4 hours.

Camera Movement: You can buy or make special motorised dollies for shooting time-lapse. I never used one, but there are good tips around the interwebs. (Like this guy. I spoke to him once, and he is awesome!) Make sure you don't change the position of the camera or tripod without these dollies, because it will look quite bad when you put together the footage. just stay in one spot.

Tip: When I change battery, I also re-set the timer shooting (Go into the Interval timer shooting menu, select OFF and press OK. Turn the camera off, change battery, turn it on, and start the thing again.) In this way I don't have to worry about the 999 limit.




Long Time-Lapse:
So, this is for the projects like shooting a construction site, or things that require you to leave your camera out for days, moths, or even longer.

What you need to know:

Autofocus: Don't use autofocus. just set your focus manually and leave it. When the camera autofocuses, it always changes a tiny-little bit, and because focusing is done by moving the elements in the lens, it can change the focal length just a bit, which will result in some in-out jumping in the compiled footage.

Shutter, ISO and aperture: You should never shoot time-lapse in P(rogram) or S(hutter-priority auto). If you use these settings, your aperture will change from shot to shot, and so does your depth of field. This result in some unwanted flicker, and is very distractng. Do not use auto ISO. Use M(anual) mode, set your exposure, and there you go. Or, you can use A(perture priority auto) if you MUST. like when the light on your subject changes, like goes from daylight to night, or when there is blue sky with nice fluffy clouds, which sometimes cover the sun, sometimes not. One important thing, is if you shoot inside, by incandescent light, don't use fast shutter speeds. The incandescent light flashes on and off 50 times a second. That's fast enough to be invisible to the eye, but if you shoot with faster than about 1/100 shutter speed, sometimes you will catch the moment when the incandescent bulb is "off", which results in flicker, which we don't want.

Power Source: You need to hook up your camera to external power. This can be either big battery packs, or a DC power adapter. Or, if you are like me, crazy and crazy, and a littlebit crazy too, (and also skin) you can go with the no-budget option.

File Storage: You will probably need to store thousands of photos. I shot a time-lapse once with more than 120,000 shots. That was crazy. You can either buy a massive memorycard, or connect your camera to a computer to store the photos. Like a laptop with an external hard drive. The computer is necesarry anyways, because you need to overcome the 999 limit.

The 999 limit: You can buy a remote shutter which has unlimited time-lapse function, or go with the no-budget option and make one yourself. But I think the best way to do this is to hook up your camera to a laptop. It can be any crappy laptop as long as it can run a camera control application, and has a USB port.

The software: You will need a program on the laptop to control the camera, and to download the pictures. There are more than enough of these out there. I used Camera Control Pro for Windows (because I didn't want to leave my MBP outside for a month) and it worked well, as long as the good old Windows NT didn't freeze.

A Box. (or something like that) Important. I just took a big blue bread-basket, cut a hole on it for the lens, lined it with a plastic thing to make it water-proof, but i left holes to have some airflow. The basket was big enough to fit the laptop, an 500GB external hard drive, the camera, and the power adapters in. Then I put a plastic sheet on top, which I could open to access the stuff, and hung it up 80 feet high in the air, with a power cord connected to the thing. Worked like a charm! There are lots of other ways to do it as well. You can figure it out.

Picture Quality: I always shoot time-lapses in jpg, fine quality. If you plan to tilt, pan or zoom in post-production, use large jpgs. If you don't plan to do such things, the smallest jpg is just a tiny bit bigger than full HD footage(1080x1920), so that will be enough. I don't recommend that though, just in case if you need to crop the frame later, or something.

Camera Movement: You can buy or make special motorised dollies for shooting time-lapse. I never used one, but there are good tips around the interwebs. (Like this guy. I spoke to him once, and he is awesome!). Make sure you don't change the position of the camera without these dollies, because it will look quite bad when you put together the footage. If you shoot a long time-lapse it can get boring (depends on subject) if you stay in one spot. Maybe you can change angle every day, or spice your final edit up with some close-ups, or better yet, have a second camera shoot diffrernt angles, or close-ups of stuff. Really, it depends on what you shoot.

What you need to do:
  • Get an extension lead that has 3 or more plugs. You will need to plug in the computer, the camera, and the external drive.
  • Put your stuff in the box (or tent, or whatever) and make sure you can access the computer and the camera. (in case you need to re-start them, or something)
  • Go to your location and find the best angle. You can set up your gear there. Make sure you are not gonna be in the way, for example if it's a construction site.
  • Make sure that you protect your gear against the weather if you shoot outside. I was told that it's a good idea to put the stuff in a little tent, but I just used a box.
  • Make sure you have a reliable power source. Find an outlet which will be always on, or buy massive battery packs. (Where I shot my big time-lapse, there was only temporary power coming from diesel generators, so I had to ask which one is gonna run 24/7. I plugged like 5 extension leads together to make it long enough to reach between the generator and the camera, and I taped down every plug, so nobody can unplug it, and also the workers were briefed about the project, so they knew they have to leave my gear alone.)
  • Make sure you do everything to protect your gear from being stolen. It's common sense.
  • Plug everything together, frame your shot, set your settings.
  • Fire up the computer and start yuor camera control program. In Camera Control Pro, you have to set where to download the pics (your external HD) under Tools > Download Options. To start shooting, go to Camera > Time Lapse Photography. There you set the interval, and make sure you tick "Shoot until cancelled" and UNtick "AF before each shot".
  • That's it!
One tip is that you can download your photos and start editing while you shoot, it this way you can save lots of time. Just make sure you don't move the camera while you fiddle around with the computer.




Compiling the Footage:


There are more than one ways to do it, I'm only gonna write down the one I used:

Adobe After Effects: Easy. This is the only method I used. (CS4) You create a new project, and go File > Import. In the Import window, you will have to navigate to your jpgs. You select the first pic, select to import it as footage, and tick "force alphabetical order", press OK. You will see your imported jpg sequence on the left in AE. Drag the imported thing onto the timeline, right click > transform > fit to comp width. Go File > Add to render queue. Set your preferred settings, and saving path, then press Render. Yaay! done. You can then import your footage to premier pro and spice it up with some music.

There you have it! I hope you find these instructions useful, and if you know better ways of doing stuff, you can say it in the comments!

No comments:

Post a Comment