Making your own time lapse systems

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Paramvir Singh
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Making your own time lapse systems

Post by Paramvir Singh »

Shooting Time lapse is an exciting pat of cinematography and the results are always fascinating to watch. In the institute, we have the excellent Mitchells for a wonderful range of time lapse work with deadly accurate pin registration and manual frame rate control. (I remember we had started the whole process of creating film titles on my old PowerBook Pismo, then shooting the files one frame at a time on the trusted old mitchell, and got breathtaking results. Who needs film recording?)

This is a wonderful artcle on creating your own time lapse setup (especially since you will hardly find a mitchell or leave alone an intervalometer in Mumbai).Read here.
If your curiosity has been piqued, try your hand at time-lapse photography. All it takes is a digital camera (consumer cameras work fine) and a method for exposing a frame on an interval. The Canon Powershot line of consumer cameras, among others, has a built-in interval timer controlled from the camera's menus. With that ability, you don't need anything else except a tripod to take a series of time-lapse photos. Then assemble the frames into a movie using QuickTime Pro or the equivalent.

One note of caution: Beware of battery failure! A consumer camera will run for just a few hours on a standard battery. An external power supply is a necessary investment. Motorcycle batteries, for example, run a camera for several days without failing.

With the right vantage point, a time-lapse camera system, and enough storage, you too can make time fly with professional-looking results.
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