Take a look at the video above. This was taken by Papadoplas while on the Seoul City Bus Tour.
Living in Korea, we have a rare opportunity to see one of the most dynamic cultures in the world. I think that time lapse photography would be to show the vibrance and energy of this country. So how do you do it and what do you need?
Fist of all you need a tripod. Just like HDR, you need something to hold your camera stead as you will be taking a series of shots in succession and the final result will be too shaky if you try and hand-hold it. Next, for a DSLR you need a timer release or intervalometer. You can can use a regular release but remember you are going to be taking a lot of shots and even shooting at a ratio of 1 shot a second. your thumb will get tired after a while.
Timer releases (Intervalometer) can be picked up off of Gmarket for cheap or the real deal for much more . These devises will help you set your times and the amount of shots that you want to take. This means that you can sit back and let your camera do the rest. Make sure to keep everything in manual as you don’t want your camera readjusting after every shot. This will make your final movie look a little strange as things will get lighter or darker, the white balances may change… etc. Just take a sample shot (use jpeg, not raw), set your white balance and everything. Then fire away.
Afterwards, assemble your shots in Quicktime Pro or iMovie. You can also batch edit them in Photoshop before, but it will add a lot of time to the process. Then add some funky music and create the final cut of your movie.
Photojojo has a great and in depth guide to time-lapse
Also Wikipedia has the more detailed article on time lapse and how it all works.
Now if you want to try this on the cheap, then I suggest that you check out Griffin Stewart’s page on how to make HD time lapse video with your iPhone for under $15. Β This is a very detailed explanation of everything that you need to get started.
Now for a bit of eye candy. This next video was taken in my former home of Vancouver and it is simply amazing… I would love to see this done in Seoul… Also check out their Youtube page for more of TimeLapseHD’s amazing work
Here is another great one from Sean Smith who commented below. It is exactly what I am talking about. Great Work Sean!
shinchon timelapse from Sean Smith on Vimeo.
SEan
I made my first time-lapse video a month ago at sinchon station http://vimeo.com/19014485
Jason Teale
Sean I think that you did a great job on this one. I just put it into the post above because I think it is really good!
SEan
Jason,
thanks for adding it to your post. If your readers have trouble buying from Gmarket you can get one from ebay, which is what i did. I got this on It was a little slow on the delivery, but cheap and does exactly what you need.
KODOS
Wow! That’s awesome.
I want to try it later.
Simon
We’ve been shooting a bunch of time-lapse footage for the past few months. Trying to compile it into a cool video.
Kinda sucks setting up the intervalometer overnight, though, because it’s noisy.
Jason Teale
I am going to try and give it a shot very soon. Well, as soon as I get my Macbook fixed so that I can is the USB ports again… π
If your time-lapse vid is even half as good as your regular vids, I will be eagerly awaiting the final compilation.
Griffin
Great article as always and thanks for the mention. Updated the post to link to this article as well:
http://bit.ly/dQaykp
Keep up the great work and as always, thanks for sharing and inspiring!