Time-lapse and stop motion photography.

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Has anyone made any? Put them up here!

I want to learn how to do this,
but the best camera shop where I live isn't being very helpfull, so far.
They say they are thinking about and are going to contact an enthusiast
they know, but it's taking ages!

Can anyone recommend a good site or tutorial or book?

I have a Canon 350D already, but the camera shop guy isn't sure if the separate timer you can get will let me take 1 frame per second and 1 frame per minute shots, which is basically all I need.
Again, they are still thinking!

What's your camera?

Any recommendations for a beginner?
I just want to make movies of clouds moving, flowers opening,
people moving, things decomposing, etc.
And see where my imagination takes me.

I don't know the price of the timer accessory you mentioned would be, but you might be able to get a digital camcorder with that feature built in for that price. If so, it might be easier to accomplish. The image quality might be a trade off, however. Good luck!

By the way, I really enjoyed your link to the youtube video of time lapse photography that you posted in a different thread! Another video showed a moon rise. The stars and planets were visible as well. Those who discussed the video could not figure out why some "stars" (planets) moved with the moon and others didn't! Sorry I don't have the link, but I think it was taken in Switzerland, if you want to find it.

I absolutely love this kind of documentary! I have never tried it with a photocamera only with video so far and with that very basic. Just placed the cam somewhere and started the "rec" and let it run for itself for an hour or so...then the editing program does the rest...

syzygyish How do you have in mind to do this with photography? To make a video out of photos you take without having a videocamera?
Do you mind staying in touch about this? I would love to learn more about your progress and what you learn about this. I dont know much myself but also want to learn more

Anyway, I put this thread as "watch this for replies" so I get informed if anyone gives us ideas...

Hey Guys, Thanks for the replies!
I had just about given up hope.

I am an utter beginner at this (and pretty dense and distractable),
in fact what perked my interest was the time-lapse video in the
'Post a random you-tube' thread you mentioned, Rocky. (thanx, btw! )

Woot! I've spent enough time with my head stuck in Astronomy books to think that's hilarious! I'll find that youtube and post it here!



The editing program turned it into a time-lapse ?
Do you think you could show us, xalepax?


Yes, if I can, but if I have to I'll buy a camcorder that does it.


I love to engage with and teach people, xalepax, so, certainly,
it would be my pleasure!
*bows to the lady*


I had better tear myself away from WP and start googling, hadn't I ?
I'm back to work on Monday, too.

well i started to make some time lapse videos, but a friend called sonia (irrelevant ) borrowed my (cheap) video camera and had an acute manic episode while my camera was in her custody. the camera is gone and i have not yet bought another one.


here is a time lapse video which is very grainy and low quality that i made 2 christmases ago. i was feeling very alone (not lonely though) on the day this clip was recorded. it
was christmas day in 2008 and i never saw anyone i knew that day.

i spent the day alone. "booo hooo"

but i liked it really as i did not have to bend my wits to accommodate anyone else's frame of mind.


so here is a clip of the sunset on that lonely day for me and it is a time lapse, and i played "oh come all ye faithful" only because i could not get that song out of my head once i thought of it earlier in the day.

so here is the time lapse video and maybe you should turn your headset down.


http://www.youtube.com/user/iamxb70#p/u/58/1UcC8SFW4Mk


the sound quality is not the best and the song is seriously shortened to fit the video.
good evening.

They made a movie back in the 90s called 'The Master of Space and Time'. It's a b-movie flick, with the most famous person in it a character from Star Trek (Gamesters of Triskellion) Angelique Pettyjohn (I can think of 2 reasons I like her...
The whole premise is about making a 'stop motion' film like you're talking about.

There's dozens of examples out there (Wallace and Grommet, etc).

I like stop-motion animation (Robot Chicken, Moral Orel, etc.)

I've done a bit of stop motion, you can find it on my youtube profile:

http://www.youtube.com/user/SquishypuffDave

They're all made on (horrible) Windows Movie Maker with dodgy framerates, but (a bit of) my technique comes through.

You should be able to take great time lapse photos with your 350D, and it is pretty easy to do.

What you need,
Very sturdy tripod and tripod head, you will only run into problems and get very frustrated with a cheap tripod
A laptop or netbook is what I use and what I would recommend (there are a ton of reasons this is better then using a remote with a timer)
You will need remote software for your laptop/netbook, something like this
http://www.breezesys.com/DSLRRemotePro/index.htm

If you are within reach of power and can string a extension cord it will be much easier, as you can set everything up, and keep everything pluged in. If you are shooting some place that you have to use batteries, determine with how many batteries you have, how long and how many photos you can take to be able to plan ahead what you will be able to do.
Set everything up, set your camera to shutter priority, aperature priority, or manual exposure (think carefuly on what one to use depending on what your shooting), set the white ballance to what you want, just make sure you dont use auto white ballance, set the custom function for mirror lockup, set your AF point that you want, just dont use auto. Set your iso and everything else you need to set, then set the software for time intervale and number of photos you want to take.
If you dont understand how to set any of those settings, if you dont understand how to use aperature/shutter priority or how to take consistent exposures, then you could try program ae or auto mode, but your photos will be inconsistent, and you will be able to tell in the final video, and it will lead to alot of frustration. So if any of that sounds foriegn to you, then it is probably best if you started by reading some photography books.

You can use pretty much any movie maker, video editor to put the photos together in a video, I dont know much about video editing software, but maybe someone else could recommend a program to use for that

Does that help any?