Shenandoah sunrise time lapse

Have I mentioned that I love the hell out of my new GoPro Hero 3+ camera?  While in Shenandoah National Park this past weekend, Debbie and I got up early to catch the sunrise.  As the sun came up over Upper Hawksbill Gap, we sleepily watched with amazement.  Note to self:  Watch more sunrises.

Moonflower time lapse

A couple of weeks ago a buddy at work gave me a few plants; two tropical, black-eyed susan vines and one moonflower plant.   Woahohohooooo Nelly...  Am I about to blog about plants?  Why yes; yes I am.  The moonflower plant is pretty awesome actually.  My buddy told me that this plant would produce flowers, one at a time, several times, before dying.  Last night it finally blossumed and I used my new GoPro to capture the time lapse.  The series of photos in the video were taken every 60 seconds, between 7:00pm and 9:00pm.  Pretty cool!

Helvetia by Night - Alessandro Della Bella

I find time lapse photography incredibly interesting. Sometimes as is the case with the video below; it truly fascinates me. This is partly because I know how difficult it can be, but also because it expresses time in a different way; at a different rate, where the mundane and ordinary become a kinetic and unstoppable force. The perpetual motion of life is made blatant, obvious. graceful. 

Alessandro Della Bella, a Swiss photographer, created the time lapse video below, which showcases the Swiss Alps and their majestic nocturnal beauty. As a photographer and outdoor enthusiast, I am inspired by, and in awe of the beauty and hard work that he has shared with the world. For more information about his project, visit the website he created for this video at: http://helvetiabynight.com
 

Helvetia's Dream from Alessandro Della Bella on Vimeo.

Perseid Meteor Shower

So, last night around midnight, the Perseus Constellation rose in the northeast sky. After which a shower of meteors apparently ensued, but my view was blocked by cloud cover (Read up on the Perseid Meteor shower here). I did have fun setting up for the show and I haven't ever tried to capture the stars before. I'd like to give it another shot sometime; most likely tonight.

Above: NOT a meteor, just a "big ol' jet airliner".

I set up with my 24mm prime lens. A relatively quick and wide angle lens works best. My 24mm is an f/2.8 which is not the fastest, but not all that slow either (better than a f/3.5). You want to use a wide angle lens because it will let you capture the largest amount of sky. I focused to infinity (...and beyond!). I read that a simple calculation can be used to establish shutter speed for shooting... shooting stars: 600 ÷ focal length = exposure time. Since I was using a 24mm lens the math was simple: 600 ÷ 24 = 25 seconds. Since you can never tell when meteors will go streaking by you pretty much play it by luck at this point. Just keep on exposing. So, I set my camera's intervalometer to expose every minute. So every 60 seconds the shutter in my camera would open for 25 seconds.

It was midnight when I set up with the tripod on the back porch and I was exhausted so I went to bed. I tried to sleep but I just didn't feel right about leaving my camera outside all night. Especially since some little bastards had broken into my jeep a few weeks ago. Though the weather radar showed only light cloud cover and no rain in the forecast I just tossed and turned worrying about my DSLR. So after about an hour and a half I went out to look at the sky: cloudy. So I pulled my camera inside and sauntered back to bed.

Above: This is the best I could come up with.

This morning I processed the 105 photos I captured. Some of them are so-so, and I included them in this blog post, but the balance of them are just shots of wispy clouds obscuring what was probably a pretty amazing sight. In the image above you'll see a light streak which is NOT a meteor; it's an airplane. Doh! I created a very short time lapse video displaying the 105 images at a rate of 10 frames per second. Kind of neat, but not at all what I had hoped for. Better luck next time! Speaking of next time: Meteor Shower Calender.

Time Lapse: Clover Beneath the Bonzai Tree

Another time lapse video that I made just for kicks. Short & sweet; no frills. 225 frames captured at a rate of one exposure every fifteen seconds and displayed at a rate of fifteen frames/second.

Day by day

A time lapse video made from 3,446 frames. I used a Nikon D700 to capture all three scenes shooting at a rate of 4 frames per minute. I used QuickTime Pro to create the image sequences at a rate of 30 frames per second and used Windows Movie Maker to create the final video.

Lessons learned:
Next time I will manually set my white balance for more consistent exposures and also shoot at a much lower resolution.

Another lapse of time

In preparation for tomorrow's ride, I replaced the leaking tube in the front wheel of my Cannondale. It was a slow leaker that took about 3 days to completely leak. Being the slacker that I am, I kept filling it up and it would hold long enough to get a great ride in; knowing that I'd have to repair it sooner or later (today being later). Thought I'd make a simple time lapse video just for kicks. The video is only 11 seconds long, made of 70 stills played at 6 frames per second.

A lapse of time

Tomorrow is Saturday. This means I'll be taking the train out of the city, up to Peekskill, NY to ride at Blue Mountain Reservation. I'll be riding with a mellow crowd of guys and taking it easy. The weather is supposed to be perfect and I know the trails will be absolutely sublime. I'm anxious to see how my new Tioga tires grip the earth. They have really stiff, tall nubs and I'm not sure how they'll hold, although online reviews say they're great. I swapped out my flat pedals for another set of Crank Brothers Candy pedals that I had laying around. These ones came on my Cannondale and I never used them because I had a pair of Eggbeaters in store for that bike. For fun, I set up my camera on the tripod exposing one frame every two seconds. I then dumped the images into Quicktime Pro at a rate of ten frames per second to end up with the time lapse video below. It's late; I've got to get some shut eye.

Eyjafjallajökull Time Lapse

Iceland, Eyjafjallajökull - May 1st and 2nd, 2010 from Sean Stiegemeier on Vimeo.

A friend of mine sent me this video and it blew my mind. Time Lapse photography taken to a new level. Kudo's on the use of a motorized dolly.

Snowy Time Lapse of Inwood

One of the things I love about my D700 is the built in intervalometer. This morning I set up at my bedroom window and focused my 24mm on the scene below. I set the intervalometer to release the shutter once every ten seconds for 1000 images. About 3 hours later I had my images, and dumped them into Quick Time Pro to produce the video you see below. Enjoy.