Time Lapse on JVC
 

A producer I work with wants me to shoot time lapse footage with the JVC HDV camera. He showed me some footage that looks pixelated. I couldn't find a time lapse funtion in the menu though. He said some thng about the shutter being set to 1/72 and you can see it in the viewfinder. Any ideas how this is done?

The camera doesn't has an intervalometer but you can obtain this feature via software. Do you use PC or Mac? For the Mac there is iStopMotion ( http://www.istopmotion.com ), it does both Time Lapse and Stop Motion. I used it with a DV camera and it works well. They have an HD version. Be aware that files can be huge so save often and check the results.

You can also get this feature with most of the hard drive recorders on the market like the DR-HD100-80 ..

http://pro.jvc.com/prof/attributes/c...&itempath=null

I stopped by the studio and some one showed me what the producer is talking about. You go in to the shutter mode that gives you up to 1/2000 of a second, I think it's the "step" shutter rather than the "variable" one that you use for shooting monitors. In step mode you can crank the shutter speed below the frame rate. For example if you're shooting at 30 frames persecond, you can still have the shutter open for 1/15th of a second or as low as 1/7.5th. In one second you're only making four descrete images instead of 30 so motion looks jerky and a little blurry (use a tripod). The tape keeps moving at 30fps. Sped up, or just ditching the extra frames in an NLE, the image looks pixelated. It's basicly a time lapse feature, but a little different because it's based on shutter speed. I'm sure you could use the 1/7.5 and 1/15th shutters to produce some interesting effects for all sorts of shots like dream / drug sequences etc.

how is the Stop Motion working for you? I would love to do some Stop Motion, and TImne Lapse on my next short film I am shooting. Do you hook up the camera to the mac while you shoot, or how does it work?

Duke

Yes, you connect the camera to the laptop via FireWire and the software takes a picture every n seconds, you decide how often.

Does anybody know what corresponding software you would use for this on a PC?

Thanks Paolo. I assume it works with the JVC HD_100, correct? I would love to should some stuff like that.

I didn't try it with the HD100, the HD license is more than I can justify right now (bought a Chrosziel matte box :)) but it should and I think they offer a warranty.

I've done several timelapse shots using the JVC by the old method of shooting in real time to tape and speeding up in the edit (perfect if your timelapse is one hour or less). Looks fine to me. Only problem I have had is stability of the set-up in windy conditions (I use the camera on the JVC quick release plate, and its pretty firm, but there is still a tiny bit of movement)

Do you have any footage you cna post to get an idea how it looks?

I just got my DR-HD100 in today...How do you do timelaspe with it (Only is SD from what I hear)?

I have spent an hour or so with the iStopMotionHR demo that Paolo linked to, and have some puzzling results.

I only have a mac here with a KonaLE card, and iStopMotion sees only that card, not firewire. I can only get input from the analog ports of the camera, at 720p59.94. It's a bit finicky -- I have to "initialize" the card with FCP by seeing the live input in log and capture before iStopMotion can see it, but then it comes through, and the timelapse works great.

So, I can do it in the studio, but that doesn't help for the real application, which is outdoors. I'm hoping that firewire will work if there is no capture card, but I don't know (yet). Has anyone tried this?

And yes, the price tag ($349 on sale!) is steep, more annoying because it is the same downloaded package that with the DV licence costs $39. But the demo is free... at least we can see what's possible.

Robert Schaller

I didn't try it with the HD100, the HD license is more than I can justify right now (bought a Chrosziel matte box :)) but it should and I think they offer a warranty.

Unfortunately, iStopMotion WILL NOT work over firewire with an HDV camera. The "Help" file for their software (version 1.10.1) states:

"StopMotion does not currently support HDV or MPEG-4 cameras as QuickTime provides no support for these technologies at the moment."

It will work with the Kona card, but this is of no value outside the editing suite, which is not where I, at least, really want to do time lapse recording.

Is there any tool out there that will capture HD as HDV over firewire to do time lapse? Or, what about Steve Benner's question about using the DR-HD100 to do time lapse -- and can that do full HD? Or, do we wait for something like the Vydeo Express Card 34 that was linked to elsewhere (and I can't find the thread) that will allow HD input into a laptop?

Real HD (V) time lapse would be very, very useful.