UWOL #7 "Tempus Fugit" by Rob Evans

Geir Inge · February 27th, 2008, 04:51 AM

Absolutely awesome!
Only one little comment at 00.24, two similar gras clips after another made a little jump cut, but this is a minor detail.
Very good film Rob, I liked it very much and it also reminds me of some of the films they've been showing on Animal Planet.

All the best
Geir Inge

David Gemmell · February 27th, 2008, 07:23 AM

Hi Rob,

That was just great watching something so different!

Like Kevin, I really loved the shot of the goose flying by and the sun rise. The effects are wonderful, although it does sound like you have to really work hard for them. Then again, you seem to have achieved such a wonderful result in such a short time.

I guess the adventure was the whole experiment of shooting in such a unique way. Top class entry as always.

Bob Thieda · February 27th, 2008, 08:04 AM

Rob,

I did some research on this whole Milapse and HDR timelapse thing, very interesting.
I see most of the stuff I found was done with DSLR cameras and they used exposure bracketing....

But what about you. I see you used a video camera, not a DSLR....
Were you shooting moving video? Or stills? I'm not familiar with your camera, so I don't know all your options.

I guess I'm looking for a little more info on your process...and maybe a picture of your set up....with the telescope tripod.

As I said before...loved your video.

Bob T.

Carl Middleton · February 27th, 2008, 08:37 AM

Rob,

Wow. I'm now very glad that I didn't go with my plan A, which was much less interesting timelapses. ;)

I really enjoyed it, the pans are really what sold me. Though the duck coming out of nowhere was by far my favorite shot.

As far as the music, towards the beginning it provided excitement, and then slowly relaxed towards the end, good pacing for this project. The soccer(football?) seemed out of place to me, like the music had already told me it was bedtime... But that's probably just me. :D

C

Rob Evans · February 27th, 2008, 08:58 AM

once again, many thanks for the feedback - Geir I hadn't spotted that one, kudos to your eagle eyes ;-)

Bob, s'funny you should mention the photo idea, I was at one point planning to film a timelapse of the tripod in action ;-) but I didn't quite get round to it.
I'll try and get some done in the next few days.

But here's a quick run-down.

Getting and setting!

Order the "milapse" telescope ( think $90) up from www.telescope-warehouse.com - it basically arrives minus bracket for telescope use. All you need to do is get a bracket made at a metal shop, which will fit the 4 screws in the tripod head and have a 90 bend, and a screw hole to fit the camcorder secure screw. In my case, I managed to "acquire" a metal bookend from my kitchen ( which will no doubt catch up with me at some point ;-) and drilled it myself. The tripod has i think 100 +deg vertical movement and 360 continual horizontal - so make sure you secure the plate so it is horizontal at the middle of the vertical range. Secure your camcorder ( in my case the hvr-a1 is a small form HDV camera) and get ready to shoot.

Using in the field.

Add 8 aa batteries and start the machine up. When it has started, wait 10s and push the speed key. It will display a speed, which starts at 2deg/sec then goes all the way down to 2x in incements as you push the speed button, which i think is something like 360deg in 24 hrs ( but don't take my word on this - there are about 8 speed levels in total ). Get the tripod as even as possible - it doesnt have a spirit level and frankly the tripod is of poor quality contstruction, but what the hey! Now, with it set to the fastest speed, pan across your intended shot by using the d-pad arrows ( left, right, up, down ) to make sure there's noting odd in the way and all angles are well framed. In my case I set the focus on the cam to manual - infinity and left the exposure on auto to handle the changing light areas - you may want to play around here. Now, sit for a few minutes without filming and watch your scene - how much action do you have going on? which direction is it moving? Is something going to happen at one point that you want to make sure is captured? Use this information to decide what speed to run at, and what angle to capture. It's take you a bit of experimentation to get this right, but most of these sequences were captured at 16X or 32X. Also at this stage think about how the movement will work between adjacent scenes in the edit - will a diagonal work here against a diagonal in another shot? will it slide into another shot travelling in the same direction? Obviously, choose a spot that will not put you or others around you in the way of any harm!
Movement is sustained by a very simple technique - a bulldog clip, like the ones use for holding files together. Using this you can clamp down 1 or two buttons at a time ( 1 for v/h 2 for diagonal ) to keep the head moving.
Once you've decided on your scene, roll the camera at normal speed ( and hope you bought a lot of tapes!! - unless you have interval record, try playing with it! ), and keep an eye on it. Resist the urge to swing the whole rig round because something is happening 180deg from the lens ( unless of course it's something like a UFO ;-) - just let it roll and commit yourself to waiting. Generally people will start talking to you because you look like a freak stood on a corner with an army surplus rocket launcher - but you get used to it....

Back in the edit

This is the dull bit. Capture the hours of footage you have filmed ( unless of course, you have a camera with interval record which will do X frames over X seconds, which my old TrV900 has but doesnt appear to be on the hvr a1!) then import it into your timeline - then crush it down to a speed that works.
Then stick it on the web so we can all see it.

Cheers!

Rob

Bob Thieda · February 27th, 2008, 09:03 AM

Thank you Rob for that excellent explaination....

You've given me something new to try....very nice!

Bob T.

Marj Atkins · February 28th, 2008, 02:05 PM

My word - time certainly flies by in this movie Rob - a very apt title!

I found your results of this time-lapse technique fascinating - thank you for showing us how it works and what you are capable of achieving with it. And thanks for all the info on how to do it - I really appreciate that. This is the sort of thing I would love to play with given the time and the equipment. I think one could use some of the resulting special effects to great effect in a movie.

I like the two birds ‘skating’ across the water in your intro - really nice - and the sun rising fast is amazing. I particularly enjoyed the views looking upwards and the crowds of people flowing towards you. I must say I also like the idea of having a really smooth pan - I really battle with that. Your music is very appropriate for this compilation.

Most enjoyable movie and a very worthwhile gizmo I would say.

Mat Thompson · February 28th, 2008, 03:22 PM

Hey Rob

Well you certainly have given uwol something different with this piece. Its facinating to watch the world in a whole new way and the use of that panning head certainly adds to this even more. While I certainly felt like I went on a journey I'm not sure I got adventure from the piece but that said there is just so much down to interpretation in all our films who's to say. All the timelapsing was great and well shot although I have to say by the end it did start to feel like a demo of the technique itself over a film with a premise.

Creative use of an interesting technology fella. I may well have to have a look at the head myself for the film I'm making this year, it would certainly add another dimension.

Great stuff

Eric Gulbransen · February 28th, 2008, 09:11 PM

I'm gonna have to learn how to pan so slow you can't even feel the rig moving. That footage was great. Nice work

Jurgen Geevels · February 29th, 2008, 05:55 PM

Its fantastic, except for the fact that you are making me want one of those :)

Ruth Happel · February 29th, 2008, 06:53 PM

I really enjoyed this, and thanks for all the behind the scenes information, I'd like to try some of those techniques. It's great when photography and video can show us ways to see the world our own eyes can't capture. You really found a very beautiful and graceful way of editing the material, too- the gliding birds and people were magical. Thanks for sharing this, and I look forward to trying out some of those techniques- I have so far only played a bit with this, but I found your film very inspirational. Great job!

Ruth

Bruce Foreman · March 1st, 2008, 01:10 AM

Beautiful imagery and a smooth sensation of time gliding by quickly. Very well and powerfully done.

Sandy Watt · March 2nd, 2008, 10:57 AM

love this- and very interesting seeing some of the stuff MIlapse has been using. love timelapse and really want to start doing more: thanks for the inspiration!
Sandy

Annie Haycock · March 9th, 2008, 12:11 PM

Very impressive to show the whole thing in time lapse without leaving the viewer feeling there is too much of it!

A couple of questions out of pure curiosity:
1) How many subjects did you actually shoot, and how many were not suitable for this treatment (note, I said subjects, not takes)?

2) By how much did you speed up the clips - all the same or did it vary on each clip?

Rob Evans · March 10th, 2008, 05:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Annie Haycock

Very impressive to show the whole thing in time lapse without leaving the viewer feeling there is too much of it!

A couple of questions out of pure curiosity:
1) How many subjects did you actually shoot, and how many were not suitable for this treatment (note, I said subjects, not takes)?

2) By how much did you speed up the clips - all the same or did it vary on each clip?

Hi Annie, glad you liked it. Would be amazing to get out and do some timlapse like this out on the beaches in pembrokeshire, the tides, clouds and space would make for some amazing shots.

to answer your questions:
1. There were two locations that i didn't use completely, the first was a closeup of a car window covered with frost, melting in the sun - looked ok but didnt quite fit in - likewise a shot of the sun coming up over a hedge at the side of a field, with the shadows gradually shortening and the iced grass turning from white to green. I had probabably another 5 hours of footage that was captured in the same locations as the footage i ended up using, but they didn't neccesarily have the same impact - it can sometimes be a very hit and miss process. The one shot that disappointed me the most was the shot of the frozen grass early on - I left it running for about 25 minutes on the slowest pan setting, and it hardly even melted. It was only later when the sun was at a higer latitude hitting grass that had already been in the shade that I realised the way it should be done!!

2. Anything between 300% and 6,000% i think - bascially what looked good in the time i had alloted for each scene in the edit.

Cheers!

February 27th, 2008, 04:51 AM	#16
Geir Inge Trustee Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Larsnes, Norway Posts: 1,342	Absolutely awesome! Only one little comment at 00.24, two similar gras clips after another made a little jump cut, but this is a minor detail. Very good film Rob, I liked it very much and it also reminds me of some of the films they've been showing on Animal Planet. All the best Geir Inge __________________ Geir Inge B. Brekke Visit me at: https://vimeo.com/gibbfilm

February 27th, 2008, 08:04 AM	#18
Bob Thieda Major Player Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Carol Stream, IL Posts: 541	Rob, I did some research on this whole Milapse and HDR timelapse thing, very interesting. I see most of the stuff I found was done with DSLR cameras and they used exposure bracketing.... But what about you. I see you used a video camera, not a DSLR.... Were you shooting moving video? Or stills? I'm not familiar with your camera, so I don't know all your options. I guess I'm looking for a little more info on your process...and maybe a picture of your set up....with the telescope tripod. As I said before...loved your video. Bob T. __________________ Bob T.

February 27th, 2008, 08:37 AM	#19
Carl Middleton Major Player Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: Fernandina Beach, FL Posts: 562	Rob, Wow. I'm now very glad that I didn't go with my plan A, which was much less interesting timelapses. ;) I really enjoyed it, the pans are really what sold me. Though the duck coming out of nowhere was by far my favorite shot. As far as the music, towards the beginning it provided excitement, and then slowly relaxed towards the end, good pacing for this project. The soccer(football?) seemed out of place to me, like the music had already told me it was bedtime... But that's probably just me. :D C __________________ Carl Middleton Whizkid Mediaworks

February 27th, 2008, 09:03 AM	#21
Bob Thieda Major Player Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Carol Stream, IL Posts: 541	Thank you Rob for that excellent explaination.... You've given me something new to try....very nice! Bob T. __________________ Bob T.

February 29th, 2008, 05:55 PM	#25
Jurgen Geevels Regular Crew Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: Belgium Posts: 57	Its fantastic, except for the fact that you are making me want one of those :) __________________ XM2, Manfrotto 055XDB 128Lp _Student Film_

February 27th, 2008, 07:23 AM	#17
David Gemmell Major Player Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Bendigo, Australia Posts: 234	Hi Rob, That was just great watching something so different! Like Kevin, I really loved the shot of the goose flying by and the sun rise. The effects are wonderful, although it does sound like you have to really work hard for them. Then again, you seem to have achieved such a wonderful result in such a short time. I guess the adventure was the whole experiment of shooting in such a unique way. Top class entry as always.

February 27th, 2008, 08:58 AM	#20
Rob Evans Major Player Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: Berkshire, UK Posts: 390	once again, many thanks for the feedback - Geir I hadn't spotted that one, kudos to your eagle eyes ;-) Bob, s'funny you should mention the photo idea, I was at one point planning to film a timelapse of the tripod in action ;-) but I didn't quite get round to it. I'll try and get some done in the next few days. But here's a quick run-down. Getting and setting! Order the "milapse" telescope ( think $90) up from www.telescope-warehouse.com - it basically arrives minus bracket for telescope use. All you need to do is get a bracket made at a metal shop, which will fit the 4 screws in the tripod head and have a 90 bend, and a screw hole to fit the camcorder secure screw. In my case, I managed to "acquire" a metal bookend from my kitchen ( which will no doubt catch up with me at some point ;-) and drilled it myself. The tripod has i think 100 +deg vertical movement and 360 continual horizontal - so make sure you secure the plate so it is horizontal at the middle of the vertical range. Secure your camcorder ( in my case the hvr-a1 is a small form HDV camera) and get ready to shoot. Using in the field. Add 8 aa batteries and start the machine up. When it has started, wait 10s and push the speed key. It will display a speed, which starts at 2deg/sec then goes all the way down to 2x in incements as you push the speed button, which i think is something like 360deg in 24 hrs ( but don't take my word on this - there are about 8 speed levels in total ). Get the tripod as even as possible - it doesnt have a spirit level and frankly the tripod is of poor quality contstruction, but what the hey! Now, with it set to the fastest speed, pan across your intended shot by using the d-pad arrows ( left, right, up, down ) to make sure there's noting odd in the way and all angles are well framed. In my case I set the focus on the cam to manual - infinity and left the exposure on auto to handle the changing light areas - you may want to play around here. Now, sit for a few minutes without filming and watch your scene - how much action do you have going on? which direction is it moving? Is something going to happen at one point that you want to make sure is captured? Use this information to decide what speed to run at, and what angle to capture. It's take you a bit of experimentation to get this right, but most of these sequences were captured at 16X or 32X. Also at this stage think about how the movement will work between adjacent scenes in the edit - will a diagonal work here against a diagonal in another shot? will it slide into another shot travelling in the same direction? Obviously, choose a spot that will not put you or others around you in the way of any harm! Movement is sustained by a very simple technique - a bulldog clip, like the ones use for holding files together. Using this you can clamp down 1 or two buttons at a time ( 1 for v/h 2 for diagonal ) to keep the head moving. Once you've decided on your scene, roll the camera at normal speed ( and hope you bought a lot of tapes!! - unless you have interval record, try playing with it! ), and keep an eye on it. Resist the urge to swing the whole rig round because something is happening 180deg from the lens ( unless of course it's something like a UFO ;-) - just let it roll and commit yourself to waiting. Generally people will start talking to you because you look like a freak stood on a corner with an army surplus rocket launcher - but you get used to it.... Back in the edit This is the dull bit. Capture the hours of footage you have filmed ( unless of course, you have a camera with interval record which will do X frames over X seconds, which my old TrV900 has but doesnt appear to be on the hvr a1!) then import it into your timeline - then crush it down to a speed that works. Then stick it on the web so we can all see it. Cheers! Rob

February 28th, 2008, 02:05 PM	#22
Marj Atkins Major Player Join Date: May 2007 Location: Johannesburg South Africa Posts: 768	My word - time certainly flies by in this movie Rob - a very apt title! I found your results of this time-lapse technique fascinating - thank you for showing us how it works and what you are capable of achieving with it. And thanks for all the info on how to do it - I really appreciate that. This is the sort of thing I would love to play with given the time and the equipment. I think one could use some of the resulting special effects to great effect in a movie. I like the two birds ‘skating’ across the water in your intro - really nice - and the sun rising fast is amazing. I particularly enjoyed the views looking upwards and the crowds of people flowing towards you. I must say I also like the idea of having a really smooth pan - I really battle with that. Your music is very appropriate for this compilation. Most enjoyable movie and a very worthwhile gizmo I would say.

February 28th, 2008, 03:22 PM	#23
Mat Thompson Trustee Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Kent UK Posts: 1,397	Hey Rob Well you certainly have given uwol something different with this piece. Its facinating to watch the world in a whole new way and the use of that panning head certainly adds to this even more. While I certainly felt like I went on a journey I'm not sure I got adventure from the piece but that said there is just so much down to interpretation in all our films who's to say. All the timelapsing was great and well shot although I have to say by the end it did start to feel like a demo of the technique itself over a film with a premise. Creative use of an interesting technology fella. I may well have to have a look at the head myself for the film I'm making this year, it would certainly add another dimension. Great stuff

February 28th, 2008, 09:11 PM	#24
Eric Gulbransen Major Player Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Palo Alto, California Posts: 520	I'm gonna have to learn how to pan so slow you can't even feel the rig moving. That footage was great. Nice work

February 29th, 2008, 06:53 PM	#26
Ruth Happel Major Player Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Black Mountain, NC Posts: 488	I really enjoyed this, and thanks for all the behind the scenes information, I'd like to try some of those techniques. It's great when photography and video can show us ways to see the world our own eyes can't capture. You really found a very beautiful and graceful way of editing the material, too- the gliding birds and people were magical. Thanks for sharing this, and I look forward to trying out some of those techniques- I have so far only played a bit with this, but I found your film very inspirational. Great job! Ruth __________________ http://rockfowl.com/

March 1st, 2008, 01:10 AM	#27
Bruce Foreman Trustee Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: San Angelo Texas Posts: 1,518	Beautiful imagery and a smooth sensation of time gliding by quickly. Very well and powerfully done.

March 2nd, 2008, 10:57 AM	#28
Sandy Watt New Boot Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Glasgow, Scotland Posts: 24	love this- and very interesting seeing some of the stuff MIlapse has been using. love timelapse and really want to start doing more: thanks for the inspiration! Sandy

March 9th, 2008, 12:11 PM	#29
Annie Haycock Major Player Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: Pembrokeshire, Wales Posts: 734	Very impressive to show the whole thing in time lapse without leaving the viewer feeling there is too much of it! A couple of questions out of pure curiosity: 1) How many subjects did you actually shoot, and how many were not suitable for this treatment (note, I said subjects, not takes)? 2) By how much did you speed up the clips - all the same or did it vary on each clip?

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