time lapse vs the sun
 

I just saw a beautiful time lapse clip of a sunset (taken with an HV20 in photo mode), and the clip began while the sun was still bright.

I've ordered an intervalometer and am considering trying to do something like that with my HV20 but I'm concerned that pointing it at the bright sun for any extended period of time could be harmful to the sensor.

Can anyone here address this issue?

Since it's been done before then it can't be that bad, can it?

:p

At dusk the sun is not that bright so it won't be harmful to the sensor. If you want to be safe use an ND filter... or at least a UV filter.

Is there some kind of intravalometer for the HV20? Or are you rigging a mount or something so it will push the photo button?

Here's a sunrise I recorded in Zanzibar in 1995 with a Video8 camcorder that had next to no manual controls:

http://www.enosoft.net/videos/ZanzibarSunrise.wmv

I just set it on the tripod and let it record...

Yes. there is a company in Scotland that makes them and will ship to the USA.
The HV20 required a special order via email , but they didn't charge extra and air shipped it the day after I ordered.

I haven't received it yet, but I know of at least one individual who is quite pleased with the one he received.

I believe it works via IR. It's small box that must be attached/aimed at the front of the HV20 via rubber bands/velcro etc.

Could someone mention what an intravalometer is please?

ahh well, I looked it up, and the 5th link down was this thread! :-)

Can you be more specific?

Yes..sorry..I should have posted the specifics when you first asked. The URL: http://www.gentles.ltd.uk/
I found their site a bit confusing, but the email exchanges were quick and easy to understand.

For the HV20, you want to order the "gentLED-AUTO" and because it's a special build you need to email them separately and tell them it's to actuate the HV20 photo button.

The special order didn't cost any extra. (38.95 euro = $62.88 US includes shipping).

I ordered mine Wed April 9, and it arrived at my house in Connecticut today at noon (Monday April 14).

It's much smaller and lighter than I expected, easy to hold in place with Velcro, and seems to be working quite well.

Right now it's banging out pictures at the rate of 1 every 3 secs, on my first sunset test.

Thanks Loren.

So what kind of timing range can you set? And how do you set it, the pics only show the small box or the led with wires coming out of it. Does the glentLED-AUTO have a dial you can use to set the fps or does it use some other method.

Thanks

Timing can run from 3 second to 4 min intervals. It came set at 3 seconds and I haven't tried to change it yet. You increase the interval it by turning a small screw on the outside of the box - one turn/second until you reach 20-30 seconds. For longer intervals, you need to open the case, and change a 'link', according to their instructions.

The gentLED-AUTO is just the box. No wires coming out of it or anything else. That was one of the things that confused me also.

Keep in mind that this device will not eliminate the risk of damage from direct sunlight. The risk comes from the concentration of light by the lens on the inside of the camera, much like when you were a kid burning paper (or ants) with a magnifying glass. With this device the lens guard would be open continuously and the chance of melting something inside the camera with sufficient sunlight is still possible. Although, shooting sunrises/sunsets the risk is minimal since the sun is not at full strength and the light is more indirect and filtered by more of the atmosphere.

It sounds like it's acting as a remote triggering device. One question: Are you shooting in video mode or capturing still shots, which is what I suspect you're doing?

From his first post: "I just saw a beautiful time lapse clip of a sunset (taken with an HV20 in photo mode), and the clip began while the sun was still bright."

I'm guessing he's doing the same.

Thanks, Rick for pointing out the comment. I find that time lapse videos made from still shots tend to appear jerky unless you can shoot at relatively long exposure times to blur the motion from one frame to the next.

You need to use something like GBdeflicker which is a plugin for Adobe After Effects.

Andy Davies

Bert,

That's exactly what it is. It triggers the shutter at 'user defined' intervals for time lapse when the camcorder is set to photo mode.

On a separate note, but using similar logic - I connect a 6 ft fiber optic cable to the remote that came with the HV20 to capture nature closeups without scaring the critters off.

I can't wait to see how yours come out.

Well --

the good news is that I did get about 800 photos in sequence over a period of hours, so the intervalometer does work as advertised.

the bad news is that I haven't been able to draw them all into Vegas 7 and I'm not sure if it's a Vegas setting, or my pc doesn't have enough power or memory
(5 yr old Dell Pentium 4 - 2.8 ghz - 3 gb ram).

So you won't get to see any results until I figure out what the obstacle is.

Did you import them as an image sequence ? In Vegas click on the 1st picture in the folder then at the bottom check import image sequence or something then it asks what frame rate 12,15,24,or 30fps. It will bring them in as a video clip.

If you have any questions message me on Vimeo.

Joey AKA Lucasberg

I reduced the size of the images to 320x240 to see if that alleviated the problem loading into Vegas 7 and it did.

But each obstacle I fight through, has another right behind it.

On to the Vegas forums next with some questions!!!

I have used the camera and the FS-C (external recorder) to do time lapse and slow motion clips. You get the same resolution (as you would in the Photo Mode) if you use the camera in the HDV mode and using Premiere CS3 I have compressed the timeline by a factor of 100 and streached it by a factor of 10 (you can do any factor you choose). I use the time compression for cloud development and sunrise/sunset clips and the time streach (and 30P mode 1/2000 of a second shutter priority) for recording the aerodynamics of finches around my bird feeder. The FS-C 100GB model will record about 8 hours of HDV video from a camera in the standby mode (no tape being used, no head wear)