Improving look of time lapse footage

I am taking about 80 minutes of footage down to 3:30, and was looking for some tips for improving the look.
I added motion blur, which improved the choppy look of the person in frame (this is a surfboard being shaped), but really killed the detail on the deck of the board.
I have heard people mention deinterlacing and changing the field order or blending can help.....?
I'd appreciate any thoughts on the subject, thanks guys.

Bueller? Bueller?

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Time lapse from stills

I am making a time lapse movie from a group of hi-res still images. The final needs to be HD to play looped on the clients HD TV.
We shot the stills only about 20secs apart. When I play the movie back, I get quite a bit of flicker. I do not beleive it is interlaced flicker I've been reading about. It is more of an exposure variance flicker. I've read that , that can be common on still camera time lapses due to the aperture is not exactly the same on all frames?? I hear there may be a plug in, Boris FX for after effects that will help with this??
Any help on this would be great!
Also, the test movies I've made with several different compressions are too soft.
I'm Pretty new at this. Again any help is greatly appreciated.

Since it sounds like you have After Effects, you may want to check out Stephen Schleicher's tutorial on removing the strobing from time lapse footage. It sounds like it's exactly what you're looking for. It uses the built-in Color Stabilizer filter to accomplish its task.
It's the first tutorial on the following page:
http://www.stephenschleicher.com/htm/tutorialsaftereffects.html

Time Lapse with iMovie 11

I was really hoping to be able to build a time lapse movie with iMovie 11. But, it looks as if it isn't possible. There are two big issues:
1. It would appear that there is a maximum number of 'clips' that iMovie 11 will accept. So, when importing still images, iMovie freezes at the maximum. I'm not sure what that miximum is, but it's somewhere between 500 and 1000. Does anybody know?
2. It would appear that the shortest period that I can allocate to an individual image is 0.04. So, each image lasts for four frames. It means that the effective frame rate for the time lapse is 6.25 frames per second (assuming a 25fps PAL movie).
It's so annoying. It was possible to develop time lapse movies with iMovie HD. It took a bit of messing around, but it was possible! I can't seem to find anyway to do it in iMovie 11. Anybody got any suggestions?

Thanks. I'll look into getting Quicktime Pro ... although I was hoping to take advantage of iMovie so that I could interweave time lapse footage with standard footage.
I did manage to come up with a workaround, but it isn't particularly elegant.
I found that I could import around 500 still images without a problem. Before importing, I adjusted the project properties so that Photo Duration was set to 1 and Initial Photo Placement was set to 'fit'. I then dragged the images to the project and they imported. Once they were all imported, I adjusted the clip properties so that the clip duration was 0.04 (the shortest duration I could get it to accept) and made sure that I checked the 'apply to all clips) box.
I now had a string of 500 images at durations of 0.04, and I exported this as an HD quicktime movie.
I then tried to do the same thing again, but found a weird anomaly and iMovie wouldn't import clips. On a hunch, I deleted the project. Exited iMovie. Emptied the trash. Restarted iMovie. Opened a new project, and tried importing the next 500 stills.
It worked!
So, it's a bit of a fuss, but after each import of 500 stills, I exported an HD movie then deleted the project, emptied the trash, and started a new project.
Eventually, I'd got through 1,799 images.
So, finally, I created an entirely new project, and imported the four movies that I'd created. I imported at 'full' quality to try to avoid as much degredation as possible. I was then able to bring the four movies into the new project, speed them up (x4) and I've got a half-way decent time lapse.
It isn't perfect, but it does provide a method of using iMovie 11 to generate time-lapse segments within broader movies.
I will try Quicktime Pro too.
Does anybody have any suggestions for best export settings from Quicktime so that the time lapse could then be imported into iMovie 11?

DV speed, and time lapse question

Hi Forum....your insight and advise on the problems with understanding film rates, etc, is boggling my brain! I'm spending tim in Ken Stone's and Adam Witt's sites, and reading more....and starting to understand a few things about what I'm dealing with. I'm still not sure how to apply them, however. I have another mini-project I need to do that I'll try out some of these techniques.
Anywy, I see that on some of the capture settings, it only allows X amount of time in the presets for "capture now"....(30min). Is this default for a reason? WIll changing it to "60 minutes" have any consequenses?
I was thinking of trying to do a faked time lapse....but am not sure if it will work...and just wanted to know if anyone has done this? I want to video the sunset and lights of our theater coming on, a couple hours of tape, and speed it up so it looks like time lapse.
Can it be done, as my mind thinks it can by just capturing as "capture now" getting the footage into the view and using speeding it up using the speed control? Will it speed it up enough? Just wondering.
Thanks again....great posts!!! I'm learning a LOT!
MW

Capture now set to 60min works. But make sure that you are not on UNCONTROLLED DEVICE. Make sure you have Firewire DV or Firewire Basic. That will ensure you ingest timecode.
Jim...Recently I STUPIDLY told the DP I wanted time of day code. Boneheaded me. So when I went to log and capture I found that they didn't give me enough pre-roll to allow for logging and capturing. SO what I did is pre-label the clip by looking at what it was, then hitting CAPTURE NOW. The TC break stopped the tape. I hated doing it, but was forced to.
The next shoot I said NO TIME OF DAY! Not like I was going to synce the 3 cameras up in post anyway...sheesh.
Shane

Logging time lapsed video

I am trying to log and capture time lapsed footage. After a few frames though, the capturing ceases and tries to locate a timecode break. The camera was never turned off. I have waited, hoping that giving it a little time would help but nothing happens. The log and capture stops.
Any thoughts?

By standard def I'll assume you mean DV. Easiest solution, you need to use uncontrolled device and capture by rolling the tape.
bogiesan

Capture Time Lapse from Canon HF100

I just bought a Canon Vixia HF100 camcorder. I want to connect it to my Macbook and record some time lapse footage in iMovie HD 6.
How can I do this? The camera doesn't have firewire support.

I probably am not the most qualified to answer this post but wanted to weigh in on this. I have done an enormous amount of research prior to purchasing my Canon HF100. First I got the camera but did not purchase the sd card at the same time so I sat there like a kid at christmas with a new toy and no batteries. Finally the card arrived 2 days ago. I wanted this camera because I needed better quality video over the JVC HDD. With everything pointing to AVCHD and everyone touting the quality and speed I thought this was my best move. 30 minutes of FXP video takes over 1 hour to import into iMovie08. I am not impressed with the video quality and do not know at this moment why the video, not the audio, freezes on playback in Quicktime or iMovie. If I could go back to the old school tape I would. Maybe I will change my mind in the next couple of days and if I do I will post it back here.

Time lapse effect from video footage NOT from sequence of photographs?

Hi forum,
hard to find this with a search because most of the links are about using photo sequence.
Which effect can make the appearance of time lapse movies using video footage not photo sequence. Preferably I would like to have control on the speed at different sections.

If you want to simulate timelapse with standard video all you should have to do is speed up the footage. IOW, retime a 1 hour take to 10 seconds and it will look like timelapse.
If you want to simulate long exposure timelapse (like where the lights of cars are streaks) then you have a lot more work to do. You'll need to use something like the Echo effect and then adjust the timing. It would help if we knew a little more about your project. I've been shooting timelapse for more than 40 years and I've used about 100 different techniques. It's hard to replicate all but one of them using a video camera.

Can I make a time lapse effect from video footage?

Is there a way to easily create a time lapse effect from video footage in Final Cut Pro 7?
I have hours of footage - too many hours to just do speed changes.
Is there a way to automatically grab a frame and hold it for a half second or so every 30 seconds?
Thanks,
LD

Lynn Diana wrote:
Is there a way to easily create a time lapse effect from video footage in Final Cut Pro 7?
Depends what you mean by "easily".
I have hours of footage - too many hours to just do speed changes.
I think doing via speed changing may be the easiest way to do this. Once the footage is ingested, get it to the timeline and do your speed up. At least this gives you the option of trying different speeds to get the effect you want, and the option to vary the speed as needed.
Is there a way to automatically grab a frame and hold it for a half second or so every 30 seconds?
Yes, but it somewhat complex. You need to buy an app from the app store called SnapMotion 2 (which I think is around $3.99).
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/snapmotion/id548959270
SnapMotion allows you to take a video a file and pull still frames at interval you specify and in the format a frame size you choose, and save them as individual images.
So you would set up the interval you want (say 30 seconds) and SnapMotion will go through the file and pull an image every 30 seconds. You would need to do that to all your files.
(I have never done this with a file that was longer than 10 minutes, so you should check with the developer and see if it will work with very long - multi hour - clips).
Once you have all your pulled stills, then open QuickTime Player 7 and import the still images as an image sequence.
Once you have the image sequence built in QuickTime, export it in the codec you want to use in FCP.
MtD

Time-lapse flicker unchanged after Color Stabilizer

I shot a sequence of still photos of a cluster of roses blooming in front of a blue screen for creating a time-lapse clip, my first time to try that. I have an NTSC-sized comp that fills the frame nicely with just one of the roses. As expected, there is flicker due to imprecision in the camera's aperture, and the rumor is that AE's Color Stabilizer effect should fix that. I have Keylight to key out the blue, and also TimeWarp to speed it up because the rose took longer than I thought to open (although that's optional, as I can just make the clip at its original length and speed it up in PPro when I combine it with backgrounds), but I made sure to put the Color Stabilizer below those other effects in the timeline - that should mean it is applied first, right? The Color Stabilizer in is "Brightness" mode, and because the rose's petals move, I put the "Black Point" on the blue screen. But it still flickers - it doesn't look like there is any improvement over not using the effect at all. Am I doing something wrong? Naturally, if the Color Stabilizer was being applied after Keylight, it wouldn't work because the background would already be erased, but I think it should be applying it first. If I have to put the Black Point on some part of the rose, I will have to chase it with a bunch of keyframes, and it may still not work right. Recommendations?
I wish there was an effect that would simply look at the whole frame's brightness and smooth each frame to a running average of several frames in a row, but as far as I know, such an effect doesn't exist.
Additional info: AE CS4 on Windows XP. The photos were for 1 second each @ f-8 with a Canon Powershot S3-IS, if that matters.

If the lighting and background are constant, there's nothing for Color
Stabilizer to do, you should not have needed it at all.
That would be true if I was shooting with my video camera (which I have done for many a sunrise or other less-than-one-hour time-lapses. But the problem is that most still cameras do not keep their aperture set while waiting between shots, and even in manual shooting mode with a specific f-stop, there will be slight variations. The flicker isn't caused by my subject matter, but by my camera.
In my case, I'm actually pretty pleased that my camera did as well as it did, considering that it's not an SLR. The flicker is not nearly as bad as some examples I have seen on the web. For your benefit, I made two half-resolution Quicktime file of the same 4 seconds of the middle of the sequence - this one has no effects at all, and this one has not just one but two effects added that are rumored to be helpful in reducing flicker: Color Stabilizer in "brightness" mode with the "black point" on the background, and Auto Levels with a Temporal Smoothing setting of 1 second. (Even at half-resolution and only four seconds, the files are still over 14MB each, because they contain the full frame rate of 29.97 fps, so be patient with the download.) To my naked eye, I can't see much difference.
I'd have
processed the individual stills in a batch in Photoshop first, leveling
all variables.
How does one do that? I do have Photoshop (CS2), but I'm not much of a Photoshop expert and have no idea how to get it to compare levels between even two files, much less do such comparison in an batch fashion between thousands of files.
Thanks for the link. I didn't see anything directly relevent at first glance (deflicker discussions center around using VirtualDub on a progressive video file, but my source is 3000 still photos, my destination is interlaced DV-encoded video, and I don't really want to process and resave it multiple times if I can avoid it). But when I have more time, I'm sure I could learn lots about time-lapse in general by reading the forum threads.

How can I create a Time Lapse from clips in FInal Cut Pro?

Currently have 3hrs of footage from an event....wondering how I can create a time lapse of it all in FCP. I want to make it shortened down to around 4mins if possible. How is this created?

Try exporting a reference quicktime of your sequence and reimporting it into your project. Drop it in a sequence. Use the Time remap tool (click and hold in the select edit points tool until you see the icon that looks like a clock and choose it). Click and drag the end of your clip until it's at the 4 min mark.
Andy
PS: This is for FCP 7. Earlier versions of FCP require use of the speed dialog (CMD+J) or Time Remapping in the Motion Tab of the viewer.
Message was edited by: Andy Neil

Time Lapse

Hi Gang
Without using any special setting on my DVX100B, I was simply going to let the camera roll for about an hour to film the set up and break down of a set.
During editing, increase the speed. Are there more effective ways to accomplish this? I believe time-lapse only captures a limited number of frames.
Does it really matter which method is employed?
Thanx
Mike
http://vimeo.com/7340608

Hi,
in principal there is no difference between letting a camera roll for an hour, or taking a series of stills over time (1 frame every 2-5 secs for example) and then gluing them together. Both are recording an event over a period of time and then compressing that timeframe afterwards, but you're right, the latter method does not capture all the action.
In practise though there is a world of difference in what you can achieve with the different methods. with the camera roll method (normally done with video cameras) you are obviously limited to the recording time of your camera, its recording method, and its photographic capabilities (shutter speed, image quality, dof etc). With stills timelapse (normally done with stills cameras) you potentially have a much more extended range of tools, more choice of lenses, exposure times, dof etc, and your recording time can be much, much longer.
In post, your video camera has the advantage of instantly being in the same format as the rest of your footage, but has the disadvantage of long clips, fixed resolutions (limiting repositions, blowups etc) looks a bit video, whereas with stills timelapses, once youve got your workflow sorted, you can be working with smaller files and get creative with pans and scans in motion and have beautiful filmic shots.
In your case (and depending on your aspirations for the project) on set, if you can afford to be without your video camera for an hour or so I would probably just let the camera roll as a quick and dirty one shot hit, speeding the clip up afterwards. But if you want to go for quality and get creative, start exploring the world of timelapses - heres a link to get you going
http://timescapes.org/phpBB3/index.php
and heres a good example of the type of quality achievable with the stills method,
http://vimeo.com/22439234
have fun
Andy

Time-lapse/framerate options

I heard that OL CS3 had a time-lapse feature, or at least the ability to select different framerates to record your footage at.
Ideally (and I don't know how plausible this is) the ability to record in a multitude of codecs, frame rates, and resolutions would be best... but the simple reintroduction of frame rate options would be a real gain for this software.

Stephen Seamark wrote:
Does the Time Capsule have to lay flat as designed or can it work perfectly well standing upright, like other hard drives?
take a look at this http://store.apple.com/us/product/TV675LL/A?fnode=MTY1NDA0Mg&mco=MTA4NTc4Nzk.
so i guess the answer is: basically yes !

I have an image sequence in JPG and when I select open image sequence, select all does not work and I can only highlight one frame at a time. I want to import these frames into QT7 to make a time lapse clip. Any suggestions

I have an image sequence in JPG that I want to import into quitck time 7 for making a time lapse clip.   It has an option to open the image sequence, but when I do, it only lets me highlight one frame at a time. The select all option seems to do nothing when I click on it trying to highlight all the frames.
      If QT7 is not designed to perform this function, is there another alternative?   iMovie is non intuitive for this kind of operation and I cannot find a clear tutorial for using it to make time lapse clips from a sequence of still frames.
       The tutorials Ive found on YouTube are well intended, but they all seem to leave out a vital step that eludes detection.
Anyway, any help appreciated.
Thanks
   I am new to this forum and I'm not sure I can locate this thread again once I'm out of it.
<Email Edited by Host>

Yes, I tried that.   The files were ordered by their original numbers as imported from the camera, but I batched them through Phocoshop to downsize all of them into a more manageable file size.   I opened that destination folder from quick time from where it said select image sequence.   I clicked on the first one and opened it.   The result was a large image with an arrow indicating a movie was ready to go.   When I pressed the arrow, though, I realized it had only imported that one frame so there was no movie.   The files are Jpgs and are about 450 KB each.
    To your knowledge are there any links to iMovie tutorials or quick time tutorials that may address this situation? Maybe there will be one I haven't looked at yet.
    Thanks

How to improve the execution time of my VI?

My vi does data processing for hundreds of files and takes more than 20 minutes to commplete. The setup is firstly i use the directory LIST function to list all the files in a dir. to a string array. Then I index this string array into a for loop, in which each file is opened one at a time inside the loop, and some other sub VIs are called to do data analysis. Is there a way to improve my execution time? Maybe loading all files into memory at once? It will be nice to be able to know which section of my vi takes the longest time too. Thanks for any help.

Bryan,
If "read from spreadsheet file" is the main time hog, consider dropping it! It is a high-level, very multipurpose VI and thus carries a lot of baggage around with it. (you can double-click it and look at the "guts" )
If the files come from a just executed "list files", you can assume the files all exist and you want to read them in one single swoop. All that extra detailed error checking for valid filenames is not needed and you never e.g. want it to popup a file dialog if a file goes missing, but simply skip it silently. If open generates an error, just skip to the next in line. Case closed.
I would do a streamlined low level "open->read->close" for each and do the "spreadsheet string to array" in your own code, optimized to the exact format of your files. For example, notice that "read from spreadheet file" converts everything to SGL, a waste of CPU if you later need to convert it to DBL for some signal processing anyway.
Anything involving formatted text is not very efficient. Consider a direct binary file format for your data files, it will read MUCH faster and take up less disk space.
LabVIEW Champion . Do more with less code and in less time .

Time Lapse in Photoshop elements 10

If someone could be so kind as to help with doing timelapse in Photoshop elements 10 from step one to finish. I have listened to youtube and researched on internet and still having problems? Help
Thank you
Greg
[email protected]

Is this Barbara Brundage, if so it is my pleasure to have an email from you. I have just received your book "the missing manual". Thank you for the answer I will look it up in "the missing manual" manual. Greg
Date: Sat, 16 Jun 2012 13:05:23 -0600
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: Time Lapse in Photoshop elements 10
    Re: Time Lapse in Photoshop elements 10
    created by Barbara B. in Photoshop Elements - View the full discussion
If you have windows, the easiest way to do this in PSE is to create a flipbook (Create>more options).
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Improving look of time lapse footage

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