Timescapes

September 22, 2009 12:36 PM

Mountain Lightis the latest beautiful time-lapse video from Tom at Timescapes. A little behind the scenes showing his dolly and camera setup in action. Check out his other videos, or follow him on Twitter.
posted by knave (18 comments total)

I wish vimeo would fix their skipping. I used to love watching videos on vimeo but now it is maddening.
posted by cashman at 12:45 PM on September 22 [3 favorites has favorites]

Wow, that was really nice and his dolly/platform is a beautiful piece of simple engineering. Thanks Knave.
posted by doctor_negative at 1:00 PM on September 22

Vimeos have always skipped for me. It's a shame.
posted by vronsky at 1:10 PM on September 22

Strange. I've never had that problem, even on perennially poorly-supported platforms like 64-bit Linux. Hopefully it doesn't happen to most of the people viewing this post.
posted by knave at 1:15 PM on September 22

monkeybrain sez: ook ook
posted by Palamedes at 1:18 PM on September 22

Yup, getting skipping/stuttering here. Had to bail out.
posted by languagehat at 1:29 PM on September 22

I'm not sure I agree that his dolly set-up is "simple engineering" but it's definitely envy-inspiring.
posted by twsf at 1:29 PM on September 22

(Protip: if you're using Firefox, go to about:config and tweak the value of browser.sessionstore.interval. By default this is like 5 seconds, increase as necessary; I think the value is in milliseconds. This can cause video stuttering. Via Mefi somewhere, but I can't recall where.)

Also: I wonder how he got meteors across multiple frames like that.
posted by neckro23 at 1:31 PM on September 22 [1 favorite has favorites]

^ Da plane, da plane!"
posted by Palamedes at 1:35 PM on September 22

I watched the behind the scenes video before watching the actual time-lapse and was wondering why he needed the dolly. After watch the videos themselves I can see why - and WOW.
posted by schwa at 1:42 PM on September 22

HD videos need video memory. If your machine isn't up to it, they won't play well. I turn HD off on Vimeo on my Netbook. They play great on my Mac Pro.

Re: The video. Beautiful, but I am dumbfounded at the watermark. He literally desecrated his own video, for what? Either show it as it's meant to be seen and deal with thieves as it comes up, or don't show it online at all. Don't ruin your own work in order to protect it.
posted by drjimmy11 at 2:06 PM on September 22

Wow, it really reminded me of home during that one part at 1:14, where the blacked out tree branches reach into the night sky like ebon fissures obliterating the stars.
posted by FatherDagon at 3:15 PM on September 22 [1 favorite has favorites]

Amazing stuff. I always get this dizzy feeling when I watch this kind of stuff, being reminded that we are constantly spinning around on some orb in space.

drjimmy11 I'm not really seeing the same dichotomy you are.
posted by CitrusFreak12 at 4:00 PM on September 22

i can't say i found the watermark all that egregious. and "desecrate?" really? like, i'm pretty sure he's got un-watermarked masters somewhere.

the generic, "quiet awe" orchestral soundtrack, however, was a bit much. i thought the videos were a good deal more impressive muted.
posted by wreckingball at 5:01 PM on September 22

Is there any way to find out what lens and camera settings he used to produce these? I'd love to read a tutorial on how to do this.
posted by mattn at 1:32 AM on September 23

I liked it, but felt there were too many scene changes to capture the beauty of individual places. I adore time lapse in general, and never tire of watching clouds morph.
posted by Goofyy at 5:25 AM on September 23

Is there any way to find out what lens and camera settings he used to produce these? I'd love to read a tutorial on how to do this.

I think he says he uses a Canon 5D MkII. I can only guess what the lens is, but from the grainy Youtube video, I'm guessing it's a Canon 16-35mm f2.8L.
posted by reformedjerk at 6:42 AM on September 23 [1 favorite has favorites]

Very nice shots - though the composition of some of them are certainly not innovative, but then it is quite a tip that he uses (and acknowledges) music from Baraka, which is pretty much the benchmark in this kind of photography.
posted by bouvin at 9:06 AM on September 23