Ever wanted to create your own time lapse video? Well today I'm looking at two very interesting gadgets from Alpine Labs that make creating this visual feats of eye-candy much easier. In fact, you can even use your smartphone set them up, after which nearly any camera can be used too.
While smartphones have taken huge bites out of the dedicated camera industry, there's still a huge market for DSLRs. In fact, there are plenty regular incredible viral photos and videos that were created on a DSLR and for the most part, it would be impossible to create them on any other device.
Time lapses, though, can be created on most devices these days from Go Pro's to iPhones but if you take your time lapses seriously then the former Kickstarter-funded company has two devices that allow you to use your smartphone to control your time lapses.
Firstly there's the Radian. As its name suggests, we're not just talking about a device that can just tell your camera to take thousands of photos for a time lapse. The Radian can rotate your camera too, creating a panning time lapse that moves across an object or landscape. It uses an internal motor that's powered by a USB-charged internal battery.
The impact of movement on a time lapse is profound, as it gives the video a real-time perspective, even though minutes or even hours have passed in a short video. The Radian can sit on a flat surface or be mounted to a tripod and it rotates horizontally. In the kit a support arm is included that allows you to mount it for vertical pans too and you can of course combine two radians as well plus if your device has its own built-in time lapse control, such as an iPhone or GoPro, you can simply mount it to the Radian for a panning effect to be added to your time lapse too.
The Michron is a simpler device that just allows you to control a DSLR using a smartphone. You have the same control over the time lapse settings in terms of number of exposures and frame rate, except it doesn't have the Radian's rotating ability. Both devices use a free app that's available for Android and iOS devices. You dial in your settings, plug your smartphone into the Michron or Radian using the headphone jack, and upload your time lapse configuration.
The devices connect directly to a DSLR and control it in the same way as a remote trigger via the 3.5mm jack that's present on most DSLRs. All the cables you need are included and once you've uploaded your time lapse, you can disconnect your smartphone. The app will keep running, though, and tells you how many shots have been taken as well as providing a countdown to when your time lapse will end - useful if you've driven somewhere remote and want to kick back in the car for an hour or two.
The smartphone apps are specific to each device but much of the actual time lapse configuration is the same. You tell the devices how long you want to keep taking photos for and how often to release the shutter, as well as the target frame rate. You can then see how long the resulting video will be, so if you want a to shoot over a one hour period using a 25fps video and 5 seconds between each photo, the resulting video will be 29 seconds long and require 720 photos.
There are more advanced options too, such as Bulb Ramping, which can alter the exposure during the time lapse, Interval Ramping, which can change the shutter release interval mid time lapse and also HDR, with multiple images being taken per shot. With the Radian app, you also get to configure the rotation angle and direction, with the Radian itself offering a preview mode so you can check for clearance if your camera is close to other objects.
Of course, it wouldn't be a proper investigation if I didn't create time lapses myself so here are two I made with just an hour or two's practise - they really are that easy to use. These are best-viewed in HD
There's a slight wobble/choppiness to the Radian time lapse and this was due to high winds on site that were unavoidable, making the camera sway slightly. Apart from this, though, the results are fantastic. To actually create the time lapse, you can use Google's Picasa image editing program, which includes a free video editor that can create a time lapse from a collection of photos.
With your photos selected, go to Create>Video>From Selection and under the video tab in the box that appears, find Transition Style and select Time Lapse. You're able to alter the slide duration - the length of time each photo is displayed, plus the output resolution of the video. It's worth remembering that if you intend to create a 1080p video, that you don't need to shoot above this resolution when starting a time lapse run - this can save a lot of space on your memory card.
The Radian retails for $249 while the Michron costs $59 although Alpine Labs does also ship internationally. Let me know what you think in the comments below, in Twitter - @antonyleather or on my Facebook page.
