Time Lapse capturing (via software) CS4?

[Jason Foster]

Now that I'm up with CS4, I've been wanting to start recapturing some time lapse shots and capture TL shots that I never took off the tapes.

I've noticed that Premiere doesn't seem to have the Stop Motion feature anymore. Help search says OnLocation does it, but I can't seem to find how to do it there yet. I read some places (via forums) that Adobe actually dropped the Stop Motion option in CS4. However someone else said they have done it (and I'm sure there is a way to still do time lapse shots) in CS4, but I couldn't get details.

What are folks using (on PC/Windows platforms) for capturing those time lapse shots?

 

[Thomas Dolmer]

Hi Jason,

I can recommend Apple Quicktime. You can select a series of images, chose frame rate etc, and QT will make a movie out of them. Works like a charm...
I use it on images captured with my DSLR + a remote timer.
That way i get the full 15 MPixel resolution. I can then zoom, pan etc. on the final movie and still get a decent resolution.

 

[cedwards]

I also have CS4.
The way I do it is just capture the entire video then right-click the video clip and select speed/duration. I can then speed it up to whatever I want even negative values if you want to make an anticyclonic storm

 

[Jason Foster]

Hi Jason,

I can recommend Apple Quicktime. You can select a series of images, chose frame rate etc, and QT will make a movie out of them. Works like a charm...
I use it on images captured with my DSLR + a remote timer.
That way i get the full 15 MPixel resolution. I can then zoom, pan etc. on the final movie and still get a decent resolution.

I was looking into TL using my camera too. Thanks for the bonus info. I will check that out.

 

[D. Hayes]

If you have a Canon you may be able to do this CHDK hack to get automated time lapse. I did this to my A640 and love it.

http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK

 

[Allan Jeffers]

check out timescapes.org

I agree about using quick time pro, its about 35 bucks after tax, simple to use.

 

[Jason Foster]

I also have CS4.
The way I do it is just capture the entire video then right-click the video clip and select speed/duration. I can then speed it up to whatever I want even negative values if you want to make an anticyclonic storm

What has been the highest percentage you've pushed? I wanted to take a 61 minute TL and bring down to around 2minutes...somewhere around 4000%, but Pr didn't like it and locked up.

 

[Ben Holcomb]

When you say Premiere locked up, did it become unresponsive for a long time or did it actually crash? What kind of hardware specs are you running?

61 minutes would probably take some considerable RAM and CPU. Premiere should do it though.

 

[Tony Perkins]

There are also free programs like FFMpeg and Mencoder/mplayer that can assemble frames into a movie.

 

[michaelmcqueen]

sometimes with premiere you'll have to crunch it down time wise, say half and then export it. bring it back in and then crunch it down again. its been years since i've used premiere and i remember it being buggy with high speed percentages.

 

[Jason Foster]

When you say Premiere locked up, did it become unresponsive for a long time or did it actually crash? What kind of hardware specs are you running?

61 minutes would probably take some considerable RAM and CPU. Premiere should do it though.

Yeah...after 15 minutes I did an end process. I don't know technically if it locked up or was just stagnant (from processing).

 

[Jason Foster]

Reviving this old thread as I'm still looking for good video time lapse software. I now have the Canon 7D so I can shoot HD quality stills & video...and already have a few video (.mov) clips I want to time lapse.

CS4 won't do what I want. Mostly because my computer won't handle the file size. This is especially true when trying to change the duration/speed (described early in the thread). With the full HD 1920x1080....it needs super serious power (that my Core2 Duo can't handle). What I've ultimately always wanted was a program that does what Premiere 6.0 did, Motion Capture. Essentially taking only a few frames per second of the 30 frames of the normal video). It worked great back in the SD days...but CS4 (and probably early versions) dropped that feature.

I haven't yet attempted the TL method taking stills. This is mostly due to the fact I just haven't yet purchased a remote release (waiting to get one with lots of controls). If folks think that is the only route with the HDSLR cameras...let me know.