Lima Crossroad

A nice timelapse bringing a three hour observation down to a gripping two minutes. It features on ly one scene, but the intensity of the cross road in view is quite fascinating. There is a vague eb and flow rhythm to it as a result of the stop and go traffic.

Besides the car traffic there is quite a lot of pedestrian movement along the side, across the roads, at the bus stop and around the phone box. The blue phone box is actually the very centre of the scene and serves for many additional functions. There are two guys using it to phone someone, but it also serves very well for leaning on.

The clip was shot by JustOneArtist using the Nokia N8 CameraPro App. It loos a bit clunky from the interface, but as you can see delivers great quality results. You can watch it ful screen in HD. JustOneArtist used a setting of every 3 sec. for 3 hours to take pictures. He also used After Effects to get the tilt shift effect in and add the sound.

Time Collapses

Time lapse video, as the title suggests, is much more dramatic as a time collapse. But its not far off and the notion of time folding into, or between the frames could be quite an interesting term. All of them imply the dropping of steps or frames, quite beautifully.

Video shot and directed by by Jean Grimard Gauthereau on Vimeo. He actually also composed the music to with the clip. It is great and creates a beautiful ambient to go with the flow of the scenery. He has some more very lovely clips on his vimeo page, for example the 'Like a Dream'.

Tokyo Flows - Rest and Rush

Flows of people and cars, full streets and walkways, platforms and crossings represent a dynamic urban metropolis in flux. Tokyo the 24 hour city is the ultimate density symbol and reference for flow representation.

Through out the clip the individuals find shelter, escape the rush and break out, rest and jump back in. Opportunities are multiple. There is a group of friends chatting in between a large body of pedestrians staying as the mass shifts by. Or the individuals that find shelter from the flow in the shadow of some pillars dividing the mass of people streaming by.

Interesting how architecture suddenly plays a different role in this context of temporal representation in the form of a timeLapse. Corners, bends or obstacles turn into havens for a timeout. All this is beautifully framed by Joe Wiecha. The images are shot before the earthquake earlier this month and we hope that the metropolis and the whole of Japan soon finds back to its routines. Tokyo time lapse feature also HERE and HERE earlier.

China From China

Joe Nafis has produce a great showreal timeLapse focusing on the own the work does for chinatimelpse of course in China. They are based on Shanghai and obviously feature the city prominently, but include some other tuff too, where they experiment with different style and techniques. You wont find the tilt shift missing in here.
Since China is the raising economic county there is a lot activity currently, some of it reflected here. For examples the Expo 2010 and the UK pavilion by Thomas Heatherwick. The in advance much hyped building was discussed controversially after the opening of the exhibition.


Image taken from Thomas Heatherwick / View of the UK pavilion together with the topographies it sits in.

For more of Joe's great timeLapse stuff visite his vimeo page, where he covers a number of other Asian cities.

Walking - Brooklyn in Steps of Four

Four steps, picture, four steps, picture, four steps picture, it must have counted him in such a sequence for the ret of the week after Ken Ardito finished his timeLapse 'Walking'. Exactly 743 times he's taken a picture after four steps. What's this thing with four steps?

Not sure but it works and the result is a a lovely stroll through Brooklyn, there is the bridge, some familiar high-rise buildings, a fright ship sails up the river and a ferry arrives. Just the normal day that is.

Slightly whitish in stile it flows in pairs of four, why not? Here you go.

Three Days Tokyo - TimeLapse

In a land fa far away three days can be endless. In tokyo the mother of all 24 hour cities this is definitely the case. However if you have time to spare and musse to dive into the endlessness you might as well become one with the place explore every inch.

In 'Totally Tokyo' Will Armitage has done exactly this and filled his camera with images on the way. THe result is this great timelapse, a never ending flood of people, building, roads and lights, infrastructure everywhere. A short personal portrait of a city that never sleeps in a far away land.

Sorry I'm late

A lovely timelapse movie on an all too familiar subject, being on time. This involves sometimes quite an effort to make it thought the wilderness of everyday street life scenes and manage the different modes of transport accordingly.

In this story directed by Tomas Mankovsky the guy does quite a number of stunts to get there. Some more details can be fond on the movie page including some making of shots, to the angles right, testing the frame rates and movement of the actors and of course the casting.


Image taken from Sorry-Im-late.com / The story board, simple but precise, see movie. Click for larger version.

Le Flâneur - Paris TimeLapse

A short trip to Paris and a great walk around the big name hot spots in the romantic capital of France.
As th etitle 'Le Flâneur' suggests, a trip in the tradition of the Situationists around Guy Debord in to the unknown of the city.

It is a project by Luke Shepard, he is a student at The American University of Paris.

Towards the end one escapes the night and crosses over into the day. I guess one of the best scenes ever so far in timelapse with the crossing of the river while traveling from the dark of nigh into the light of day!

Small World - the Shooting Continues

Some catching up with the Small World series produced by Dolphinners Films. It featured HERE earlier with the first three instalments. You might remember the runners in Race or the cuddling couples in Kiss or MyHometown where the shooting actually begann.

Not quite sure where this is taking us but the shooting continues. Actually it turns into a fully grown bloodbath sort of first person shooter or 'Moorhun' style (play HERE).

The series has in the mean time grown to a total of nine instalments. These being Destiny, Sneakers, Finding List - Shopping Center, Finding List - Seoul Sta. and Fireworks.

The last two are now much more engaging with the audience. In the 'Where is Wally' style the aim is to scan the scene and find the guy first. However the urban scenes and everyday setting of a metropolis proofs rather challenging and it requires a quick an sharp eye to pick one person out of the crowd, time is ticking.



Of course the answer is where it gets a bit messy. So take a deep breath ans check out how many you got right.



For more check out the 'spot the guy' at Seoul Station clip. First and second one here The series continues with number 9 'Fireworks' (make sure you watch this one right to the end, nothing is as it seems!).

Snow is in the Air

It is cold and dark and already January, meaning that we have seen these days for good and need to brake out and enjoy something fresh, something shiny, something joyful.
What better way than going out skiing on the perfect slopes and gliding down the hills finding the rhythm and letting go of anything else than this very moment.

For a perfect day out in the snow on the runs of Belalp, delphi brings a great tilt-shift to the channel. A timelapse capturing the bare essentials of a active winters day.

Drift - Morphing City

The ever changing perspective as we navigate the urban landscape is an important feature influencing the perception and in many ways influences how the space we create as we go along are experienced. It's not as if the street is existing, but it is renewed every time as a recreation of itself with a specific take.

Buildings feature in this process consciously as a back drop and the immediate focus is put on the objects whizzing about, to avoid potential collisions. The trajectories of these has to be continuously monitored and one's own path adjusted accordingly. It is a sort of negotiation between the elements that make use of their power to take decisions and with it continuously generate situations.

However, this consuming activity might in the long run is not be the main focus. Unconsciously the main focus might lay on the static frame and the defining elements as parameters of the room for action.

In this beautiful time lapse Theo Tagholm shows an interpretation of this spatiality of places from the perspective of one subject.

As it says in the description "I drift, half awake, half asleep. Moving through the city I recall but have never been to."
The clip is produced by Theo Tagholm, a video artist. He's got some other great video work. As linked here earlier with the clip Still Moving.

Life in the Line - A one Minute Clip

The experimenting with the SenseCam over the past summer month was great fun and the various contributors and participants have enjoyed the experience.
We are left with a huge pile of data that needs processing now and besides all the other stuff calling for attention it is sort of a tricky task. In total we snapped over 200'000 still images, that goes together with the data collected with the GPS that we attached to the SensCam. Additionally we of course also have the log files of the cameras own sensors.

To give a preview example of the temperature logged by the TMP sensor of the camera here is a Graph of this summers temperature. It wasn't too bad, was it this summer?


Image by single-blogs / Temperature curve over the recording period during the summer of 2010, as captured by the SenseCam Revue TMP sensor.

In terms of visualisation one of the main and intense aspect is the image processing and in a temporal sense the animation of this timelapse data makes sense. An earlier preview of some of the captured dat can be found HERE, together with some screen shots.

One of the participants, the artist Kai has also now processed the data she collected during one day of the experiment into a 1 minute clip, showing her every move, covering a mad range of activities. For detailed description and the longlist of different activities visit the artists website at 3rdlifekaidie.

TimeLapse is Growing up

TimeLapse has been sort of a niche thing with few geeks loving it and producing seductive clips. However these days seem now over and TimeLapse is becoming widely used and much more sophisticated. Different techniques and ways and subjects have been explored and developed, but now technology is moving in. The big shot cameras are getting more widely used and the built in features bring TimeLapse up to speed. However not only in the high end market but across the boards equipment, including post processing is easier accessible and simpler to handle wich makes the difference.

Now also the gadget are becoming more widely used and here we have two examples showing of the potential of motion controle equipment. The shots are very fascinating and truly take this genre to a next level.





The two videos are using different brands of motion controle equipment. The first one is testing a beta Stage Zero Motorized Timelapse Dolly developed by dynamicperception. and the second one is using a drive cam developed by dotgear. However both are still in development, but should be available for pre order.

Seattle Tilt Shift

"I'd like to be under the sea in an octopus's garden in the shade ..." Actually this great timeLapse has neither to do with the sea nor with an octopus, but the music used with it is great. This line of text and the tune might follow you through the day though, so be careful.
However, the clip gives you a peep preview of Seattle and as one of the comments on the Vimeo page in respons to the clip goes: "This has that real Seattle light to it..."
I especially like the sequence with the two boats and the pier rocking in the waves, probably only visible in the timeLapse replay.

TimeLapse Story - Little Dramas

dolphiners is a Korean movie and animation company who produces brilliant stuff. One of the lates works is the series Small Earth, a loose sequence of everyday stories focusing on the little pleasures in urban live. It does however also include the drama and twist of a real thriller, amazing.

The series is produces as stop motion animations using a tilt-shift effect to guide the focus.

Have a look at the most recent one 'The Race' and watch out for the blue and the yellow racers, they will take you on a journey with a rather dramatic finish. Catch up on the previeous three and a bit prequels HERE.

Poster Time Lapse - the Story Continues

It has been a bit more than a year that the great timeLapse short story produced by Olympus for the PEN cam featured HERE. You might recall it, the life told in thousands of images taken printed and retaken as a stop motion animation, lovely.

Here comes no the second take on the same product comes as a XXXXXL version - PEN Giant.

SnowDay

A winterday as one is dreaming of. Winter holiday in Lenzerheide, Switzerland.
This clip was shot with an iPhone 3GS using timeLapse and edited in Quick Time. Music by Ceilí Moss 'Ship of Fools' on mp3unsigned.com.
It isn't really the season for this kind of activity, but it is sort of a teaser for the coming winter month that will hopefully be as beautiful as it was last year.

Remembering the Day - Imaging Activities

Do you remember what you did just forty minutes ago, or maybe over lunch or just after you got up this early morning?
Maybe roughly and most likely you could piece it back together using key frames of memory constructing a sort of narrative reaching close to the area in question.

As a sort of extension of the UrbanDiary project, where GPS technology is used to trace the spatial extension of an everyday routine, timeLapse technology is used to frame individual activities and record a massive pool of images documenting an individuals day.


Image by single-blogs for UrbanDiary / Everyday situation recorded with the ViconRevue during the initial trials in August 2010. The perspective is something the viewer has to get used to.

The technology used is a ViconRevue cam. It is based on the Microsoft SensCam discussed in another post. From the distance, not having had the chance to test the device, the impression was not too convincing. However now, having used it for a coupe of days, taken a few thousand snaps, it has to be said that it work really well.

Vicom describes the product everywhere as a memory suport and uses a couple of medical studies where the Revenue is used by patients suffering memory loss, brain injuries or Alzheimer. In the current setting we are focusing on urban and city navigation, differences of activities in a number of spatial configuration. For this we have coupled the camera with a GPS device inorder to trace the spatial movement.




Image by single-blogs for UrbanDiary / Everyday situation recorded with the ViconRevue during the initial trials in August 2010. The available privacy button gives a 4minute time-out, but usually this is over in the very wrong moment.

It does help a bit with the remembering of specific situations. However the perspective is something one has to get use to. It si not exactly the belly button view, but slightly higher. More strange it is the sort of Doom/Quake perspective with one's own hands constantly in the frame that distracts from the actual activity documented. It is your personal first person shooter perspective.

The installation and managing of the camera and data surprisingly works on a Mac as well as a Windows machine. It uses the Adobe AIR (Adobe Integrated Runtime) technology.
Best surprise was the accessibility of a CSV fiel that actually stores the sensor information for each captured image. The camera uses, in addition to a timer, several sensors to trigger the capturing of an image. This should ensure an image being captured at every change of environment. However, in the accompanying documentation Vicom does not reveal what sort of sensors there are integrated wiht the cam. There is a brightness sensor, maybe a motion sensor? but not sure what else there might be. The CSV file should reveal more details.

Not convincing is the desktop software to review the captured material. Maybe there is less function on the mac version, but even with establishing the various folders the app has difficulties. It did corrupt some of the days and is not willing to show the material unlike for other days where it works perfectly. Handling is tricky and the only option given is a note box either for full albums or individual images. There is not option to sort the images other than by album which is based on time and date.

We will keep working with the as part of the UrbanDiary project in collaboration with the New Scientist. A variety of different participants will contribute glimpses of their everyday lives over the coming weeks. We will keep you posted for update.


Music 'Ain't my Night to Drive' taken from mp3unsigned by Jennifer Riddle.

Small StreetLife

A new streetlife clip by Christoph Schaarschmidt. A nice collection of rooftop perspectives.
Music: billionaire versus bear "Oh my, what are they doing?" He has put it forwards as his entry for the "Digital Reportage Award 2010". The topic was to produce a short video showing "Streetlife". You can vote for this entry on the competition site.

City Groove - Tokyo

Tokyo the dense city with the many lights, buzzing streets and total anonymity in the crowd. Or as here the beautiful place, sitting in context between speed rail and the colour changing sky.

Produced by Stefan Werc on a Canon 7D, music, Broadcast 2000 "get up and go" broadcast2000.co.uk

Get up and go from Stefan Werc on Vimeo.