Hello /p/, I was asked the other day to create a list of all the essential things when it comes to making a time lapse.
I thought this would be a easy job, it turns out I underestimated this challenge.
What I started out with in my planning:
- GoPro Hero 4 silver
- 128GB SD card
But I just received a mail with the total time:
- 115 days
Form what I've read the gopro will take picture ranging from 5 MB to 7 MB(estimated) so I calculated and I got this:
60*24*115=165600 pictures
and if we say that every picture is 6 MB then we end up with:
165600*6=993600MB
which is the equivalent of
993600/1024=970GB
My question to you how would you go about making something like this?
>>2777042
Think about it for a second.
Where on earth would you present 165600 frames?
At 24 fps it's 6900 seconds, a.k.a. almost a two hour movie of your amazing timelapse.
Question is, is this what you want to create? I honestly doubt it, so in case you want a steady timelapse over 115 days (with day and night flicker included) for a more reasonable timeframe, say 2 minutes you need to take 60 times fewer pictures = one an hour.
I doubt a Gopro is the right tool for that job - especially keeping in mind the battery - in case it's a looking out the office window sorta thing you could connect it to a computer (I suppose you can use a raspberry pie etc.) and trigger the cam every hour and make sure it does not move. For the cam for proper results you can use a Canon rebel and shoot it raw or a higher level webcam if that's good enough for you.
>>2777046
You have some good points.
I guess that I should've added more information to my initial question. We're going to film a house being built so if it would be possible to make something that took pictures from 8am to 4pm that would be the best.
By doing so I would have roughly 55000 pictures.
the power wouldn't be a problem as it could be connected to a power outlet throughout the project.
>>2777059
That's still 40 minutes, but if that's what you guys watch at family gatherings then you know, why not.
start with the time length the timelapse should have
divide it through 25 (cause 25 fps)
divide the result through 115
-> now you know how many pictures you want to shoot each day
you face tougher problems when it comes to post processing, as you for sure will have very different light in the photos
>>2777080
additional comment:
i've not worked with a gopro yet so i don't know what features it offers. the best option would be if you could set the brightness to a fixed value(?). if that isn't possible you need to fix the darker frames in post production, there are tools but idk much about that.
also you need a spot where you can place the gopro, that protects it against heavy storm and, of course, thieves. you need a stable tripod.
another point: you need a reliable power source and an adapter. you can't run the gopro on battery over that time span.
you also might want to film with two gopros so if one fails, you still have the material from the other one.
I appreciate all the help! When it comes to the time couldn't I speed it up in at a later point? this might look strange though.
As stated in a earlier post power wouldn't be problem as we're going to mount it on a wall. Hope this answers most of the questions(I know I was pretty vague in the original comment)
They want to buy the GoPro so that can use it at a later date with a quad copter.
I guess I will have to do allot of work in post processing using lwks or something. Thank you guys for all the help! I will study more and post here tomorrow if the thread is still up.
DSLR, Eye-Fi card, AC/DC to battery adapter (plugs cam directly into mains power)?
>>2777215
Would also need a laptop plugged into mains power to receive the photos onto an external or large internal drive.
Just use an old laptop + a webcam.
>>2777080
>>2777179
err it was late at night and i made a mistake: you have to MULTIPLY with 25, not divide.
ie if you want the timelapse to be 60 seconds long:
60x25/115=13,xxx
that is the amount of photos you have to take each day
if you want to know the interval in which you shoot the photos you calculate slightly different:
(real time you want to have in the timelapse in seconds) / ((length of timelapse)x(fps))
ie if you want to shoot a time span of 1 hour and the timelapse should be 60 seconds long:
3600/(60x25)=2,4
=> you would have to shoot a picture every 2,4 seconds
After a lot of consideration we have decided to go with a canon EOS camera using the eos utilities to set it up as a web cam and taking pictures straight to a external 1TB HDD
Thanks to everyone who contributed with this! I can finally get some rest, from this mini project.
If someone wonders why I would go about using a canon EOS it's ease of use for the lesser technical people that will eventually use this system.
