Motion-Control TIME-LAPSE samples
Monument Valley; Moab, Utah; Bozeman,
Montana; etc…
Time-lapse shot utilizing my portable
motion-control head. This device can be mounted on sticks [as the majority
of the samples were shot] or on an 8’ long mo-co programmable track.
I tried to emphasize the motion of the
clouds by panning against their travel. Special attention in programming
needs to factor in the speed of the actual cloud formations as well
as the solar travel of the sun & shadows.
In shooting desert time-lapse, you are
often faced with a cloudless scene. You then have to decide do you have
the production time to shoot extended periods of time to get actual
solar movement of sun & shadows or scrap the day. The sun [usually]
moves a heck of a lot slower than clouds, and if the only motion you
can capture is traveling shadows, try to factor in where would be the
most visually evident section of the environment in which to capture
this motion.
Additionally, desert shooting requires
long periods of time where the sun bakes your gear. Most motion picture
cameras are painted black or dark gray...this gets incredibly hot when
blasted by the direct sun for hour upon hour. 35mm film can get ruined
in such a super hot environment! I hit the grocery store at these locations
and bought a roll of aluminum foil, wrap every exposed surface of the
camera & head & battery with it.
At 109 degrees in the desert, I bet the
exposed metal of the camera probably got another +30 degrees if not
more.
Most of these scenes were shot on Bureau
of Land Management land [except for the mountain range pan from Bozeman
where we mistakenly ended up on Dennis Quaid’s ranch and were chased
by a shotgun wielding ranch-hand!!]. One strange story was when I was
shooting way way out in Moab, jeep only accessibly area. It was mid
afternoon about 106 in the shade and I had the camera programmed to
shoot 1 frame every 27 seconds for a duration of 5 or 6 hours. I snoozed
in my rented jeep when suddenly I hear a load motor and look up to see
a huge full size RV pulling up in front of my camera! Some dude jumps
out and stands right in front of the camera trying to see what it was
shooting. “Click” goes the camera! It was a non-English speaking
German tourist who had rented this RV and somehow managed to get it
way way out in the desert!
Needless to say, with a motion-controlled
pan shot [even time-lapse] you cannot remove that one frame and get
a smooth move. Ruined!!
BTW, everything was shot with my Arriflex
35-3 with a Norris Intervalometer and a capping shutter. NEVER let anyone
tell you that you cannot shoot time-lapse with a 35-3…this is proof!