Timelapse video

Been playing again with creating timelapse video sequences and now I understand the process much better.

Firstly, unless you really need the extra resolution (i.e. perhaps you plan to zoom in on a section of video for example), then the camera can be set to its lowest JPEG image setting. In the case of my 550D this happened to be 2592 x 1728 which is obviously much higher than is needed for standard 1080P HD video.

Secondly, as most DSLR cameras take their pictures with an aspect ratio of 3:2, we need to ensure that when exporting the image sequence to 1920 x 1080, that the aspect ratio is preserved, otherwise horizontal stretching will occur.

Any way, the way I carried out my timelapse was to record a series of images every 5 seconds (using Magic Lantern's built in intervalometer) and to simply then take these into Quicktime Player 7 using its "OPEN IMAGE SEQUENCE" option.

Upon doing this, a window will appear asking what frame rate to use - I simply chose the standard PAL of 25fps.

The sequence can then be exported and I chose to use Apple ProRes LT (in case I wanted to take the finished video in a FCP project) with a resolution of 1920 x 1080. IMPORTANT: you need to make sure that PRESERVE ASPECT RATIO using CROP is selected to ensure that the resultant video file is not stretched.

Job done!