The iPhone can do more than just shoot photos and videos. With the time lapse function you can also make cool time lapse videos. In this article you can read what you should pay attention to.
A timelapse looks spectacular very quickly. It is a movie in which everything is played very quickly. In the evening, for example, a highway seems to change into stripes of car headlights and you see clouds in the sky expand and contract at breakneck speed. A sunset also looks beautiful immediately.
The good news is that you can create a timelapse yourself very easily. This feature was added to the iPhone’s Camera app with iOS 8. Because the camera of the newer iPhones, especially those of the iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro, are very good, you can also make beautiful videos with your smartphone.
In this article you will not only read how making a timelapse works, but also what the underlying technique is and how you can best get a good result.
1. Make an iPhone timelapse
Let’s start at the beginning. To make a timelapse you only need an iPhone. Follow these steps:
- Open the Camera app on your iPhone;
- Just above the shutter button, swipe right until ‘Time Lapse’ is selected;
- Place the iPhone in the right place and tap the record button;
- Once you’re done, press the record button again to stop the time lapse.
You will find the timelapse in the Photo app.
2. Speed ​​of the movie
And yet there are some things to keep in mind to create the perfect iPhone time-lapse movie. Almost any movie you make with the Time-lapse feature ends in a video that lasts 20 to 40 seconds. It does not matter whether you have recorded for half an hour or an hour and a half. Studio Neat figured out how that could be done and came up with the diagram below. In it you can see that depending on how long you record, Apple speeds up the video.
If your video is less than 10 minutes long, the Camera app takes two images every second. If your video is longer than an hour and twenty minutes, it will only record one frame every eight seconds. The video is then accelerated 240 times compared to reality. A ten minute video is only speeded up 15 times. So keep this in mind if you are taking a picture and you want to determine to some extent how fast the movement in the picture should be, because you cannot set this manually.
3. Even faster with the app
Do you want to make the movie even faster or make a difference in speed? Then you can use apps. Studio Neat has already been discussed above, but they have also created an app that allows you to adjust the speed of videos. With the Slow Fast Slow app, you can speed up or slow down videos very easily. You drag dots up to make it go faster and down to slow it down. That gives a very cool effect, as if you were fast-forwarding a time lapse. The app also works very well with slow motion images. Below you can download it for free.
4. Use a tripod
Recording a timelapse takes a lot of time anyway. You can take a 15-minute shot, but images of half an hour or longer are often a lot nicer. It is therefore not possible to shoot images from the free wrist, because that causes jerks in the video. It is therefore best to use a tripod, or at least to place your iPhone firmly away, so that the frames remain the same.
Online there are various tripods where you can slide or click the iPhone easily. There are the standard tripods with three legs for sturdiness, but you can also choose tripods with flexible legs. You can bend it around fences or posts, for example, so that you have a tripod at hand for almost every location.
5. Go outside
You can of course record a timelapse from your window, especially if you have a nice view. But if you have the choice, put your iPhone outside. This way you prevent reflection in the window from ruining your recording. This can come from other windows or light, but also due to the reflection of your iPhone. In addition, possible dirt on the window is often unavoidable.
6. Choose the best angle
If you can, walk around for the best shot. Where does the setting sun go and how do you best picture it? Is a certain image perhaps more beautiful from the other side? Always try to find the best location and the right composition. That is the difference between a good time lapse and a spectacular time lapse.
More photo tips
Do you want to get more out of your iPhone’s camera? On iPhone you can regularly read useful tips to take the best photos with your iPhone. We have listed 8 important iOS Camera app tips for you. Do you have the latest iPhone 12 at home? Then you can read 7 important camera tips for the iPhone 12 (Pro) on our site. If you’d like to try a different photo app, give our site tips about the Halide Mark II camera app.
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