In the end I did find a program which will automatically convert a series of jpg stills to a video. VideoMach is a fairly versatile program. It is possible to adjust colour balance, add text and resize or crop amongst other facilities. The program can be run for free. All functions work. The only thing different is that it adds the program name to the bottom of the first second of the final video. Not a great problem. VideoMach produces an Mpeg1 file and YouTube didn't really like that so I used Ulead Video Studio 11+ to re-save it as Mpeg2.
My second attempt was clouds again. I decreased the time interval between photos to about 1 every 11 seconds. It still looks jerky but I think that is partly due to the speed the clouds were travelling across the sky.
I tried another batch later on with 1 shot per 5 seconds and that looked a lot better. Unfortunately the series was not very long as the camera battery ran out. I must remember to turn off the camera LCD screen to save power. I think another problem I have found is in the circuit design. The 555 timer chip is voltage sensitive so the timing will change as the 9V battery runs down. I have a solution for that which I will try later but it involves using a larger 12V gell cell - no so portable!
Tuesday, 15 June 2010
Monday, 14 June 2010
Foal
A couple of days ago while out walkies I spotted a mare with her foal but photo opportunities were difficult as the foal was taking a well earned nap and the camera battery ran out.
Yesterday when we passed the same spot the foal was up and about and a short wait enabled me to get a good view albeit a distant one.
I also took a bit of video as I was using the TZ7. This is a still from the widescreen video.
I have recently found a program called VideoMach which will automatically combine jpg photos to make a video. Another facility it has is to crop a video. This is what I did with the following clip. I lost some of the surrounding scenery by cropping a 640 x 480 section.
The TZ7 was hand held in one hand (Bobby's lead was in the other) and the full 12x zoom had to be used so the result is a bit on the wobbly side. That is not Bobby barking!
Yesterday when we passed the same spot the foal was up and about and a short wait enabled me to get a good view albeit a distant one.
I also took a bit of video as I was using the TZ7. This is a still from the widescreen video.
I have recently found a program called VideoMach which will automatically combine jpg photos to make a video. Another facility it has is to crop a video. This is what I did with the following clip. I lost some of the surrounding scenery by cropping a 640 x 480 section.
The TZ7 was hand held in one hand (Bobby's lead was in the other) and the full 12x zoom had to be used so the result is a bit on the wobbly side. That is not Bobby barking!
Sunday, 13 June 2010
Time Lapse Photography + FireFox Flash Problem
For some time now I have been taking the RSS feed from DIY Photography. A few days ago there was an article explaining how Marco Jetti made an electronic circuit to take time lapse photos with his Canon DSLR. The article may be read HERE. There is a link to the circuit diagram but layout is up to the builder.
This idea took my imagination so I decided to have a go at building the circuit to operate my 350D. I stripped out the old contents from a project box I had been given years ago and set about searching my junk boxes to find the parts I needed. The original used a photo isolator chip to trigger the camera but I don't have one of those so I used a small relay instead. It took me most of yesterday afternoon, my eyesight and soldering skills not being what they used to be. Well, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it. Eventually I ended up with this:
Not the world's neatest layout but it worked! Controls allow time lapse from 1 photo every 4 seconds to 1 every 48 seconds. The circuit is powered by a small 9V battery and the black wire is from a cable release for the 350D with the push button replaced by the contacts in the orange relay.
After my evening meal I set up the camera in the kitchen, on a sturdy tripod, and set the intervalometer (as people like to call the circuit) to its maximum and left it to it for a couple of hours. The camera was using the M setting which happened to be set to 1/200 at f11. To get the fading daylight it was necessary to use a manual setting. Also as high resolution photos were not needed for the final movie I set the photo size to S.
The next task was to convert the resulting 120+ photos to a video. I had downloaded a free program which was supposed to do this automatically but it failed miserably. Next I tried loading the photos in Windows Movie Maker but it wanted to show each picture for too long and the result was very jerky. In the end I used Ulead Video Studio 11+. A bit better but it needed two goes to get it looking reasonable. The first run through made a video with each frame being shown for one second. The shortest available in the program. When that video was saved I reloaded it and saved it again only this time speeded up 900 pc! This is the result:
Still a bit jerky. Future attempts need to use a shorter time interval between shots, maybe one every ten seconds to give a smoother result. As the resulting set of photos will run into hundreds I need to find a working program which will do the job of making the video automatically. It is no fun pasting each one individually into the time line in Video Studio.
If you don't fancy an exercise in soldering then there is at least one other way of achieving the same result, one of which can be found on the Instructables web site. This method uses a Texas Instruments graphing calculator to do the timing and triggering of the camera. You can read about it HERE. I have not tried this method but understand it should work with the TI-82 TI-83 TI-84 and TI-89.
PROBLEM WITH FIREFOX AND FLASH
Last night I got an automatic update for Adobe Flash but since then no flash will work in Firefox. It is fine in Opera and IE. I have tried to download the needed plugin but all attempts have failed. Anybody else with the same problem? Better still does anyone have a solution as I cannot see any movie files in Firefox at the moment.
This idea took my imagination so I decided to have a go at building the circuit to operate my 350D. I stripped out the old contents from a project box I had been given years ago and set about searching my junk boxes to find the parts I needed. The original used a photo isolator chip to trigger the camera but I don't have one of those so I used a small relay instead. It took me most of yesterday afternoon, my eyesight and soldering skills not being what they used to be. Well, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it. Eventually I ended up with this:
Not the world's neatest layout but it worked! Controls allow time lapse from 1 photo every 4 seconds to 1 every 48 seconds. The circuit is powered by a small 9V battery and the black wire is from a cable release for the 350D with the push button replaced by the contacts in the orange relay.
After my evening meal I set up the camera in the kitchen, on a sturdy tripod, and set the intervalometer (as people like to call the circuit) to its maximum and left it to it for a couple of hours. The camera was using the M setting which happened to be set to 1/200 at f11. To get the fading daylight it was necessary to use a manual setting. Also as high resolution photos were not needed for the final movie I set the photo size to S.
The next task was to convert the resulting 120+ photos to a video. I had downloaded a free program which was supposed to do this automatically but it failed miserably. Next I tried loading the photos in Windows Movie Maker but it wanted to show each picture for too long and the result was very jerky. In the end I used Ulead Video Studio 11+. A bit better but it needed two goes to get it looking reasonable. The first run through made a video with each frame being shown for one second. The shortest available in the program. When that video was saved I reloaded it and saved it again only this time speeded up 900 pc! This is the result:
Still a bit jerky. Future attempts need to use a shorter time interval between shots, maybe one every ten seconds to give a smoother result. As the resulting set of photos will run into hundreds I need to find a working program which will do the job of making the video automatically. It is no fun pasting each one individually into the time line in Video Studio.
If you don't fancy an exercise in soldering then there is at least one other way of achieving the same result, one of which can be found on the Instructables web site. This method uses a Texas Instruments graphing calculator to do the timing and triggering of the camera. You can read about it HERE. I have not tried this method but understand it should work with the TI-82 TI-83 TI-84 and TI-89.
PROBLEM WITH FIREFOX AND FLASH
Last night I got an automatic update for Adobe Flash but since then no flash will work in Firefox. It is fine in Opera and IE. I have tried to download the needed plugin but all attempts have failed. Anybody else with the same problem? Better still does anyone have a solution as I cannot see any movie files in Firefox at the moment.
Friday, 11 June 2010
Friday at the Flicks (Hungry Hedgehogs, Hungry Jackdaws)
In spite of the rain a couple of nights ago the juvenile Hedgehogs paid several visits to the feeding area. In this video the captures have been speeded up to show the full night's activity.
As often seems to happen there was one altercation during the night where Hooligan the Hedgehog charges at the other juvenile. The victim curls up in a ball and I can't quite make out whether it carries on eating or whether it is licking an injured foot. Rain on the camera makes the picture somewhat blurred.
Last night there was a youngster crunching away at the dried mealworms when Bobby and I went out for a last look round the garden. The Hedgehog carried on eating for a short while before making a dash for the shelter of the Hedgehog House, returning to eat once we had gone back indoors.
This clip of Jackdaws was taken some while ago. It always makes me smile watching the one on the right. After it falls off it spends a while trying to puzzle out why the other Jackdaw can reach the food more easily that it can.
Have a great weekend observing the wildlife wherever you are.
As often seems to happen there was one altercation during the night where Hooligan the Hedgehog charges at the other juvenile. The victim curls up in a ball and I can't quite make out whether it carries on eating or whether it is licking an injured foot. Rain on the camera makes the picture somewhat blurred.
Last night there was a youngster crunching away at the dried mealworms when Bobby and I went out for a last look round the garden. The Hedgehog carried on eating for a short while before making a dash for the shelter of the Hedgehog House, returning to eat once we had gone back indoors.
This clip of Jackdaws was taken some while ago. It always makes me smile watching the one on the right. After it falls off it spends a while trying to puzzle out why the other Jackdaw can reach the food more easily that it can.
Have a great weekend observing the wildlife wherever you are.
Thursday, 10 June 2010
Make Your Nature Count - Count
Not exactly the weather for nature photography, dull grey skies with periods of rain. While tomorrow's video clips were uploading to YouTube I decided to spend the time making my count for the RSPB Make Your Nature Count event.
During the hour the following birds visited the garden:
1 Great Tit
1 Blue Tit
1 Coal Tit
1 Collared Dove
2 Chaffinches
3 Blackbirds
3 Goldfinches
3 Greenfinches
3 House Sparrows
5 Wood Pigeons
5 Jackdaws
9 Starlings
Also added to my record was the fact that Hedgehogs visit the garden daily.
Amongst the normal visitors which were conspicuous by their absence were Robins, Dunnocks, Rooks, Magpies and Stock Doves.
If you live in the UK and want to take part in the Make Your Nature Count event there is still time. Details can be found HERE on the RSPB site.
During the hour the following birds visited the garden:
1 Great Tit
1 Blue Tit
1 Coal Tit
1 Collared Dove
2 Chaffinches
3 Blackbirds
3 Goldfinches
3 Greenfinches
3 House Sparrows
5 Wood Pigeons
5 Jackdaws
9 Starlings
Also added to my record was the fact that Hedgehogs visit the garden daily.
Amongst the normal visitors which were conspicuous by their absence were Robins, Dunnocks, Rooks, Magpies and Stock Doves.
If you live in the UK and want to take part in the Make Your Nature Count event there is still time. Details can be found HERE on the RSPB site.
Wednesday, 9 June 2010
Pond Snails (video)
I had spotted a newt in the garden pond and dashed inside to get the TZ7 to take a bit of video. By the time I got back to the pond it had disappeared but in its place was the largest Rams Horn pond snail I have seen. It was a good inch (25mm) in size. Not the best of video clips as it was beginning to get dark and the reflections on the surface of the water were hard to cut out. Next to the Rams Horn Snail were a couple of Great Pond Snails which ended up hitching a lift on the Rams Horn.
The Rams Horn was a rare sighting in my pond. This one must be a fair age by the size of it. All the pond snails are very welcome in the pond as they spend their lives munching away at the algae.
The Rams Horn was a rare sighting in my pond. This one must be a fair age by the size of it. All the pond snails are very welcome in the pond as they spend their lives munching away at the algae.
Tuesday, 8 June 2010
Wanted - Hedgehog ASBO
Talk about an unprovoked attack. I think one youngster needs an ASBO banning it from coming within 2 metres of any other Hedgehog.
I am still keeping an eye on the garden pond for signs of winged life. So far I have only seen two damselflies:
A Blue-tailed Damselfly
A Common Blue Damselfly
The few really hot days we had recently have also brought out the first of the pond lilies.
I am still keeping an eye on the garden pond for signs of winged life. So far I have only seen two damselflies:
A Blue-tailed Damselfly
A Common Blue Damselfly
The few really hot days we had recently have also brought out the first of the pond lilies.
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