Time-Lapse smartphone photography

The Van Wert Area Photography Club will meet Thursday, April 12, at 114 S. Race St. in Van Wert. Plans for the remaining year and financial reports are on the agenda.  Visitors are welcome.

This week’s topic is shooting a time-lapse sequence with an iPhone 8. It is done by opening your camera and swiping right till Time-Lapse is directly above the red record button.  What you will be doing is taking a large number of photos over a long period of time and then putting them together to show the action in a brief period of time. Anything that moves slowly such as drifting clouds, a flower opening at the start of the day, or the tide coming in or out would make good subjects. However, active subjects could also be captured.

Consider trimming the Christmas tree, painting a room, or the bustle of shoppers that could be speeded up for viewing to communicate the energy being exerted in the activity.

The phone will need to be locked on a tripod, the scene composed by spreading your thumb and finger on the screen to move closer to the action or pinching them to back away from the action.  Tap the screen and keep contact where the action will be located till the AE/AF appears to assure that the auto focus is activated.

You can brighten or dim the exposure by moving the slider along this area with your finger. When everything is ready, tap the record button and let the phone do its thing till you tap the button again to stop recording.

The phone will piece all the frames together and the finished product will appear at the bottom corner.  Tap on it to see if you have what you want, or locate it later in the Time-Lapse album in Photos.  You may want to do a search on Time-Lapse Apps that you can add to your phone to provide more control over the final results.  Some are helpful as well as free downloads from the App Store.

Next week will be Slo-Mo, which is just the opposite of Time-Lapse.