Manhattanhenge

I apologize for blogging about this so late, but hey - I've been keeping busy, and busy is good, right?

Right.

So a few weeks ago, an event called "Manhattanhenge" took place in New York City. This event happens twice a year in the summertime, where the setting sun hits the horizon in near-perfect alignment with the city grid of Manhattan. Stand on just about any east/west street, and you'll see the sun line right up in between the buildings and skyscrapers. It's pretty neat.

You can find a lot more info about it here.

Having done a little bit of research, I discovered a few things. There is a pretty decent following of this event, and lots of people like to come out and photograph it. Many of the posted photos I found listed where in the city they were shot from, so I made some mental notes about potential shoot-sites for myself. I had also noticed that no one seemed to post a decent-looking timelapse of the event. I'm sure it's been done, but I couldn't find any. So I decided to take a crack at it for myself.

I headed over to what seemed like the easiest, most convenient spot - the bridge that crosses over 42nd street, just above 1st ave.

Unfortunately, I wasn't the only one with this idea. By the time I had arrived (about 7:45 or so), there was already a large crowd of people huddled up against the railing of the bridge, taking up the whole sidewalk. A forest of tripods made it clear that there was no way I was going to be able to get my shot from this spot.

After glancing down 42nd street, I could make out what looked to be another bridge, about 3 or 4 avenues over. I hopped on my bike and headed in that direction to investigate.

Sure enough, there was an overpass, right in front of Grand Central Station. This looked like a perfect spot. Nobody was up there, so I maneuvered around until I could find my way up. That's when I figured out why no one was up there - there were signs at at the on-ramp onto the bridge stating "no pedestrian traffic".

I reasoned that since I was on my bike, I really couldn't be classified as a pedestrian. So I pedaled up to the spot, where I found a very narrow sidewalk. I stashed my bike, and set up my two Canons - the SD630, shooting as fast as it could (about 1 frame every 2-3 seconds), and the G7, shooting a -2, 0, +2 bracket sequence as fast as it could (also about 2-3 seconds) - using the wonderful CHDK intervalometer I've become so dependent on.

I used a super clamp and a little ball head to secure the cameras to the railing, and - fearing interference from the police - I decided to step away from the railing and wait until the last moment before the sunset (which only lasts about 3 or 4 minutes) to grab some stills with my other cameras.

Everything was going smoothly, but sure enough, as the sunset crept closer, people started to walk up to my spot, and set up their tripods and get ready for their shots. After about three of four of them showed up, I decided that I'd better get over there, so as to secure my own spot, and to make sure nothing happened to my TL cams.

By the time the event had finally come around, I'd say there were a good dozen or so fellow law-breakers up there with me, and we were all shooting away. I snapped a few frames with the F3 on Velvia, and wound up setting up another super clamp with a magic arm to help me stabilize my D90 with the 80-200, which I was shooting bracketed frames with as well.

Here's a quick iPhone grab of what my view was:

The best-looking shot I was able to get with the D90 looks like this:

Not bad, but not great, either. Shooting the sun is harder than I expected.

As the last of the sun disappeared into the horizon, as if on cue, one of New York City's finest came along to break up our little party. He asked if any of us were interested in receiving a summons, and if not, to vacate the bridge immediately. Since I had so much crap with me, I did the best I could to pack up quickly, but I did stall a little, with the hopes of at least letting the TL cams catch that last bit of sun disappearing as possible.

I was the last person to leave the bridge (first one in, last one out, heh), and fortunately, the cop didn't give me any trouble.

When I got home to compile the TL frames, I realized that my framing was a bit on the wide side, and a tighter composition (not unlike the still above) would've probably made for a better shot. I also forgot to set the cameras to under-expose, so the frames that the 630 shot were pretty much useless. I monkeyed around with some HDR and exposure blending with the frames from the G7, but due to the rapid movements of the street traffic, nothing looked right.

In the end, I decided I'd just compile the -2 set of frames, and go with that; lesson learned.

Here it is up on flickr:

I know, too wide. And the sky is completely blown out.

Anyway, there is a happy ending to this story.

For whatever reason, I decided to post my shots as soon as I'd finished them (this is not something I do very often; I tend to post bunches of stuff all at once).

I woke up the next morning to find a ton of messages in my flickr inbox, reporting new comments on my movie, and, more surprisingly, lots of new contacts (followers). It turns out that the flickr blog decided to post about Manhattanhenge that day, and they linked to my time lapse movie (probably because it was the only one) in their post.

I scored a all-time personal best hit count that week, landing well over 500 views over the next couple of days. Pretty cool, but I really wish the shot had come out better.

Oh well. Lessons learned for next time.

Timelapse with the G7

Since I've decided to use point-and-shoot class cameras for my time lapse work, I decided that - as much as I love it - my little Canon SD630 wasn't really giving me the kind of quality and performance that I'd like.

One of the things using that camera did open me up to was the Canon Hackers Development Kit (aka CHDK) - an "upgrade" to the existing camera firmware that offers several cool handy features, including (in my case) an extremely versatile intervalometer.

After doing a bit of research, I decided that Canon's top-end PowerShot series - the "G" series - was where I should be looking for my next TL camera. The current offerings, the G10 and the G9, are both really fantastic little cameras, packed with some great features like full manual control, a hotshoe for off-camera flash, a nice big lens, and extremely solid build quality.

I decided that since I'm going to be shooting frames for video, extremely high-resolution images aren't really that big of a deal to me. So I aimed a bit lower, and found that the PowerShot G7, at 10 megapixels, would probably suit my needs.

Price watching on ebay showed me that the going price for a G7 is about $250 - close to half the cost of the currently available G10. The final determining factor, however, was the fact that there has been a version of the CHDK in development for the G7 for a year or two. I know they're working on versions for the G9 and G10 right now, and I'm sure they'll be available soon enough.

So I received my ebay-bought G7 yesterday, which came with an additional (third party) battery, and jumped right in. Another feature I was pleased to discover was the fact that this camera didn't seem to have any issues with SD cards larger than 2GB (the 630 didn't recognize the larger cards for some reason).

After some trial and error, I got the CHDK installed and working on a 4GB card, and ran upstairs to my roof to run some tests.
My first trial was using the "continuous mode" trick, clamping the shutter button down and letting it run perpetually. To my surprise, I was able to capture around 3500 frames at around over a period of about 25 minutes or so - at which point, the SD card had filled up! I was also delighted to find that the battery appeared to have been only 50% depleted. My hunch is that being able to turn off the rear LCD while shooting has a major impact on battery life.

Next, I decided to try capturing a sunset using the CHDK intervalometer. [one of the downsides to the continuous mode technique is that the focus and exposure settings are locked into place for the entire run. This is fine if you're working with consistent, continuous light (like in the middle of the day), but if you're trying to capture a dynamic transition in light (say, a sunrise or a sunset), then it's no good.]
After a little experimenting, I figured out how to get the CHDK routine working with the LCD powered off, and let it run.
I let it go for well over an hour, and was shocked to find that the camera was still shooting - mainly because I hadn't had the chance to recharge the battery from the prior test, and it started this run at around 50% capacity. It captured another 1200 frames or so before I stopped it. At that point, the battery was practically at 0%, but still - I am extremely pleased with the battery performance at this point.

Here is the shot I made of the sunset:

A couple of issues, yes, but for a first run, I'm pretty happy.

As I type this, the camera is shooting the sunrise. Stay tuned on my flickr feed for the results (assuming they're presentable).

"Continuous" timelapse shooting

For some time now, I've been into making timelapse movies using several different digital cameras.

Here's a quick rundown of my timelaspse history:

My first digital camera was a Nikon CoolPix 5000. Nikon made an accessory for it called the MC-EU1, a "remote cord". It functions as a cable release, but also has a nifty little intervalometer built-in. Only downside to it is that the shortest interval available is 2 minutes. Good for long-term stuff (like, a full day), but not so much for the short stuff that I've been into lately.


Next, I got a CoolPix 5400, which, for all intents and purposes, was the same camera as the 5000. It used the same remote cord, and the same power adapter (another necessity for the long-term shot.


Then I got my D70. Being one of the earlier Nikon DSLRs, it didn't have the handy-dandy "accessory" port that its successors did, so there was no way to trip the shutter remotely, save for the dinky little infrared remote, which is very finicky about line-of-sight. And easy to lose (I lost my first one).


This is when I started thinking about using Lego to me out. I went through various phases of experimentation, using motors, variable speed controllers from the European train sets, and elaborate gear ratios, in order to both physically trip the shutter (with a little mechanical "finger"), and even animate the camera - having it roll across my windowsill, for example.


Finally, I wound up getting a Canon SD630. The thing that really makes this a great camera for timelapse work is something called the CHDK - the Canon Hacker's Development Kit. Using this alternative firmware, I can utilize a really nice and simple intervalometer program (a script, technically), and set intervals as low as 3 or 4 seconds (basically as long as it takes for
the camera to focus, expose, and record the image).


The bulk of my recent timelapse work has been done with this camera/software combo.

Which brings us to the topic of this post.


Recently, I came across a video on Vimeo that was shot with - get this - the very same camera I've got (the 630), but using a totally different technique than anything I'd tried in the past. (I can't seem to find it right now, otherwise I'd link to it)


Anyway, in the comments of the video's post, the creator mentions that he used the camera's "Continuous" mode to shoot rapid-fire frames, by _manually_ holding down the shutter button for minutes at a time.


As soon as I'd read this, I busted out my camera and experimented a bit, and found that at the resolution I tend to shoot at (about 1600x1200 or so), the camera grabs about 1-2 frames per second. I filed this info away, and sort of forgot about it.


A few weeks later, I came across a good deal on a pair of small ratcheting bar clamps, and figured that they might be the perfect way to hold down the shutter button on my camera for longer periods of time. It turns out that I was right.



The other day, I ventured up to my roof, and set my camera up like this:



I figured I'd let it go for as long as it could take it - either the battery would die, the card would fill up, or the camera would just freak out and crash. Guess what happened.

Nope, the card filled up.

I was kinda sad, because I really loved the way the clouds were moving, and wanted to get a few more minutes of motion in, but I was really psyched that it actually worked. Now, the only problem I have is that the camera doesn't seem to like SD cards larger than 2GB, and the only 2GB card I have is my Eye-Fi card. The problem with the Eye-Fi card is that it consumes more battery power than a regular SD card, and - assuming this is because it's trying to broadcast the images it's capturing as it's capturing them - it seems to inhibit the write speed of the images to the card, which yields a lower (slower) frame rate.



Oh, here's the result of the test:



I think this combination of frame rate and cloud motion worked especially well.

So. Stay tuned for more "Continuous" mode timelapse stuff in the future.