Timelapse with RED Scarlet-W. Ideas

[Antonio Azzurro]

Dear friends,

i'm trying to make a good timelapse with my Scarlet-w.

So this is my considerations.

What i wanna do is the timelapse of day to night and viceversa.

I used two paths:

1 - HDRX. in menu recording i've set timelapse mode with 1 frame each 2 seconds. This way shutter is locked because the HDRX works via shutter. I can change aperture/iso/WB, but if you have eletronic aperture lens is better to don't touch and use the HDRX works for you. This method is fine till the frame x can compensate the aperture difference of the scene. Result is nice, and also movements in the details seem ok.

2 - using frame processing (summing). This option let you go under 1fps in the framerate section. (i don't understand the difference between setting 1/2fps and go inside internal timelapse timer and set 1 frame each 2 second). This option (frame processing) disable HDRX and let you change shutter during the recording. Result may be ok if you have the way to change shutter or aperture in a smooth way during the timelapse, otherwise you feel the step in the recording.

What i'm asking for, if there is a way to set the camera with continuos auto-aperture or auto-shutter and also auto-wb, so if you don't have cinema lens you can still make it.

this is a test with HDRX.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1C-b9bEPUnk

Big Hi everybody here.

Antonio.

 

[Chad Lancaster]

I've shot a lot of timelapses on Red, day to night or night to day transitions won't do as well as a dslr. If the night is somewhere like a city with a lot of light you may get away with it but in general i'd say go with a dslr.

For daytime timelapses its awesome!

 

[Ryan Williams]

Chad, previously how have you set up your daytime time lapses with your RED camera? Could you please elaborate on your settings, options, and any support gear that you used to execute your timelapses?

 

[David Battistella]

Antonio.

THe best thing to do is understand the Dynamic range of the sensor and choose and exposure that will allow you to go from day to night. I am speaking of RED only here. As CHASD already stated there are tools out there for DSLR camera's that are amazing at this. Combined then with the right post software tols you can end up with pretty amazing results.

My other advice is to understand that this is a TWO STAGE process, capture and post. In the capture phase you might want to do some math and figure out where the expose you can get away with in the darket part of the scene and also in the brightest part of the scene. IN the post process you will most definitely be blending the two exposures and pushing the limits on both ends to get a dramatic looking shot.

It takes some time, work, effort and experimenting.

As a quick example.

Let's say your daylight exposure is ISO 800 F16 at 1/48th and the night exposure is F2.8 ISO 800 at 1/48th.

You could perhaps set the camera to F5.6/4 split and provided you are not clipping (turing on any stoplights) then you could let the whole TL happen at that exposure.

Then you can do the exposure ramping in resolve by setting keyframes.

That is one way of doing it.

There are no exposure ramping tools built into the RED's TL feature. It would be hard to do because of blackshading considerations. The only other thing I have tried is to put a gear on a variable ND filter and have that rotate with external software and hardware but you still end up loosing a stop in the dark part of the shot.

Just keep shooting and experimenting.

With HDR-X you can record TWO STREAMS, so set an exposure for the daylight and an exposure for the night shot.

Let's say you did this.

F5.6 and 360 degree shutter at 1FPS. That exposure would be completely bown out in the daytime.

But if you turned on 6 stops of HDR X you might be able to get decent exposure in the daytime part of the shot.

Then you would output both streams of the HDR track seperately and blend them yourself in post.

David

 

[Antonio Azzurro]

David, thank you so much.
I already did what you suggested me, last time with good result.

Do you know:
1 - If is possible to keyframe RED ISO from DaVinci Resolve (this way i have another parameter to use to control the light)
2 - If is possible to "keyframe" the shutter speed in camera just for timelapse purpose?

I will keep testing timelapse to figure it out right setup.

Have a nice evening.

Antonio.

 

[Chad Lancaster]

Ryan,

Timelapse mode is in..
Menu -> Settings -> Recording -> Change mode to "Internal Timelapse Timer"
It's essentially taking your shooting settings and recording a single frame per second that you specify. So if you have your camera set at normal 24fps 1/48th in timelapse mode for 1 frame/sec its pulling a single 1/48 frame and saving it. If your in low light you can run the camera in continuous mode at a lower fps and then just speed it up as needed in post. One of the great things about shooting r3d timelapses is instant playback in camera with various forward speeds, no need to render.

As for setups I tend to run the camera off a single mounted paglink battery or for longer shots I use the battery belt clip that way you don't have to touch the camera to change batteries. I like paglinks because you can stack them to get more power. I also mount the monitor on the side of the camera so that it doesn't act like a sail and potentially move the camera. Foolcontrol of course for changing settings without touching the camera. For motion control I use a kessler cinedrive and run power as above depending on the shot.

I'm not sure if in LRtimelapse if it will see the individual frames of a sequence, I'll have to look into it.

Send me a PM if you need any questions

 

[David Battistella]

There is no way to keyframe ISO in resolve. But once you are in there you are working in RAW and have many other parameters you can use to vary perceived exposure.

David

David, thank you so much.
I already did what you suggested me, last time with good result.

Do you know:
1 - If is possible to keyframe RED ISO from DaVinci Resolve (this way i have another parameter to use to control the light)
2 - If is possible to "keyframe" the shutter speed in camera just for timelapse purpose?

I will keep testing timelapse to figure it out right setup.

Have a nice evening.

Antonio.

 

[Ryan Williams]

Chad,

Thanks for the reply. I'll def. take you up on your offer to fire some questions at you. I need to get my camera properly set up but hopefully here soon we'll talk again.

Cheers!