12 Hours at RibbleHead Viaduct

[GordonH]

I spent last night at Ribblehead Viaduct in the Yorkshire Dales shooting another "Holy Grail" time lapse, this time I wanted to go all the way and shoot a time lapse that went from day to night and then back to day again. The weather forecast wasn't brilliant but sometimes you've just got to go out and do it and hope for the best. Although the majority of the night was cloud bound there were a few short clear spells and I managed to get the milky way crossing the sky albeit behind some clouds.

I started at about 7pm (an hour before sunset) and finished at 7am (an hour after sunrise). I used my Sony A7Sii and Samyang 24mm f1.4 lens, my Dynamic Perception slider with Sapphire Pro pan and tilt head and NMX pro controller for the camera movement and my Timelapse+ view intervalometer for handling the ramping of the exposures needed during the night. As mentioned on a previous post you programme the camera movement into the NMX controller via a blue tooth phone app and then after taking a correctly exposed image at ISO 100 and f1.4 you set a few parameters into the intervalometer such as longest exposure and highest ISO and then the intervalometer makes the necessary exposure adjustments during the night and also moves the slider after each exposure so apart from periodically checking on batteries, cables, etc it is nicely automated, any flickering from the exposure changes is handled using a plug in for Lightroom from Timelapse+. In all I took 1,830 images with exposures ranging from 1/2500 of a second at f1.4 and ISO 100 to 20 seconds at f1.4 and ISO 6400. That is over 21 stops of exposure difference during the night and each exposure change is made in 1/3 stop increments so the intervalometer has a fairly busy time during the night. During the night the moon came up which added a bit of extra illumination to the landscape.

Hope you like it, the video can be seen at the link below and is available in 4K

 

https://youtube.com/watch?v=dmFglty2XT8&t=11s

Best wishes

Gordon

 

[Mark at Beaufort]

Very nice again Gordon. Look forward to seeing you next year with more video footage.

[PhotoGav]

Lovely lovely lovely! Well done, that was well worth every minute of preparation and execution. The clouds really add to it too. All too often it seems as though a perfectly clear night is what is required for that kind of thing, but when it comes to it, that bit of cloud and the tantalising views of the night sky behind with the differing movements of the two actually make it a whole lot more interesting!

[westmarch]

Superb.  Yorkshire clouds only add to the beauty.

John

[RichLD]

Nice work sir! ?

[Ruud]

Well done Gordon! A magnificent timelapse with excellent processing. Beautifully detailed! And it runs smooth as silk.

Among the best 4Ks on youtube!

[JamesF]

Agree with Gav about the different motions of the clouds and stars.  Makes it quite compelling.

James

[Ludd]

Fabulous time lapse!  Thank you for sharing. 

[Captain Scarlet]

Superb.

Magnus

[newbie alert]

Beautiful timelapse..i was waiting for the milky way to pop into view,I guess it was in a different direction.. superb ..

[GordonH]

3 hours ago, newbie alert said:

Beautiful timelapse..i was waiting for the milky way to pop into view,I guess it was in a different direction.. superb ..

Actually, the milky way is visible you can make it out behind some clouds as it moves towards the right of the frame and then it disappears to the right, it's just after the 40 second mark

[newbie alert]

2 hours ago, GordonH said:

Actually, the milky way is visible you can make it out behind some clouds as it moves towards the right of the frame and then it disappears to the right, it's just after the 40 second mark

So it does...shame on the cloud but it kind of adds to the timelapse too..

Stunning capture,please do another..

[clarkpm4242]

Excellent work!  Makes my time laspes look very basic  no transitions like that!

I would prefer the night time to be more apparent though.  Exposure ramping is so smooth but the impact of darkness is partly lost?  I guess the moon illumination contributes?  It looks like it is all dayight and then a period of daylight with stars rather than it becoming night..?  Personal taste.  YMMV.

Cheers

Paul

 

[GordonH]

8 hours ago, clarkpm4242 said:

Excellent work!  Makes my time laspes look very basic  no transitions like that!

I would prefer the night time to be more apparent though.  Exposure ramping is so smooth but the impact of darkness is partly lost?  I guess the moon illumination contributes?  It looks like it is all dayight and then a period of daylight with stars rather than it becoming night..?  Personal taste.  YMMV.

Cheers

Paul

 

The moon does have an effect but there is also a setting on the Timelapse+ view intervalometer that I've been playing with, it is an exposure adjustment for night time compared to day and the default setting is -1 stop so the night exposures are automatically 1 stop less than day to ensure that the sky is noticeably darker, I had it set to -1/3 stop so I might try the default setting of -1 stop next time, I could also darken the sky by adjusting the processing on the night time key frames. It's all in the experimental stage at the moment as this is the first time I've tried doing "Holy Grail" time lapses

Best wishes

Gordon

 

[clarkpm4242]

42 minutes ago, GordonH said:

first time I've tried doing "Holy Grail" time lapses

Cool.  It is as much down to personal taste and what you wish to achieve.  I'm nowhere near as sophisticated.

Hope you have a productive winter season!

Cheers

Paul