Hacking MLV for timelapse

[marekk]

What do you think about option in MLV_REC to capture frames using intervalometer settings instead of fps ?  We can add one option in MLV_REC menu to capture 1 frame every N seconds (1 frame every X frames; X = N seconds * fps). It would be nice to record timelapse videos with MLV_REC. Now we can set FPS to min. value but I think it's to fast for timelapse..

[Danne]

That would be awesome if you ask me

[dpjpandone]

What do you think about option in MLV_REC to capture frames using intervalometer settings instead of fps ?  We can add one option in MLV_REC menu to capture 1 frame every N seconds (1 frame every X frames; X = N seconds * fps). It would be nice to record timelapse videos with MLV_REC. Now we can set FPS to min. value but I think it's to fast for timelapse..

How would this be different from using intervalometer with silent picture?

[marekk]

How would this be different from using intervalometer with silent picture?

Silent pics don't include any metadata ..

[dpjpandone]

thanks for clearing that up!

[Audionut]

Why hack movie recording for images, and not add functionality to the specific feature?

[marekk]

mlv_rec records images

Why hack movie recording for images, and not add functionality to the specific feature?

[marekk]

I've just added two options to mlv_rec module:
Timelapse - Nth frame
Timelapse - desired fps
UPDATE: 28.06.2014
Timelapse - number of frames

First option will force mlv_rec to save 1 frame every N frames so if you set fps to 25 and "Timelapse - Nth frame" to 100 - mlv rec will capture 1 frame every 4 seconds.
Second option will save desired fps value to mlv header. Available options: 23.976, 24, 25, 30, 50 or 60. It's a frame rate value saved by mlv_dump in DNG file.
Third option will force mlv_rec to stop recording after N captured frames.

Rec status will display lenght of your timelapse movie based on current fps or "Timelapse - desired fps". It will display also a value of (frame_count-1) (saved frames).

compiled mlv_rec module:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/5wqnaz1vahcptmo/mlv_rec.mo

source:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/wk1yoxccr97qs20/mlv_rec.c

Tested on 5d3 1.2.3. (Pls don't use it on 5d3 1.1.3).
Please let me know if you experience any problems with this feature.

[garry23]

Marekk

Just tried out the new timelapse features and here are some early thoughts. I caveat this by saying I don't normally use video.

Basic capture seemed to work, ie I get a .mlv file that I threw at MLV2DNG, to give me my DNGs. Pleased to see EXIF data embedded with DNGs.

One problem I can see, unless I'm missing something, is that I will not be able to get the shutter speed greater that the FPS with this timelapse approach. I have tried and can not achieve long exposures, ISO keeps bumping up.

When I'm taking images every, say, 10s this will be a limitation. As I say, unless I'm missing a trick.

This is why I hope some kind sole gets the EXIF running in silent.dng, so that we may use this with the timelapse module.

I will keep testing and feeding back results.

Cheers

[marekk]

One problem I can see, unless I'm missing something, is that I will not be able to get the shutter speed greater that the FPS with this timelapse approach. I have tried and can not achieve long exposures, ISO keeps bumping up.

garry23, are you able to do it with silent picture feature ?

[garry23]

Marekk

When I take a timelapse using silent picture mode I can dial in any exposure I need, ie if I need a 1 second exposure this works.

Using the MLV timelapse I, of course, can't go to exposures longer than the FPS.

Reading the link that Alex put up, I get the impression that EXIF data in LV needs to be handled carefully and nay not be 'accurate'. However, if we are trying to get ML to do shutterless holy grail with ETTR, then I would have thought it wort experimenting with any quality of EXIF, eg frame_ISO.

IMHO

[marekk]

When I take a timelapse using silent picture mode I can dial in any exposure I need, ie if I need a 1 second exposure this works.

I didn't know about it. I tested it on normal daylight scenes without ND last weekend and it worked like a charm I'm going to the mountains next week and I would like to shoot some timelapses.. but I don't want to work with tons of CR2 files. I would like to process a dng sequence in Davinci Resolve and export it to prores mov.
I ordered also a Anker Astro Pro 2 20000mah external battery. I'm going to connect it to 5d3 as a power source.

[jimmyD30]

Yeah, same here, I would like to do time-lapse as an MLV video. Maybe it's just because I'm so familiar with raw/mlv work flow and additionally doing time-lapse that way would just strengthen those skills even more as much as make it that much easier to do time-lapse itself as I'm just getting in to it now.

[garry23]

Marekk

Looking forward to hearing about your experiences with silent mode timelapse. BTW did you get the EXIF writing running in the silent module?

[marekk]

Looking forward to hearing about your experiences with silent mode timelapse. BTW did you get the EXIF writing running in the silent module?

I'm going to use mlv_rec.

BTW did you get the EXIF writing running in the silent module?

Audionut is trying to find correct values for photo mode.

[barepixels]

works on 5D2  yay! and thank you

[marekk]

I tested it last week and it works really god. No need to use LRtimelapse or other deflickers. But unfortunately it eats battery a lot. Sometimes it's not important but in the mountains ... ehh

[mageye]

@marekk

First of all, I would like to say thanks for adding these little features. So thanks!

It makes a nice 'quick and dirty' way to do a timelapse and have it encapsulated into the MLV file. I have just used the 'silent pics Full-res' and both methods have their pros and cons. They are both useful tools (in my opinion), and will (hopefully) enable me to do lots more timelapse.

I tried out the modded mlv_rec.mo on the 5DmkII (I can't remember which nightly build I used it with right now , but it would have been one of the contemporary ones).

Anyway, if I try to add this module to the very latest nightly builds I get the 'unable to link modules' error. So, I was wondering if it would be possible that this module could be made compatible with current/future builds?

Or would it just be possible that this could just be added to the main nightlies?

I am no developer myself and appreciate that such things are not necessarily as simple as I might believe them to be . But I would really like to see this feature included within the package that is Magic Lantern.

A handy feature (in my humble opinion! )

Thanks in advance anyway.

[Kharak]

Sorry, but I am not a frequent "timelapser".

But I shot some timelapse tests with MLV by FPS overide set to 0.25 or 1 fps etc. and that worked great until I hit the 29.59 min mark and my camera gets some fatal flaw.

So what is the difference of this and mlv with fps override-timelapse?