New York Time-lapse Photography

Josh Owens is making a career out of making timelapse videos. His appropriately titled film, NYC, demonstrates to us the talent that makes the job choice feasible. Under the Mindrelic moniker, Owens has made a number of New York City based timelapses. Have a look at NYC:

To make this particular timelapse, Owens set up his Canon 5D Mark II on Dynamic Perception dolly rig. A combination of lenses were used including a Canon 14mm f/2.8L, 24mm f/1.4L, 70-200 f/2.8L, and 16-35 f/2.8L . Owens also enlisted the help of The Little Bramper to automate the moderation of exposure times during changes of light. He added a neutral density filter to lengthen exposure times during the shots taken in a moving car.

“The longer the shutter is open, the more forgiving the results are with bumps in the road etc. We used ND for the day shot to get the shutter to 1.5 seconds and the night shot was at 4 seconds,” added Owens.

new york time lapse

Times Square Scene: The world moving around a resting worker

While all the moving shots were made using the dolly, the pans were added during post. One last interesting piece of equipment used to make NYC is the Gorillapod.

“For the vertical shots in times square I just had one end of the rail on the ground, and the other held to the light pole with the gorilla. Also used the gorilla to do static shots, wrapping it to railings, etc, etc…”

You can see his previous project we discussed here: Manhattan Timelapse

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One response to “New York Time-lapse Photography”

  1. Ariel Teo says:

    Hi all!

    I have a question: how does the slow movement in the time-lapse?
    I understand the theory. I can not imagine is whether it is a device with a guide or a tripod.

    Does anyone can guide me about the technique?

    Thanks in advance!

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