Peter Shi  


Spring Sprung by Peter Shi
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March 2020 - Spring Sprung

About the Image(s)

Most clips of this video were made inside (home walking closet). I started last late spring while it was almost out of season for me to get seasonal images outside. On the other hand I wanted to present plants fast growing effects. Then I tried interior time-lapse. Growing seeds/plants in the “studio” was not easy! Lighting for plants and camera was conflicting. Plants were growing very slowly in low light environment. Some footages were taken more than a week with hundreds images. I also created some animation effects and merged them with the time-lapse footages into proper exterior backgrounds.
Canon 6D with tripod for time-lapse; other footages by mobile phone. Editing with Lr cc, Pr cc & Ae cc.


This round’s discussion is now closed!
17 comments posted




Larry Treadwell   Larry Treadwell
(Groups 36 & 67)
Please read my first post on Dick's page to understand my point of view in reviewing this video BEFORE you read the review itself.   Posted: 03/18/2020 11:15:23



Larry Treadwell   Larry Treadwell
(Groups 36 & 67)
Sometimes being whimsical is all that is necessary. This little video is very seasonal and just seems to fit. I feel you have the perfect opening to set the stage, Your title screen let's the viewer know that this is going to be fun. The music in no way detracted. It was perfect background white noise. It left me completely free to just enjoy the scenes passing before me.

I also find the green house setting a good opening because the sprouts start from nothing (a beginning) I would like to know how long the camera had to be set up to capture all these images for this scene. (also for the other scenes) Did you have more than one camera operating or did you use multiple setups? Also how long did this take to make? Dick's River Run was a one day event---this clearly was not so I'm interested. How did you protect the camera over time in some of the field scenes.

Please note that I enjoyed this a great deal my questions are not meant to be negative. It is more that inquiring minds want to know. I'm a photographer but I don't do this sort of thing and I'm interested in technique.

As a photographer I know the eye is drawn to light and bright. In your second scene there are white flowers in the background on the left that distract my eye. I wish they were not there.

In the scene beginning around 1:06 I noticed a black line around the edges of the growing plants. In a still image this would be a tell that there was an extract taking place. So my question was did you do some sot of extract to create this sequence and if so---just how many frames did you have to extract. This is not a critique, I'm just trying to understand the process since I do not do any video at all.

There is a great deal of animation, pelicans flying, outline flowers growing and butterflies flying. Did you create these animations yourself? And if so using what platform.

Thanks for the smiles I liked the presentation and really want to know more about how it was done. I'm especially interested in the time involved.   Posted: 03/18/2020 11:31:14



Larry Treadwell   Larry Treadwell
(Groups 36 & 67)
Please allow me to add an additional thought. As a still photographer I watch several video showing how the movie 1917 was made. I did this to study camera angles and techniques. I watched these videos several times each. As I write the critiques for this group I thought maybe some of you could used some of these techniques yourselves.

This forum is about making our photography grow and I thought this was a good learning tool. If I'm off base, please forgive me. Enjoy the videos and best of luck in your future film making efforts. I have really enjoyed my visit.

There are two video links provided.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypvd2LJCJHg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMBnvz-dEXw   Posted: 03/18/2020 12:13:40
Peter Shi   Peter Shi
Larry,
Thank you very much for sharing us these wonderful film making videos. There were so much technic and skills used in the film, also amazing amount of work. Enjoyable!   Posted: 03/25/2020 16:39:13



Dorinda Wills   Dorinda Wills
(Group 30)
Peter, this is a lovely, creative video. I especially liked the dissolves between scenes. The music sets the perfect mood. Well done!
  Posted: 03/18/2020 14:26:03



Dick Burr   Dick Burr
Larry Treadwell wrote the following on my video and asked that I share it with the group:

I just stumbled upon this group and I'm fascinated. I would like to offer a few observations if I may. I would ask that you this preamble with the other group members so I don't haveto type it over and over for each video. Thanks.

This may well end up being a long comment but I want you to understand my point of view before I begin.
I consider myself to be a hardworking nature and wildlife photographer. I spend a great deal of time researching my subjects before I venture into the field. Recently while on a shoot I was approached by a videographer who asked if he could photograph me at work. Over the course of the day he worked much harder than I did. He was relentless in his efforts, when I took a break he was still gathering clips. He wired me for sound, forced untrained me to think out loud and led me with questions. Since then he has made two videos of me at work. I have the utmost appreciation for him and his craft. I think the video required much more work than me captured that one special shot. Video required that one shot and so much more.

  Posted: 03/23/2020 13:54:59



Dick Burr   Dick Burr
Peter,
I thought that your video was an amazing capture of time laps photography, in addition the animated scenes added a fun whimsical effect that captured my interest and imagination.

I haven't been able to figure out how you created some of the effects. Since this was shot in a home closet, the green house and the background flowers had to have been added in post, but I don't know how it was done. Was this something that your post software does or do you have some other magic that you can share with the group.

This whole video had to have taken months to capture. It's amazing that you could keep the lighting consistent throughout the video.

I want to try my hand at time laps, but just haven't got around to it. I doubt if I could master the skill as well as you and Rajani.

Well Done, My Friend

Dick

  Posted: 03/23/2020 14:11:47



Dick Burr   Dick Burr
By the way, I watched the two videos that Larry Treadwell suggested, and found them very interesting. Not sure that the techniques talked about in those videos would be anything that we would want to try, but it is worth watching. Maybe it will give us some ideas.   Posted: 03/23/2020 14:20:10



Peter Shi   Peter Shi
Thank you all for your comments and I really appreciate all your suggestions!
Yes, It took several months to complete this video. Now let me explain some details here.
1. Time-lapse was taken by DSLR with single images stacked by using Adobe Lightroom. Plants were growing very slowly due to the low light condition, so averagely it took about ten days for each kind.
2. Background set with blue screen to distinguish from green plants. Use "keying" function in Adobe Premiere Pro to change the background color from blue to transparency, then add your own background to bottom layer same as in Photoshop.
3. All 3D animations such as bee, butterflies and growing plants were created with Adobe After Effects.   Posted: 03/25/2020 16:37:34
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Dick Burr   Dick Burr
Peter,

So did you have the camera set to automatically take a shot each frame or did you have to manually release the shutter.

About how long in-between each shot, a minute, an hour or several hours? I just can't imagine doing this over a several month period. How did you handle the battery in the camera, didn't you have to change it over a month period?   Posted: 03/26/2020 00:20:01
Peter Shi   Peter Shi
Dick,
Camera shutter can be set automatically by using Timer Remote Controller. For the settings of the length and interval there is a formula which can be found online with keywords Time Lapse Calculator. Battery issue can be solved with DC Coupler. I took about ten days averagely for each kind of plants to grow up. Totally it took several months to complete including animations and postproduction.   Posted: 03/26/2020 12:23:06
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Peter Shi   Peter Shi
  Posted: 03/25/2020 16:37:54
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Peter Shi   Peter Shi
  Posted: 03/25/2020 16:38:23
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Peter Shi   Peter Shi
  Posted: 03/25/2020 16:38:42
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Syed Shakhawat Kamal   Syed Shakhawat Kamal
Hi Peter,
A very innovative and creative work. The work shows itself, you needed to spend a lot of time and effort, to put up the show. I understand the time lapses during the video. But could you also tell me, how did you make the sequences of the complete or final work? As I am not very familiar with the seasons around your region, probably need some of your pointer regarding this sequences that you have followed. The animations worked very well, between the scene though. Great work my friend. Cheers.   Posted: 03/26/2020 12:48:13
Peter Shi   Peter Shi
Kamal,
As for the time lapse I shot hundreds of single still images during the plants growing, then stacked them with Lightroom to generate video footage. Since I started the outside shooting at late spring, tulip may be the last seasonal plant for me to shoot in northwest of the States. Hope I answered your questions.   Posted: 03/26/2020 14:12:25



 
Hi Peter,

Love the animation of this video and colors for the flowers. It fits perfectly for the spring!

Fion   Posted: 04/11/2020 17:37:20