Hi all,

Well, it sat on my hard drive for nearly a year, but I finally found a piece of music that I felt was appropriate. It's acknowledged third-party material, so you'll see an ad on the screen (If you don't have AdBlock installed, that is), but at least YouTube isn't removing the music entirely.

This was the first time I used a still camera, rather than my old mini DV camcorder, so this is the first time lapse I attempted to edit in 1080p. It was shot from the balcony at stage right, so I got a much wider angle view of the crowd this time. The only drawback is that you may not spot yourself as easily as in the other two.

Anyway, enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWG-r15Jkos

Thanks again!

Questions:

1. Can you post a slow motion version? (or, is there a way to do slo-mo on youtube?)

2. Why don't you post more on the board, Neil??


Neil_N wrote on Jan 30^th, 2014 at 12:26pm:

Hi all, Well, it sat on my hard drive for nearly a year, but I finally found a piece of music that I felt was appropriate. It's acknowledged third-party material, so you'll see an ad on the screen (If you don't have AdBlock installed, that is), but at least YouTube isn't removing the music entirely. This was the first time I used a still camera, rather than my old mini DV camcorder, so this is the first time lapse I attempted to edit in 1080p. It was shot from the balcony at stage right, so I got a much wider angle view of the crowd this time. The only drawback is that you may not spot yourself as easily as in the other two. Anyway, enjoy! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWG-r15Jkos

Well, I suppose I could, but how slow do you want it? A time lapse can get very boring if it's really slow. If you don't mind it not having any music or anything, I could post a version that's as slow as you like.

As for why I don't really post here, I dunno. There are only so many forums I can hang out on, and my thoughts turn to this one when we're close to the marathon itself.

Just an alt-version so we can make out some faces etc. No biggie. Alternately, if ANYBODY knows how to do Slo-mo on youtube, please post it. I've never figured out how. Some sites that use Flash do have a Slow Motion feature.

And, you can start by posting your comments about the lineup we have:

http://sf.theboard.net/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1386354263/0#0

I don't think slowing it down is going to overcome the problem of YouTube's additional video compression on the original material. Let me see if I can find some online storage for you to grab a copy of the original.

Neil_N wrote on Jan 31^st, 2014 at 8:58am:

I don't think slowing it down is going to overcome the problem of YouTube's additional video compression on the original material. Let me see if I can find some online storage for you to grab a copy of the original.

If I might suggest a simple and useful program
www.Freemake.com

It'll let you download stuff from YouTube, convert it to other formats (including making a DVD) re-combine YouTube segments, edit, add subtitles.
A great way to save stuff that may vanish later from YouTube's policy of letting companies have stuff removed at their whim.
Plus it is legal, heck the instruction for using it are on YouTube. :)

So simple even I can use it.

da_Bunnyman wrote on Jan 31^st, 2014 at 2:34pm:

If I might suggest a simple and useful program www.Freemake.com It'll let you download stuff from YouTube, convert it to other formats (including making a DVD) re-combine YouTube segments, edit, add subtitles. A great way to save stuff that may vanish later from YouTube's policy of letting companies have stuff removed at their whim. Plus it is legal, heck the instruction for using it are on YouTube. :) So simple even I can use it.

The only problem with that is YouTube is still recompressing my original video, so using that program still only nets you something as good as what's there right now.

Anyway, I uploaded the original video file to my Google Drive, so if anyone wants a copy, just download it from this link here. Click on the little down arrow in the upper left and you can have your very own mp4 of it. The only thing that will let you see the faces more clearly would be the original images, which were captured at 9 MP, and the whole collection over 24 hours is about 1.6 GB. Unfortunately, I'd have to render the file at 4K to get anywhere near that res, and my copy of Premiere doesn't do 4K.

Meanwhile, I have a question for anyone who cares to answer it: should I keep the camera in the balcony this year, or bring it back down to stage right. The balcony gives us a much wider view of the audience, while some of you seemed to like seeing the faces a bit more at stage level, at the cost of much fewer attendees getting into the shot.

Thoughts?

Neil_N wrote on Jan 31^st, 2014 at 6:46pm:

Meanwhile, I have a question for anyone who cares to answer it: should I keep the camera in the balcony this year, or bring it back down to stage right. The balcony gives us a much wider view of the audience, while some of you seemed to like seeing the faces a bit more at stage level, at the cost of much fewer attendees getting into the shot. Thoughts?

As to this years camera placement, I think the stage setup is better, maybe if you can set it to take in the balcony too. That really shows off the Somerville Theater's restored movie palace atmosphere.

Followup idea. Get some shots of the crowd filing in at the beginning and the survivors leaving at the end to bookend the time lapse.

What would be REALLY cool would be multiple cameras! Balcony, Projection Booth, Stage and the Two Box Seats perhaps?



Neil_N wrote on Jan 31^st, 2014 at 6:46pm:

Meanwhile, I have a question for anyone who cares to answer it: should I keep the camera in the balcony this year, or bring it back down to stage right. The balcony gives us a much wider view of the audience, while some of you seemed to like seeing the faces a bit more at stage level, at the cost of much fewer attendees getting into the shot. Thoughts?

L.A. Connection wrote on Jan 31^st, 2014 at 10:36pm:

What would be REALLY cool would be multiple cameras! Balcony, Projection Booth, Stage and the Two Box Seats perhaps?

Yes, I agree. That would be cool. If I had four more cameras and tripods, I'd totally do it. Sadly, I only have one camera. If anyone else has a Canon digicam with tripod and AC adapter they'd like to contribute, please feel free.

But, assuming I have only one camera to play with, what's the preferred vantage point?

The video on youtube is being blocked by the walt disney company because of the soundtrack.

Sigh... God, I hate the death of Fair Use.

Well, just use the link I posted to my Google Drive and either view it there or download it. Strange, though. It still plays for me when I click the link, even when I sign myself out.

Rich Bartlett wrote on Feb 1^st, 2014 at 9:02pm:

The video on youtube is being blocked by the walt disney company because of the soundtrack.

Worked for me too, even when I switched to YouTube to watch fullscreen. Usually they'd just block the sound rather than remove the video.

Curious. It does seem to working fine now.

Rich Bartlett wrote on Feb 2^nd, 2014 at 7:51am:

Curious. It does seem to working fine now.

Maybe they saw we liked John Carter and decided to let it pass. :)

da_Bunnyman wrote on Feb 1^st, 2014 at 11:37pm:

Worked for me too, even when I switched to YouTube to watch fullscreen. Usually they'd just block the sound rather than remove the video.

They seem to have a new option where, if you acknowledge that the music is third-party content, they just play ads over it that send money to the owner. To be honest, I'm perfectly cool with that. I really like the Space Mountain music for these things, and I didn't want to use freaking "Toubou" again.

Niel's time-lapse film, like the ones before it, demonstrate how hale and hearty many of the attendees are during the 24 Hours! Many are the brave marathoners who stay glued to their seats from the Atomic Fireball to the last announcement.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWG-r15Jkos

It also tells another story: Some of the best seats in the house -the center section five to ten rows back are occupied by people's belongings the entire time!

Who hasn't asked "Are those seats taken?" and had the response "I'm saving them for..." The time lapse clearly shows that some of those fine seats are saved for coats, blankets and munchies while unfortunate marathoners have to look at the screen from a corner or a distant balcony seat. So please be considerate and remember we're all in this together.

R_F_Fineman wrote on Feb 15^th, 2014 at 9:30am:

Niel's time-lapse film, like the ones before it, demonstrate how hale and hearty many of the attendees are during the 24 Hours! Many are the brave marathoners who stay glued to their seats from the Atomic Fireball to the last announcement. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWG-r15Jkos It also tells another story: Some of the best seats in the house -the center section five to ten rows back are occupied by people's belongings the entire time! Who hasn't asked "Are those seats taken?" and had the response "I'm saving them for..." The time lapse clearly shows that some of those fine seats are saved for coats, blankets and munchies while unfortunate marathoners have to look at the screen from a corner or a distant balcony seat. So please be considerate and remember we're all in this together.

Good point R.F.
In the words of Harry Tuttle (Robert DeNiro) from the film Brazil.
"Remember, we're all in this together."

Though for what it's worth the front row seats in the big auditorium at The Somerville are great seats, even the side rows.

This year's lineup should keep a lot of us glued to our seats. Ready for blastoff!

http://i161.photobucket.com/albums/t214/Karen_Tom/Movies/Mysterian_zps31715ccd.gif

The Mysterians

I'm seriously thinking of picking up a second camera to do an alternate angle time lapse for next year. The folks in the balcony never show up, because there's a bank of house lights mounted on there that completely blind the camera between each movie.