Timelapse Export Plugin for Aperture

[Kenndac]

Hey guys,

A few weeks ago I tried to try my hand at timelapse photography. After importing all my images into Aperture then cropping and adjusting them, I had to export them all again, import into an old version of QuickTime Player and export as videos. What a pain!

I'm a Mac OS X programmer by trade, so I thought I'd whip together a little app to pull the selected images out of Aperture using AppleScript and assembling them into a video. My friend then suggested an Aperture Export Plugin would be more sensible, so, that's what I did!

It's very simple - you select a bunch of images, choose Export -> Time Lapse... from Aperture's File menu, choose a frame rate and off you go. It's free and open-source - I hope someone finds it useful!

You can find it here: http://www.kennettnet.co.uk/products/timelapse/

Ah, and since this is a photography forum, here's one of the timelapses I made: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ikenndac/5718565234/

 

[mrbash]

You can do this in Photoshop and After Effects via a macro. It's pretty straight-forward.

 

[cupcakes2000]

You can do this in Photoshop and After Effects via a macro. It's pretty straight-forward.

Yeah, fair enough but;

A, Not everyone can afford the creative suit.

and

B, this guy is trying to help everyone else out by taking some time out to write a plugin and post it for free and tweekable use.

I think his post requires more of a response than 'It's pretty straight forward".

 

[mrbash]

I apologize if my response was flippant. Aperture does not support macros.
Most people creating time-lapse videos use Adobe Creative Suite. A big reason being the automation of the workflow between applications.

I guess what I am saying, is that Aperture is ill suited for time-lapse videos. You have to do more than simply re-size each picture, but also do tonal averaging etc. Aperture simply does not support this kind of workflow. Ps and AE do.

 

[Kenndac]

Most people creating time-lapse videos use Adobe Creative Suite. A big reason being the automation of the workflow between applications.

Most professionals may use Creative Suite, but this isn't aimed at them, or you. It's aimed at people like me who just want to fool around and experiment!

 

[pigbat]

I wanted to give this a try but the installation fails without much explanation. Does this work with Aperture 2.x or only 3.x?

 

[BMP84]

I wanted to give this a try but the installation fails without much explanation. Does this work with Aperture 2.x or only 3.x?

I too am having a error, it wont install for me either. And I am running Aperture 3, fully updated.

 

[mackmgg]

Another option for those who can't get this to work is Quicktime. It's one of those little known features of Quicktime. There's an option to import a bunch of photos, and it will make it into a time lapse for you. You just select the photos, framerate, and a few other settings and it creates the time lapse for you.

I don't think it's in Quicktime X, but it works great in Quicktime 7 on Snow Leopard.

 

[initialsBB]

I love the idea of this plugin, it could use a little extra work though ! Previewing is slow as heck, I can't seem to change the encoding preset (not so serious) and export takes much longer than if I batch export to JPEG and then compile manually in QuickTime 7...

It installed without a hitch for me.

 

[Drag'nGT]

Thanks for the plugin! I'll give it a try!

 

[mtbdudex]

Thx for doing this, will have to try it out - nice timelapses video on your flickr site.
Will come in handy for my timelapse stuff I do in the future directly from Aperture and simplify workflow.

fwiw, there is Mac program called "Time Lapse Assembler" @ http://www.dayofthenewdan.com/projects/time-lapse-assembler-1

I used it on the same 370+ frames that made my Aug-5-2011 NASA APOD for 2 video clips, re-post from my astrophotography forum thread below
http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?p=12800862#post12800862

Actually I knew the fireflies were out if force, but not this heavy!

Made a 15 second video clip
(can we embed YouTube videos here?? How?)
You can see the moonrise in the garage lower RH and upper middle window.
This video is between 10:45pm and 1am.


This shows the stars rotating as pin points of light along the NCP (North Celestial Pole, near Polaris), and you can see individual fireflies in it:
Click to watch YouTube HD 720p video StarTrail timelapse 7-20-2011 2+ hrs in 15 seconds



I re-processed this star trail video timelapse using the cumulative image saving feature in StarStax.
The cumulative stacking then timelapse gives a different effect/feeling.
Click to watch HD 720p video "Timelapse StarTrails and fireflies stacked@ 60fps "


Specs:
Camera Canon T1i
Lens Canon 15-85 @ 15mm f3.5
ISO800 20 sec exposure each
Over 370 frames Processed all in MacOSX
StarStax, Time Lapse Assembler, iMovie11

Credits:
Time Lapse Assembler, http://www.dayofthenewdan.com/projects/time-lapse-assembler-1

Time Lapse Assembler allows you to create movies from a sequence of images.
Provide it with a folder containing sequentially named JPEG images and it will produce a Quicktime compatible movie file for use in iMovie or other editing software.
Features
Exports MPEG, H.264, Photo-JPEG, and RAW movies
Select between 0.1 and 60 fps (new in version 1.5)
Allows resizing of finished movie
Now supports Leopard!
Make sure your source folder images are all the same size
Requirements
Mac OS X 10.5 or higher
Quicktime 7.2.1 or higher

 

[mtbdudex]

I'm having a 3:30am brain fade, upon download the zip file and extract, I don't see a complied plug-in file, rather a folder titled "iKenndac-Timelapse-for-Aperture-8dcf879" with a single file "README.markdown" that won't open upon double click and two folders "Timelapse For Aperture" and "Timelapse For Aperture.xcodeproj" with stuff in them, but no plug-in file.

Something simple for sure, can someone here advise me?

 

[xStep]

I'm having a 3:30am brain fade...

Weird. I just downloaded it and inspected the "Timelapse For Aperture 1.0.pkg" that was unzipped. It looks like a proper executable. I don't have Aperture so don't know the procedure for installing that.

The .xcodeproj file is an Xcode file. You shouldn't have that given the same link.

 

[TheReef]

I'm having a 3:30am brain fade, upon download the zip file and extract, I don't see a complied plug-in file, rather a folder titled "iKenndac-Timelapse-for-Aperture-8dcf879" with a single file "README.markdown" that won't open upon double click and two folders "Timelapse For Aperture" and "Timelapse For Aperture.xcodeproj" with stuff in them, but no plug-in file.

Something simple for sure, can someone here advise me?

Sounds like you've downloaded the source, use the link on the right hand side for the package installer.


My camera captures images at 20fps in burst mode, so this looks just like what I'm after.

Unfortunately it crashes during "Hardcore Previewing Action" p) when the window is first displayed
(Aperture 2.0, Mac OS X 10.6.8)

Brilliant idea though.

 

[mtbdudex]

Pacakge installed, seems to work fine Aperture 3 on my 2009 iMac i7, thx for tip on installing the package not the source code (a 3:30am duh on my part)