Time lapse photography records scenes as they change over time. You may have seen stunning short videos of traffic moving, or clouds racing across the sky, or the classic sunset or sunrise. You too can capture these using an app and the correct settings for your scene. You can also add filter overlays perhaps, even music to accompany your scene, to produce a really nice finished product. Even if you have a native camera app with a time lapse function built in to your smartphone, you might need to use two or more apps to achieve that kind of an output. Lapse It Pro can do capture, editing, filters, music and rendering all within the app.
Here’s the low down on the main features and how they work:
1. With a little background reading on time lapse photography, you can get a pretty good idea of what you want to achieve. There’s also a handy video tutorial that you can access from the start up screen of the app. Once you’ve done that, you’ll have a better idea as to how to use Lapse It Pro to get the results you want.
2. In the Pro version, you have full control of the settings. In the version I tested using my iPhone 7+ I had full control over exposure and ISO settings to control light, am able to drag the focal point where I want it to be and lock it there if I want, correct white balance manually or set it on auto to dynamically respond to changing circumstances, and also use the optical zoom ability in my smartphone. There are also other control for flash, sound, and also a grid to help you line up your horizon so its straight. You can also control the capture resolution - the Pro version unlocks the ability to record in 1080p.
3. You can set the frequency of photographs taken - for the video below, I set it to one shot every 12 seconds, and I let it got for about 30 mins. That’s 150 images that I then rendered into an MP4 video, which comes out at 30 frames per second at about 5 seconds long.
4. Once you’ve captured your time lapse, the app allow you to edit the photos and even remove unwanted frames. You can add a filter to achieve a certain look, and even add a sound track too. The rendering engine has multiple settings including MP4, MOV and FLV, quality and frame-rate too, including the ability to trim the series of photos that you are compiling into the video.
5. To find inspiration, Lapse It Pro also has a gallery of time lapses created by other users. Its a social feature, so you can view and comment on other videos as well as upload your own. You can also upload your creation to Youtube, Facebook and other social platform for easy sharing outside the app’s own ecosystem.
6. The app allows you to schedule your capture too - so you can set it up to start recording a particular scene at a particular time, without you having to be there to press the start button.
7. A bonus I discovered when testing the app is that it can bring new life to your old devices. My old iPhone 4 doesn’t have a time lapse function in the native camera app, but using Lapse it Pro means that I can use this device as a dedicated time lapse camera - so long as I’ve got it tethered to an external battery to keep it charged up for as long as I can.
Remember that as well considering battery drain and charging, you’ll need a tripod or something else to keep your phone or device rock-steady as it’ll be capturing photos for a while. Or else, you can buy timed rotating tripod heads to help the camera device pan across a scene for added impact.
There are other ways you can use the app, for example to make stop-motion movies, so it’s a versatile and easy-to-use app that I can recommend. It’s available for free on the Apple and Google Play app stores, and costs £2.99 to unlock the Pro features.
Conclusion
What do you think about Lapse It Pro? Do you think it might be useful for you in your photography and video? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below.
Download Lapse It Pro (Free - £2.99 to unlock Pro features):
I’m Sarb Johal, and I take a lot of photographs. You can see more about my photography blog and my portfolio here. I’ll be posting a blog Photography tools and apps blog column weekly, every Tuesday.
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