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A sunset over a woodland scene with a carpet of bluebells.

News Coming to life – springtime time-lapse

7 April 2017 Kate

Following on from our recent blog outlining several tips on how to capture the best of the springtime with your camera, we feature some examples of how time-lapse photography can capture this exciting season in full bloom.

As of Monday 20th March 2017, spring has sprung in the Northern Hemisphere. This marks the spring equinox – the moment wherein the plane of the Earth’s equator passes through the centre of the Sun.

The season of spring can be associated with ideas of rebirth, renewal, and regrowth.

Indeed, many plants begin to grow again following the cold and rather harsh conditions during winter and landscapes come alive with all manner of flora and fauna.

As made notable by David Attenborough-BBC titles such as The Private Life of Plants (1995), time-lapse sequences are able to present details that would otherwise be missed by the human eye.

As plants live on a different time scale, it is only through the manipulation of time that we can see certain aspects of plant behaviour.

Amazing Nature by Chokchai Love King

This compilation of time-lapse sequences capture different flowers in the process of blooming. The detail is incredible and emphasises the delicate and elaborate biology of these living organisms.

Visualising plants and flowers blooming outside of their natural surroundings can also offer a creative variation on this kind of narrative, as this other video shows. The vibrant and abstract backgrounds appear quite jarring, while drawing attention to the magic of these processes in their isolation.

Time-lapse can also highlight the liveness of a landscape.

Rolling clouds meet calm waters in this video showing Sweden in springtime. Although simple in its composition, the focus is mostly on the sky and the powerful movements of the clouds from sunrise to sunset.

Utilising time-lapse in combination with other techniques such as a camera dolly can also reap pleasing results.

Snowdrops = Spring | Timelapse Dolly by MiLapse

Simplicity is the key in this video, as the camera moves along the undergrowth capturing the subtle movements of the snowdrop flowers and patterns of light across the fallen leaves.

Similarly, time-lapse is utilised with a dolly in this video to survey the effects of spring on a larger scale, capturing broader waterside landscapes.

As well as renewal and rejuvenation, spring can be considered as a period of transition. As winter loosens its grip on the natural landscape and warmer conditions begin to appear, time-lapse can be a useful means of documenting such subtle transitions.

This footage spans four days in the Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado. Evidence of the landscape coming to life can be seen in the melting snow, the elk, and the flying birds.

The park itself includes mountains, alpine lakes, and a wide variety of wildlife that exist within various climates and environments, ranging from mountain tundra to wooded forests. This video captures these dynamic conditions during the fascinating metamorphosis between winter and spring.

These are all time-lapses videos that are truly varied, showing the versatility of the genre through the new season.

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