News Time-lapse Systems: our 2018 round-up – part two

We began the first part of our 2018 round-up by reflecting on some of this year’s highlights, in particular those projects and major milestones that we have captured for our clients.

In part two we want to turn your attention to more of what has been happening behind-the-scenes, in-house at Hideaway Media – Time-Lapse Systems.

Like years previously, we have made new additions to our dedicated workforce to help in areas such as engineering, web development and editing.

Our work is incredibly varied and employing new staff is not only a reflection of our continued success in the industry, but is also testament to our continued commitment to providing the best time-lapse and site monitoring solutions.

In-house innovations: site monitoring

2018 is the year of iRis 4.0.

Above: our brand new iRis 4.0 time-lapse and site monitoring viewing portal builds on the signature elements of iRis 3.0, redesigned with additions, including a compare image functionality.

Shortly after Easter, Time-Lapse Systems released an upgrade to our revolutionary online viewing portal – an online platform which allows clients to view and share a secure archive of images from their project(s).

Guaranteeing the same professional standards and quality as our previous versions of the viewer, we have further engineered the software in-house to deliver an even greater degree of flexibility for our clients.

The iRis 4.0 includes the following features & upgrades:

• A new mobile and tablet friendly app-style interface & desktop view mode
• A new full screen image viewer mode
• A streamlined dashboard layout
• More sharing options (including direct integration with social media platforms)
• Full responsiveness on all modern browsers and devices.

Another key upgrade is the new compare image functionality, which allows both side-by-side and overlay options, so that clients can easily analyse two different stages of work simultaneously on one screen.

Our web design team are continuously working to deliver the next phase of innovative developments – including the next generation iRis viewer – providing leading site monitoring solutions for any purpose.

Web round-up

As well as in-house software developments, this year has been busy on our blog and our various social media platforms.

We value these as vital points of contact with our clients, as well as a means of forging new relationships with the public & customers.

We keep our blog updated throughout each year with news reports regarding some of our successfully completed projects. Our most popular case study of this kind from 2018 documented our time-lapse construction of Wicker Man roller coaster at Alton Towers, which we detailed in part one of our round-up.

Our most popular blog post of this year – ‘revealing the build story’ – considers the almost synonymous relationship between time-lapse and construction in both theory and application.

Above: an image captured by one of our camera systems on a City of London project. Time-lapse construction in the city is a large part of our portfolio, which includes some of the biggest developments in the capital alone.

Two series launched last year continue, ‘Using Time-Lapse’ and ‘Time-Lapse Trends’, continue to be a popular addition to our blog; in fact, an instalment of the latter on roller coasters made the top 10 of our most-read blogs of this year.

Some more of our popular blog posts from this year, as well as some of our own personal favourites, include:

• Time-lapse as part art, part science – looking at the creative applications of a tool rooted in science.
• A better relationship for photography & the natural world? – weighing up the ambiguous potential of social media in relation to environmental factors.
• Capturing never-to-be-seen-again views of the city – a look at how time-lapse construction is preserving the ever-changing landscape of London and other big cities in the UK.
• Time-lapse photography: old or new technology? – time-lapse as a mode of photography is in its infancy but is developed from over 140 years of history.
• Time-lapse & social media: the perfect combination – considering how social media has now become part of the day-to-day workflow of contractors.

As always, we have enjoyed seeing our own clients share the images and video edits that we have produced for them over the past 12 months.

Last year we reported on the completed demolition phase of 125 Deansgate – one of our many Manchester-based projects.

Since then, construction work has begun: installation of a steel framework is documented in our most recent time-lapse video edit for our clients (above). We look forward to monitoring the incredible construction progress at 125 Deansgate into 2019.

We relish all the challenges that come our way and, as ever, we are ready to embrace another busy schedule starting in the new year.

Thank you for joining us in seeing out a successful 2018 and, as always, get in touch in relation to any of our time-lapse, site monitoring and video solutions.

From all of us here at Time-Lapse Systems, we wish you all the very best for 2019!