<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6243093#post6243093 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by avansickle
How did you automate the camera to do the on/off throughout the night? Also, I assume it captured at normal speed and then you edited it to faster speeds? I'm interested in learning this stuff.
Thanks for the compliments, Amy
As for how I do the timelapse stuff..... I have a digital camera, a Nikon Coolpix 8800, that has several movie settings, including the very useful timelapse settings. During the day I set it to take a non-flash pic every 30 seconds. During the night I set it to take flash pics every 10 minutes. I also have a homemade night light over the tank so the camera has at least a bit of light with which to focus the flash pic.
The original movie files are rendered in .MOV files. I use "River Past Video Cleaner Pro 6.7" that dear husband bought off the internet for me to convert the .MOV files to .avi files. The editing software, "Pinnacle Studio 9", cannot use .MOV files but is great with .avi files.
Once the movie files are in .avi format, I use "OSS Video Decompiler" (also bought off the internet) to extract all the frames from the .avi movie and convert them into .jpeg format.
With the day movies, I will get 300-400+ frames (three times a day) of which I select only a small portion in any particular movie. With the night movies, I get under 100 frames and use them all. I have a choice in my editing software as to how long each frame plays. The day movies, with so many frames, are set to play very quickly. The night movies are set to play more slowly to see the quick action at a slower rate.
I hope that explains the technical side of the process.
Indeed, I have posted these movies in the anemone/clownfish forum :rollface: Mud Shrimp Moe adores my GBTA movies
As it turns out, had to requascape the 37g yesterday. Placed the GBTA higher up in the rockwork on the other side of the tank and the silly clowns were looking in the old spot for their home until this afternoon. I used clown psychology to get them out from under the rockwork, where they lived in their old tank as well as in the new tank near where their GBTA was.
Clown psychology, you ask? Well, that entails looking at them for long periods of time from the side of the tank where the anemone is located. They like to stare people down, so when I got in their faces they got right back into mine. They eventually became aware of the GBTA by accidentally brushing against during the staring contests. Now, the female is going back and forth to snuggle again in her home. The male is close by, but not actually going into the anemone.
Judging from their previous behaviour, by tomorrow night, both will be sleeping in the GBTA
![Smile :) :)](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)
However, I'm not sure the GBTA will stay put tonight, and I'm not sure what the clowns will do if it goes on a trek around the tank
Anyway, back to editing the newest GBTA/clown two movies :rollface:
Take care!