SL2[-S] intervalometer weirdness

[Vlad Kuzemchik]

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Does anyone know what is the deal with intervalometer design on SL2-S (and I assume SL2)?

The only topic I found discussing topic is this one (in German) where they complaining about inconsistencies of number of images.

I set interval shooting same way I did for my M10R — number of shots and interval, assuming it is interval between shots, because this is how it works on every other camera I used.

But based on my testing, it is actually interval between triggers (shutter open -> shutter open, opposite to shutter close -> shutter open), so if your Shutter speed + NR is longer than this Interval, SL2[-S] will just skip the shot and will tell you "Some Frames are dropped" at the end.

I'm a bit confused why is it behaving like that and what benefit it gives comparing to every other implementation.

The only thing I could come up with is to precisely control the timing between images (for example to have exactly 24 images per minute to convert 1 minute to 1 second in time-lapse).

But this seems to be much less predictable in case the exposure changes. And you will know about the issue only after finding out that the change in exposure caused camera to shoot for longer than 8 seconds which triggered noise reduction and now your 15 seconds interval was missing half of images.

Any thoughts?

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[helged]

9 hours ago, Vlad Kuzemchik said:

Does anyone know what is the deal with intervalometer design on SL2-S (and I assume SL2)?

The only topic I found discussing topic is this one (in German) where they complaining about inconsistencies of number of images.

I set interval shooting same way I did for my M10R — number of shots and interval, assuming it is interval between shots, because this is how it works on every other camera I used.

But based on my testing, it is actually interval between triggers (shutter open -> shutter open, opposite to shutter close -> shutter open), so if your Shutter speed + NR is longer than this Interval, SL2[-S] will just skip the shot and will tell you "Some Frames are dropped" at the end.

I'm a bit confused why is it behaving like that and what benefit it gives comparing to every other implementation.

The only thing I could come up with is to precisely control the timing between images (for example to have exactly 24 images per minute to convert 1 minute to 1 second in time-lapse).

But this seems to be much less predictable in case the exposure changes. And you will know about the issue only after finding out that the change in exposure caused camera to shoot for longer than 8 seconds which triggered noise reduction and now your 15 seconds interval was missing half of images.

Any thoughts?

Yes, this is/can be irritating. Hard to know the thinking behind this. It should be possible to have the option to get fixed time between the shots, or fixed time based on the shutter activation. One can hope for a FW fix, but I wouldn't be overly optimistic. Personally I use the Miops Smart trigger. 

 

[beewee]

15 hours ago, Vlad Kuzemchik said:

I'm a bit confused why is it behaving like that and what benefit it gives comparing to every other implementation.

The only thing I could come up with is to precisely control the timing between images (for example to have exactly 24 images per minute to convert 1 minute to 1 second in time-lapse).

Imagine you’re shooting a sunrise time lapse for a video and you start out with 5s exposures every 15 seconds. With the ‘normal’ method, you would have to set 10s between exposures. As the sun comes up, you get down to 1/50 second exposures and now you only have 10s between exposures with the normal method which then induces a time scaling effect to your time lapse video and things appear to accelerate in speed as you play back at a fixed frame rate.

Whereas with Leica’s implementation, you only have to ensure your exposure time does not go beyond the time between exposures and there is never a risk of a weird time scaling effect in your video when you play a time lapse back at fixed frame rates. With the ‘normal’ intervalometer, your time lapse video frame rate would be dependent on scene brightness which would be nearly impossible to correct in post if you wanted a time lapse video with a fixed frame rate.

Edited September 2, 2021 by beewee
Correction in first sentence.

[Vlad Kuzemchik]

@beewee I actually do remember the speed up/slow down in some time lapses I watched. 

That makes a lot of sense. Thanks!

 

[Pelu2010]

Hey, 

 

when I do time lapses from sunset to dark and from dark to sunrise I usually use a bramper. 

I did this with the canons (magic lantern hack) 

Bevor this with  triggertrap

bevor this with some adurino .... 

Now I guess you need :

https://www.miops.com/products/smart

or 

 

https://plutotrigger.com/pages/manuals

(if I read this correct, they can both "bulb ramping") 

Which I did not test. 

Or you take 

https://lrtimelapse.com/de/

 

These are the things I found work. 

I lost the delight to do these kind of time lapses because I invested so much money that did not pay out. 

The best combination was magic lantern. Because it used the processor of the camera to calculate the exact 

exposure time. And it was slick and worked flawless. 

I posted this as a feature that I would like the engineers include into the camera. 

It was really easy . You made a reference picture and the camera calculated for every shot the difference and compensated. 

I would love to have this feature in the SL´s, but I am guessing that to many people complain about. 

cheers Peter 

 

 

[beewee]

Here’s a video that shows you how to do time lapse for sunsets. It also shows how to use LRTimelapse to make gradual lightroom adjustments.

 

Edited September 3, 2021 by beewee