Hi,

Looking for some advice as I start exploring more timelapse photography. To date I have shot 2 nightlapses of the stars but these weren’t the main plans of my shoots. I was mainly takijg multiple shots using the Fuji in camera Intervalometer to allow me to stack images to reduce noise. When I learned this method it was advised to have the interval between the shutter closing and the reopening as quick as possible so I set the interval in the camera to be 1 sec and the shutter speed is usually in the region 10-15 seconds depending on focal length etc. for minimising star trailing etc.

In learning the above technique, my camera has always appeared to be operating with minimal dark time between shots and it doesn’t seem to struggle with missed shots however in researching more daytime/holy grail Timelapse technique I have come to realise my understanding and use of the Intervalometer has been wrong. The interval should actually be the the sum of the exposure time plus the dark time so for Astro examples above at 15 seconds, I should have set the interval timer to at least 16 seconds.

However when trying this out on my Fujifilm X-T3 with +1 sec on top of shutter speed, the camera can’t do all its processing so it misses the next shot and starts its 16 timer again which is obviously not what I want. I then trialled 15 + 2 seconds and the camera seems to get every second shot ok but the shots in between these miss like the +1 settings which again isn’t useable. 15+3 seems to the shortest time I can get it to work using this method which is fine and I’m sure would provide adequate results however as I mentioned at the start, my initial setup of just using a 1 sec interval (albeit wrong) seems to produce no missed shots and minimises dark time.

I am trying to understand what is going on with camera for it to behave this way as I embark on exploring more Timelapse so I can make sure I have a higher chance of success in the field.

Maybe I have just been lucky with these 2 Astro Timelapse’s to date haha.

Yes, sometimes people get the definitions wrong, which is then confusing.
Interval always includes Exposure + Dark Time.

I don't know your specific camera, but if you set an interval shorter than the exposure with the internal intervalometer, the camera might have gone to a special mode where it "connected" the shots. Another option that some cameras allow for this is to "lock" the shutter like for continuous shooting. You can do this with an external intervalometer. Then the camera will trigger shots in succession with a minimum dark time. This might be better than the approach with the internal intervalometer set to a the "correct" interval.

Generally, I recommend to always use an external intervalometer. Nearly all internal ones behave "weird" the one way or another. Mostly they require way too long dark times. That's one of the reasons I've designed the LRT PRO Timer: to achieve the shortest dark times possible: https://lrtimelapse.com/lrtpt

For example on my Nikons with the LRT PRO Timer I get the best results and dark times of down to 0.3 secs.

This post was last modified: 2024-09-03, 10:58 by Tattieee.

Thanks for the advice.

Yea I believe my camera is going into some form of different mode like you said which seems to be useable for the night shoots that I have done so far.

Would I be right in thinking when I have tried the other option of like 15+1 for total of 16 sec interval and the camera misses firing the second shot, this is mainly caused by the camera unable to complete the write of the previous image to the SD card before taking the next shot?

Also can you explain the contionous lock way of doing it with an external Intervalometer?

Would I be right in thinking when I have tried the other option of like 15+1 for total of 16 sec interval and the camera misses firing the second shot, this is mainly caused by the camera unable to complete the write of the previous image to the SD card before taking the next shot?

Yes, I think so.

Also can you explain the contionous lock way of doing it with an external Intervalometer?

Basically you set a long time exposure (in the LRT PRO Timer mode "Single/Bulb") then you can either define the whole time of the timelapse, like 120mins as "Exposure" or work with "Open End" where you can manually stop the exposure.
The camera will be set to continuous shooting and the "real" exposure set in the camera.
Basically this makes the Timer "hold" the shutter the whole time and the camera does the continuous shooting.

Great thanks for your help, I will maybe do some tests with faster SD cards to see how the camera behaves.

Is the LRT Pro Timer available to ship to the UK? I couldn’t see anything on the buy page for this.