TIME-LAPSE MAGIC

By now, we should all be used to light and colour manipulation. After all, we’ve been spoilt with choice when it comes to photo and video editing apps, and we all have someone to impress on social media. But with videos, there’s more than light and colour to manipulate – we can also manipulate time. The Huawei Mate30 Pro 5G is the perfect tool to help with this…


The opposite of slow-motion is time-lapse. These videos record change over time by showing a sequence of frames that are shot at set intervals. When the sequence is played back at normal speed, the action will look as if it has been sped up. In the past, photographers needed to hook an intervalometer to their cameras in order to take time-lapse videos. Fortunately for us, we can do the same thing with just our smartphones today.

Time-lapse is a great technique for capturing a lot of subject matters, such as a long drive along winding roads or clouds moving beside you as you peek out from the plane – but none are mesmerising as day-to-night (or vice versa) time-lapses.

There’s a reason why it’s referred to as the “holy grail” of timelapses Doing the holy grail with a traditional camera requires a good understanding of how to tweak camera parameters. Because of how the availability of natural light changes as the sun sets or rises, you’d need to set up exposure correctly before you start (or on the fly), or you’d wind up with over- or under-exposed footage. But if you have a HUAWEI Mate30 Pro 5G, then it’s a different story.

Powered by a Kirin 990 5G SoC and a fifthgeneration ISP, the HUAWEI Mate30 Pro 5G supports 4K low-light ultra-wide time-lapse video recording. The devices offer an Auto time-lapse capture mode that automatically tunes the devices for the optimal settings to ensure you get the best results in any scenario. Besides the Auto mode, you can manually set the frame interval or recording duration to fit your time-lapse needs. Of course, a Manual mode is also available for those who prefer to customise parameters themselves for artistic results.

While you can take a day-to-night time-lapse video with just the smartphone, it doesn’t mean you should. The holy grail takes hours to capture – you don’t want to hold your phone in place for that long. Instead, plan for your shot. Before heading out, make sure you have packed a tripod for extra flexibility, and umbrella to stay cool under the sun or dry in the rain, and a power bank. Video recording can be battery intensive. While the HUAWEI Mate30 Pro 5G houses a 4500mAh and 4200mAh battery respectively, it doesn’t hurt to bring along a power bank to ensure your device stays powered during and after the shoot.

Now that you’re set and ready to shoot with your HUAWEI Mate30 Pro 5G device, open the Camera app and swipe left on the slider below until you hit More. In the menu, pick Time-lapse, then frame your shot and start recording. If you want a bit more control over the frame interval, tap Auto to bring up the options. The second icon to your left lets you choose the speed; for the holy grail, we suggest four- to five-second intervals, which produces footage that speeds up real time by 120x or 150x. Huawei has also included some frame interval suggestions for other types of time-lapses, as seen on the Camera UI. For example, 0.5s and 1s intervals are ideal for cars and moving crowds, and 20s and 30s intervals are great for stars at night. ✤


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