this week I'm going to show you how to
use an intervalometer
if you use a Sony camera like the a7 3
and you want to shoot time lapses you'll
have to get an intervalometer for some
reason they don't include an
intervalometer built into the camera
which most other brands do this seems a
bit of a pain especially now with the a7
3 where they've gotten rid of the time
lapse app now the only way to shoot time
lapses on a sony camera is to use an
intervalometer most intervalometer look
the same you have a little LED display
then you have a series of buttons on the
bottom I'll show you what all of these
functions and what the buttons do and
how you can use it to create time lapses
or take a long exposure shots along the
top you have a tag and by pressing left
or right on the directional pad you can
choose any of the functions delay long
interval N and audio these may be
different on your intervalometer or they
might be in a different order but they
all pretty much do the same thing this
is the time that you want to delay the
start of the time-lapse maybe you want
to get into or out of the shot or you
want to wait some time before the camera
starts taking the time-lapse
this is where this is useful this is how
long the shutter will be press for if
you're doing long exposures in your
time-lapse you could use this to hold
the shutter open in bulb mode for
however long you want and you would set
that here
this is how long the interval is between
the shots this is the one that you will
use all the time when shooting time
lapses I said it anywhere between 1 and
30 seconds if you were doing exposures
longer than 30 seconds this is where
long would come in so you could set this
to a minute or however long your
exposure is going to be but normally I
set my time lapse interval between 1 and
30 seconds so I can set the shutter
speed on the camera this is for the
number of shots you want I used to use
this function but there have been a few
times where I shot a time-lapse and just
coming to the end of the number that I
said something interesting was happening
in the shot there was no way to reset
this number and the time lapse just
stopped I could have started it again
but there would have been a jarring
point in that time lapse so now I set it
to infinity and stop it when I want I
normally take around about 350 images in
a time lapse sequence but towards the
end I'll see what's going on in the
frame and see if there's anything
interesting passing through the frame if
there is I'll let this happen
by carrying on shooting and then
stopping it after that point so if you
want to set a time lapse going when
you're sleeping say with an
astrophotography time lapse sequence you
would set this number to 300 or 350 or
however many images you want and then
you'd be able to sleep knowing that the
camera is going to stop once it's got to
that number the musical note will turn
the beep on or off if you're doing quite
a quick time-lapse a shot every second
and also if you're doing a time lapse
while you're sleeping it can be really
annoying having a beep going off every
30 seconds so I tend to have this turned
off to change any of these settings put
the tag on the setting you want to
change and then press set that's the
center button on the directional pad it
will start to flash you have your hours
minutes and seconds so use the control
pad to select the one that you want and
then use the up and down
to change the figure once you have the
number that you want press set again to
keep it where it is the light and lock
button is a double function button press
it for a short duration and the light
will come on press it for a long period
and it will lock all of the buttons this
lock button is actually really good I've
had the intervalometer buried somewhere
in my bag I had the audio beep on and it
was beeping away because I'd
inadvertently pressed the start/stop
button I could hear this beeping in the
hotel room and I didn't know where it
was coming from and it took me ages to
find out where show if you hit the lock
button this will stop this from
happening the button on the right is the
start/stop button this button will
basically start or stop your time-lapse
the bottom button is the manual shutter
release button which has a hold function
built into it so it actually doubles up
as you long exposures shutter release as
well as a time-lapse interval ometer
also when using this hold function on
the shutter release button
it will start a timer when you click it
up to the hold position so you know how
long the shutter has been open for this
is great as you don't need a stopwatch
just put your camera into the bulb
function press and push this up to the
hold function and then it'll count the
seconds for you they normally take two
triple A batteries I tend to put a strip
of velcro on the leg of the tripod and
then one on the back of the
intervalometer so it's not blowing
around in the wind to shoot a time-lapse
set your camera to single-shot plug the
intervalometer into your camera set a
delay at the start of the time-lapse if
you want it set the interval time to
where you want it make sure that
intervalometer isn't dangling in the
wind this could inadvertently bang on
the tripod and cause a bit of shake
while the camera is taking the photos
press the start button all you need to
do then is calculate the time you need
to wait for the camera to get the amount
of shots that you want for the
time-lapse once you're done hit the stop
button and that's about it if you're
interested in shooting time lapses click
on the I in the corner this will take
you to the video showing you how to do
it step by step
an intervalometer is a vital bit of kit
if you want to shoot time lapses
especially if you're shooting with a
sony camera and nowadays you can get
some relatively cheap ones from amazon
the branded ones are really expensive so
stick to the Chinese copies as always if
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