Stop-Motion Dolly (Trackless)
Having been playing with QuickTime’s Image Sequence feature for the time-lapse vids I’ve posted recently, I found myself wondering if the same trick could be used to replace a dolly for shots without moving subjects. In other words, stop motion by moving the camera rather than the subject.
I placed a tape measure along a line in the floor, set up the tripod with two legs touching the measure, and took a shot. I then lifted the pod an camera and placed it down carefully, with the same two legs touching the measure, and took another. I repeated this reasonably quickly until I got to the end of the room.
After this I copied the pictures to the computer and assembled them in QuickTime as I’ve described in the past. While results are unsurprisingly jerky straight out of QuickTime, I had hope that Final Cut Pro’s Smooth Cam filter (it’s in Video Filters > Video) would do the trick.
And it sort of does…