a6400 Time Lapse and Shutter Speed

[VidThreeNorth]

I have been trying to use my a6400 for over-night time lapse. I have the camera taking "auto-exposure" frames at 1 fps, but the shutter speed will not drop below 1/30th sec. If I could, I would allow it to drop down to around 1/8th sec where appropriate. Does anyone know if I can change a setting somewhere to allow this?

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[VidThreeNorth]

250413 Long Time-Lapse Moon and Stars - Sony a6400

This is s "semi-successful" time lapse. I was using a Canon 50mm F1.4 lens and wanted to track the moon for a while, but then transition it to following the stars. The problem is that using auto-exposure (+2 stops) was going to be too high for the moon (which needs a -x exposure really) but lower than ideal for the stars. Exposure of +2 is actually fairly minimal to capture stars, particularly with an exposure limit of 1/30 sec. and that F1.4. I had actually wanted a clip of about 5 min., but I ended up with around 11 min. So really I needed to do post processing, but everything I tried resulted in a crash. I'm not sure why. But I ended up uploading it in its out-of-camera form for now. Someday, when I sort things out, I hope I can cut it into two different clips and process them into better uploads. But for now:

250413 Long Time-Lapse Moon and Stars - Sony a6400
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[NerdyTimelapser]

I have been trying to use my a6400 for over-night time lapse. I have the camera taking "auto-exposure" frames at 1 fps, but the shutter speed will not drop below 1/30th sec. I would to allow it to drop down to around 1/8th sec where appropriate. Does anyone know if I can change a setting somewhere to allow this?

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In my experience you get the best time-lapse results when you shoot RAW and use full manual settings, and you keep changing exposure when needed. When you go from night to day you might want to start under exposing. Auto exposure will unlikely precisely do what you have in mind yourself. Afterwards you will need a program like LRTimelapse - Advanced Time Lapse Photography made easy! to smooth out the exposure differences.

 

[NerdyTimelapser]

250413 Long Time-Lapse Moon and Stars - Sony a6400

This is s "semi-successful" time lapse. I was using a Canon 50mm F1.4 lens and wanted to track the moon for a while, but then transition it to following the stars. The problem is that using auto-exposure (+2 stops) was going to be too high for the moon (which needs a -x exposure really) but lower than ideal for the stars. Exposure of +2 is actually fairly minimal to capture stars, particularly with an exposure limit of 1/30 sec. and that F1.4. I had actually wanted a clip of about 5 min., but I ended up with around 11 min. So really I needed to do post processing, but everything I tried resulted in a crash. I'm not sure why. But I ended up uploading it in its out-of-camera form for now. Someday, when I sort things out, I hope I can cut it into two different clips and process them into better uploads. But for now:

250413 Long Time-Lapse Moon and Stars - Sony a6400
​

250413 Long Time-Lapse Moon and Stars - Sony a6400

This is s "semi-successful" time lapse. I was using a Canon 50mm F1.4 lens and wanted to track the moon for a while, but then transition it to following the stars. The problem is that using auto-exposure (+2 stops) was going to be too high for the moon (which needs a -x exposure really) but lower than ideal for the stars. Exposure of +2 is actually fairly minimal to capture stars, particularly with an exposure limit of 1/30 sec. and that F1.4. I had actually wanted a clip of about 5 min., but I ended up with around 11 min. So really I needed to do post processing, but everything I tried resulted in a crash. I'm not sure why. But I ended up uploading it in its out-of-camera form for now. Someday, when I sort things out, I hope I can cut it into two different clips and process them into better uploads. But for now:

250413 Long Time-Lapse Moon and Stars - Sony a6400
​

A full moon is so extremely bright compared to the rest of the sky/scene. If you don't want the moon to look like a sun and see some texture, you need to under expose a lot. I don't have that much experience with astro timelapses, but normally people make those when the moon is not visible in the sky. A full moon will give so much light pollution. Also light pollution from big cities can ruin astro timelapses, site like Light pollution map can show you were in the world you should go .
5-11 min is also pretty long for a time-lapse, maybe try a larger interval.
What software were you using that crashed?
Good luck!

 

[VidThreeNorth]

What software were you using that crashed?
Good luck!

...

I tried DVDvidesoft's "Video Suite" and a version of "Pinnacle" (Ultimate on Windows 8.1).

 

[NerdyTimelapser]

I have never used those, but Blackmagic has a free version of its excellent DaVinci Resolve (DaVinci Resolve | Blackmagic Design). In my experience it is very stable software

 

[VidThreeNorth]

. . . normally people make those when the moon is not visible in the sky.

Using Slog2 gives fairly low contrast. The a6400 has no way to preset start and stop times. I have to be there and hit the button myself. In this case, I just didn't get around to stopping it within a shorter time.

. . .maybe try a larger interval.

The a6400 only has a 1 sec. interval in the S&Q mode (built into the camera). To use any other interval, I would need to buy an external timer. I can't do that right now.

 

[VidThreeNorth]

I have uploaded my latest time-lapse to YouTube as:

"250428 Time-Lapse Stars Morning Birds - Sony a6400"
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Length is about 4:40. This one was started around 04:09:55, and ended at about 06:29:28 (covering about 2 1/2 hrs). which is after sunrise. About 3 min follows the stars, then as the stars disappear, clouds come in and eventually there are birds. You cannot really see the birds because they appear in individual frames "here and there" from about 4:08 to the end. This is literally a case of "if you blink, you'll miss them."