How to shoot and edit hyperlapses with cheap lower end gear

It’s been a while since we’ve seen a video from Matthew Vandeputte, but now he’s back with a good one for all you aspiring hyperlapse shooters that don’t have high-end cameras and lenses, gimbals, or other expensive and fancy gadgets.

During a recent social media meet up in London, Matthew borrowed a friend’s Canon EOS 200D (Rebel SL2) with the 18-55mm kit lens to provide us with some tips to show us how we can shoot hyperlapse sequences with very inexpensive equipment.

The Anon EOS 200D/Rebel SL2 is currently around $500 on Amazon, with a bunch of extra bits thrown in. You can probably find it even cheaper if you shop around, but this technique doesn’t require the 200D. Matthew’s goal with the video is that the gear doesn’t really matter for hyperlapse, especially these days when even “low-resolution” cameras are still plenty more than is required to put out 1080p or even 4K video – of course, the higher resolution your camera, the better you can fake that “dolly zoom” look if you want it.

This technique will work with just about anything that allows full manual control over your focus and exposure. You could even do it with your phone as long as you’re using a suitable camera app and follow the principles outlined in the video.

• Pick a subject for your sequence
• Set your camera (or app) to full manual control
• Find a detail point to keep constant in your shots as you move
• Make sure the camera stays level
• Keep your timing and step size consistent between shots
• Keep going – they can take a while!

After this, the post-work is quite simple. Matthew uses the Warp Stabiliser inside Adobe After Effects, and if the first round of stabilisation doesn’t give you nice clean footage, precompose the sequence and run it again. Matthew suggests that multiple lower amounts of stability nested together will provide a smoother, cleaner result than just going nuts with a high amount of stabilisation on a single composition.

So, if you’ve been thinking about having a go with hyperlapses, but you’re worried that your gear sucks, or you don’t have a gimbal yet, then don’t worry. Just get out there and start shooting. You might surprise yourself with the results you can achieve with some practice. And it means that when you do eventually get the gear you think you need, you’ll be at a much better starting point with it.

What do you use to shoot hyperlapses?