Time-Lapse Photography Art and Techniques by Mark Higgins

An extreme close-up enables you to capture the small details of your subject. Generally a macro lens
is used for this type of shot.
Often shot with a macro lens, an extreme close up will fill the frame with small details from your
subject. This kind of shot is used when making time-lapse videos of small nature and wildlife
subjects, such as ants or a flower growing. In any situation showing small details which will assist
your storytelling, aim to get really close. This helps with achieving visual diversity as well as
keeping the viewer’s eyes busy.
Camera angles
This section is concerned with how the shot is framed. This could affect decisions such as what lens
you use and where the camera is when it is shooting. Most of these angles can be translated back to
stills shooting as well and, in fact, a lot of it might sound familiar to stills photographers.
High angle
High angle is where the camera is high up, looking down on your subject. A time-lapse shot from a
high angle can show a large amount of moving detail and help us get a sense of scale and distance
between objects. If you are shooting anything with a lot of people or traffic, this angle will help you
see more of what is going on. If you shoot a busy scene from street level, for example, you will see
much less movement, but from higher up everything is more visible. Using this kind of angle will
always make a scene impressive, but of course you need to find somewhere high up to shoot from.
Look for a hill or a building with a good view.
Low angle
A low angle shot is when the camera is low down on the ground. This will work well when you are