In this out-of-class exercise, we ventured to the the highest floor of Clementi Mall's HDB blocks, the 40th floor, with the goal of taking a timelapse. We were challenged to capture 2 types of "motion" of the view below; cars moving in and out of the carpark, people travelling to and fro, etc.

We started off adjusting the settings on the camera and setting it up on a tripod. For our first timelapse, we framed the camera to capture the moving ships and boats in the ocean near the port. Then, all we had to do was sit back for 20 minutes and let the camera work its wonders, while ensuring that nothing and no one moves the camera, even a little, as the video is being taken. Subsequently, we captured a timelapse of people walking at ground level and finally, the cars on the highway. In post-production, we sped up the video in premiere pro and added a motion blur effect in after effects.

This experience taught us that even the most mundane of views can be turned into something interesting, through a timelapse. At first, we thought the timelapse of the port wouldn’t show much movement as the ships didn't look like they were moving much. After editing the 20 minutes of footage however, we realised that the port was bustling with activity and that made us realise that timelapses could reveal to us what we can't see. The best part of taking a timelapse is hitting the "record" button and waiting for time to pass.