Macro, High Speed & Time-Lapse Photography

PLEASE NOTE - SEE SAMPLES OF PHOTOS AFTER THIS SECTION

Macro photography is extreme close-up photography, usually of very small subjects and living organisms like insects, in which the size of the subject in the photograph is greater than life size. By the original definition, a macro photograph is one in which the size of the subject on the negative or image sensor is life size or greater. In some senses, however, it refers to a finished photograph of a subject that is greater than life size.

High-speed photography is the science of taking pictures of very fast phenomena. In 1948, the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers(SMPTE) defined high-speed photography as any set of photographs captured by a camera capable of 69 frames per second or greater, and of at least three consecutive frames. High-speed photography can be considered to be the opposite of time-lapse photography.

In common usage, high-speed photography may refer to either or both of the following meanings. The first is that the photograph itself may be taken in a way as to appear to freeze the motion, especially to reduce motion blur. The second is that a series of photographs may be taken at a high sampling frequency or frame rate. The first requires a sensor with good sensitivity and either a very good shuttering system or a very fast strobe light. The second requires some means of capturing successive frames, either with a mechanical device or by moving data off electronic sensors very quickly.

Time-lapse photography is a technique in which the frequency at which filmframes are captured (the frame rate) is much lower than the frequency used to view the sequence. When played at normal speed, time appears to be moving faster and thus lapsing. For example, an image of a scene may be captured at 1 frame per second but then played back at 30 frames per second; the result is an apparent 30 times speed increase. Similarly, film can also be played at a much lower rate than at which it was captured, which slows down an otherwise fast action, as in slow motion or high-speed photography.

Processes that would normally appear subtle and slow to the human eye, such as the motion of the sun and stars in the sky or the growth of a plant, become very pronounced. Time-lapse is the extreme version of the cinematography technique of undercranking. Stop motion animation is a comparable technique; a subject that does not actually move, such as a puppet, can repeatedly be moved manually by a small distance and photographed. Then, the photographs can be played back as a film at a speed that shows the subject appearing to move.

The red organ in the center of the squid is its digestive gland, flanked on either side by two white, crescent-shaped organs that are the squid’s gills. Also visible below each eye are photophores, which are light-producing organs. Researchers on board the NOAA ship Okeanos Explorer have captured this image.