The Wormhole: An impressive display of pure timelapse creativity

Be prepared to be mesmerised by this extremely impressive, but very trippy kaleidoscopic timelapse by Michael Shainblum

For some reason, no matter how many of them are produced, timelapses still hold a continuing fascination. Indeed stock footage libraries never seem to run out of space for them. Timelapse has come a long way thanks to modern cameras. At one time the ability to create timelapses on a budget was as elusive as slow motion. In fact not so very long ago featuring a timelapse in your work was a sure fire way to increase 'production value', simply because, just like slow motion, you could only previously create it effectively with a specialised film camera.

DSLRs changed all that by enabling anyone to take incredibly high resolution stills and then put them together in a video sequence within Premiere or FCP. With the advent of non-linear recording to systems such as Sony XDCAM and Panasonic's P2 system, timelapse became even easier to produce, with the camera automatically creating the finished video sequence itself.

But whereas at one time simply filming some clouds moving across the sky would have people aghasp at how you'd managed to stay awake long enough to set and forget your video camera, now that it could take individual frames, timelapse has become very creative.

Hyperlapse was one of the last big innovations. But the video below isn't just a technical feat, it is much more of a purely creative one. Taking timelapse and turning it into an abstract animated kaleidoscope sequence. It might seem simple, but consider the visualisation of symmetry that the artist would need to employ to make a sequence such as this effective. Not surprisingly it won a Vimeo Staff Pick award. Enjoy!

 WARNING: This video may potentially trigger seizures for people with photosensitive epilepsy. Viewer discretion is advised.