Fixed point photography app

[Caitlin Pearson]

We’re setting up a group of volunteers to do some fixed point photography of leaky dams and flood events. Does anyone have any recommendations of apps or programmes for fixed point photography? I’m wanting to do two things, which could be in different apps if necessary.

Firstly, we want to use a previous photo as a template to make sure the photos can be compared. Unfortunately we can’t put camera posts in at the location. I’ve found an app called fixed point camera beta which works well but only for android devices. Does anyone know of an equivalent for iPhone?

Secondly, we’d like to stitch the photos together to make a timelapse video and see how it changes over time. Is there an app or computer programme that does this?

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

[Dan Turner]

Hi Caitlin

Cant help you with the fixed point photo app, but stitching together photos for a time-lapse is pretty simple, you can do it in windows movie maker, put all your photos in a folder, order by date, drag and drop all your photos into a timeline then fiddle around with timings until you are happy with the video.

Good luck.

[Michelle Walker]

Hi Caitlin
Marc Naura from RRC mentioned at the Catchment Data User Group meeting this week that they are releasing a fixed point photography app soon – I think he said in the new year.
You should be able to contact him via the RRC website, or via the CDUG sharepoint site, or ping me an email and I’ll put you in touch.

They also have a short guide which might be useful:
https://www.therrc.co.uk/sites/default/files/files/Guidance_training/fixed_point_photography.pdf

[obsidian-uas]

Hi Caitlin, one very effective solution to this problem would be to use a waypoint capable drone. These use GPS coordinates to return to the same point in space and repeat the same photograph (or video) over and over. This could be done over days, weeks, months or years as long as you keep the waypoint stored on the drone. Multiple waypoints can be used to take several shots from different positions. This also has the advantage of taking photographs from anything up to 400ft up which would give a much better overall view of a flood or management scheme. Positioning accuracy would typically be around +/- 1.5m horizontally and +/- 0.5m vertically. The cameras on a good quality drone would also be vastly better than a mobile phone and are stabilised so they don’t blur the photographs and video isn’t jumpy.
There are a number of applications out there that can stitch photographs like this together to create timelapse effects. The software that comes with DJI drones can also produce numerous other effects such as slow-motion video, panoramic photographs, Point-of-interest shots (e.g. moving the camera around while keeping the same spot in the centre of the frame to give different views of it) etc.

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