The Sandpit

I came across this video again while I was browsing the net this morning. I was blown away when I first saw it and still is. It's a  few months old but I wanted to share it with you guys. 

If you've seen pictures that shows miniature scenes like the one on top, it's probably taken by an SLR camera with a specialized lens called a "tilt-shift" lens. 

These lenses can change the angle of the plane of focus and thus control the perspective of the picture. This lens is usually used for architectural picture where you want to shoot with a wide angle and prevent keystoning from happening.





Another "accidental" use for this lens is that you can control where the plane of focus is as well as the shallow depth of field to create scenes that looks like miniatures. 


Searching flickr will show you a lot of examples of this kind of photography but   you'll notice that a lot of the pictures where actually done in post (maybe because the lens is pretty expensive).


This is where the video comes in. Sam O'Hare shot over 35,000 pictures in a span of 5 days, did his magic in post processing and created one of the most creative videos of NY that you can imagine. So enjoy and judge for yourself. :o)

The Sandpit from Sam O'Hare on Vimeo.
Watch in HD in Full Screen for the best effect!

Head over to Aero Film for descriptions on how they made the film.
Martin Pot also made a very informative tutorial on how to get this same effect  in Photoshop. You can check it out Here.