If you haven't seen this yet, you need to. Practically demands full screen, and after dark is best, with nothing else going on, no distractions, no other noises. I've watched it about five times now.
By Mike Olbinski. Pretty amazingly wonderful! The music gets better with each hearing, too.
Mike
(Thanks to half a dozen readers over the past few weeks)
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(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:
Jim Kofron: "It's truly fantastic. The beauty of nature captured so eloquently, with the ability to study the fluid dynamics of the atmosphere—just incredible. And the soundtrack that goes along with it is awesome. And as you read about his journey over the month, covering thousands of miles—I think 'it's still better than doing weddings' (which he also does). Great stuff!"
DavidB: "The time lapse videos put together by Mike Olbinski get better and better each year. His videos do great justice in explaining why we chase and photograph storms. For some chasers, it's all about risk taking and how many tornadoes they got; with chasers like Mr. Olbinski it's about showing how amazing the atmosphere is.
"I've been chasing and photographing storms since the early '80s—long before it became popular. For me—and the folks I chased with—it was as much about the beauty of the storms as it was about tornadoes. Also, since we were all atmospheric scientists studying thunderstorms and tornadoes, it was an opportunity to observe the very phenomena we were studying through computer simulations and Doppler radar analysis. Some of us were even fortunate enough to do storm photography as part of our jobs during the various research programs over the years.
"As I watched this video, I was amused to actually recognize some of those storms. It would appear that Mr. Olbinski and I were located very near each other on at least a few days this spring. Congratulations to Mr. Olbinski for yet another outstanding storm video."
Andre Y: "Mike does great work and I'm a fan, but I think one of his previous videos is even better than this one!"
It is great. I may show it in my Earth Science class when I start talking about storms.
Posted by: Steven Ralser | Wednesday, 26 July 2017 at 01:13 PM
Astounding!
Posted by: Dave Van de Mark | Wednesday, 26 July 2017 at 02:03 PM
Excellent. The spectacle of natural forces rarely disappoints, eh? I can't imagine how much time this footage took to capture and edit, not to mention how much dead and travel time was involved. (Probably much like a wildlife doc, eh?) The music indeed fit like a glove. Personally, I'd cut it down to under 5 minutes.
How about another that recently came my way, also on Vimeo? This one, by Max Wilson titled Windy City Nights is a collection of (gee, guess) Chicago night scenes. But they're truly remarkable, many from vantages that I've sometimes imagined using for stills. This one is also a bit long for its own good, a common amateur film making mistake. But I think readers will enjoy it, particularly anyone who knows Chicago well.
Posted by: Ken Tanaka | Wednesday, 26 July 2017 at 02:33 PM
AWESOME!
Posted by: Bill Mitchell | Wednesday, 26 July 2017 at 03:45 PM
Simply overwhelming. Thanks for supplying the link
Fritz
Posted by: Fritz | Wednesday, 26 July 2017 at 05:18 PM
You can buy blu-ray discs directly from his web site, as I did after seeing a feature about his work on the PBS Newshour many months ago - just wonderful! "Pursuit" is new to me however and up on his site with the rest under "Store," I may buy that as well.
Posted by: Bob Casner | Wednesday, 26 July 2017 at 05:32 PM
Just.....WOW!
Posted by: Mark Kinsman | Wednesday, 26 July 2017 at 07:23 PM
Or the longer, earlier, original work: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koyaanisqatsi
Love the time lapse and the music...in both.
Posted by: kirk tuck | Wednesday, 26 July 2017 at 07:25 PM
It'd look better if it was not as undercranked. It'd also be better if he used professional equipment ,which would eliminate the choppy, uneven speed that mars most of the shots.
Posted by: Keith B | Wednesday, 26 July 2017 at 11:51 PM
Wow.
Posted by: Rick Wilcox | Wednesday, 26 July 2017 at 11:59 PM
Thanks for that Mike - truly amazing.
Posted by: Bob Johnston | Thursday, 27 July 2017 at 01:09 AM
This is… magnificent and humbling! Thanks Mike.
Have you seen the movie "Koyaanisqatsi"? If not, I guess you would love it…
Posted by: Bernard | Thursday, 27 July 2017 at 06:58 AM
I will never see clouds in the same way again. Over the years, studying about weather for my pilot's license, and following depictions and explanations provided by AccuWeather, I thought I had some idea of how these things worked. Wrong-0! Too bad I didn't view this until last evening. We had some very vigorous cloud development and movement her in SE PA yesterday. I could have set my LX100 on a tripod, and tried some time lapse photography myself.
And by the way, both the visuals and the soundtrack remind me of the Philip Glass movie "Koyaanisqatsi"
Posted by: MikeR | Thursday, 27 July 2017 at 09:57 AM
Sorry, I'm much less appreciative. The images are indeed wonderful, but it suffers the plague of most time-lapse vids at the moment : it goes much (much !) too fast. I'd say at least 4 times, if not 8 times too fast.
Most takes look choppy as a result, sometimes downright stroboscopic. Nothing is fluid or elegant, and the scenes replace each other faster than in a videoclip. Totally prevents me getting caught in the moment.
The vid mentioned by Andre Y looks miles better precisely because it's not as accelerated (speed could still be reduced a bit to me).
Posted by: vinck | Friday, 28 July 2017 at 05:03 PM