Captivating black and white storm time-lapse film by photographer, Mike Olbinski. Be sure to watch this full-screen in HD, it’s going to blow you away.
Meet storm chasing photographer, Mike Olbinski. Mike has made a name for himself with his incredible thunderstorm, tornado, and monsoon time-lapse films. For his latest project, Mike decided to do things a little differently by keeping the project entirely in black and white.
“For quite a few years now I’ve been wanting to do something different with my time-lapse films. I love color. Storms are full of color. The blues, the greens, the warm oranges, and reds at sunset. The colors are sometimes what make a simple storm into something extra special.
But black and white speaks to my soul. I love it. There is something when you remove the color that lets you truly see the textures, movement, and emotion of a storm.
And then you hear a song. I had asked my buddy Jay Worsley (vimeo.com/jayworsley) if he had heard anything lately that might rock for a black and white storm film, and he linked me to Tony Anderson’s “The Way Home.” The moment I heard it, I knew that was the song. My recent films have a frantic pace to them and people occasionally tell me they’d love to see the footage in a much slower speed. I already knew that going with the monochrome style sorta demanded something more solemn and poetic… and the song was perfect for that.
I also went with a much wider aspect ratio than I’ve ever done before. I feel like it actually feels like it brings you in closer to the action, almost like you were standing right there with me.
I held myself back for a long time in doing this project because I wasn’t very knowledgable about using tools like Premiere Pro to color grade footage, and all I thought was that I’d have to re-render all my clips as black and white before doing the film. And that’s a lot of work. But the past few years have brought me tons of experience in Premiere Pro, plus help from my buddy Jay, and I figured out how to do it all there and without a ton of effort.
The film is made up of some of my favorite clips from the past few years. A mix of the monsoon and supercell plains chasing. I’m so inspired by the songs I choose for these videos. Kerry Muzzey, Tony Anderson. Their songs are so powerful and moving and the stories they tell themselves are amazing. I went with clips that felt right with each beat of the song and while I usually try to tell a story with these films, I mostly decided to let the music be that here.
I hope you enjoy this! The creative juices were flowing and I also have some serious withdrawals from chasing storms. I HAD to work on something to hold me over until spring gets here. Only around four months to go before I hit the road to chase supercells and tornadoes in April, May and June!” [Mike Olbinski on Vimeo]
If you’d like to keep up with more from Mike, be sure to subscribe to his channel on Vimeo, follow him on Facebook or visit his website.
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