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Photo collages record passage of time in 'slices'

Aug 7, 2013 at 18:13:50 GMT

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In his series 'Time is a Dimension,' photographer Fong Qi Wei stretches the boundaries of still photography to produce images that convey the passage of time. Rather than using simple time-lapse, he has created a series of photo collages, each composed of many 'slices' taken in a 2 to 4 hour timespan. The resulting images capture the changing colors of sunrise and sunset in a way a single conventional still frame, or a video can't match.

Photo by Fong Qi Wei.

Via: the Creators Project, Source: Fong Qi Wei

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Comments

Total comments: 33

It's a new take on time slices, definitely.
To the ones who think there's trickery, you can see that he has chosen a full slice where there is movement, the only trickery appears to be his clever slicing and processing, anyway, I like that it's a different approach and produced some interesting pics, nothing too fantastic but good for advertising-related work.

0 upvotes

I've been doing "time slicing" for years. I named it Intervalography.
Here's some of my work:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/agrinberg/sets/72157603852523992

0 upvotes

Artistically all the pictures are very pleasant and beautiful. However, they just don't convey the passage of time. In fact, some of them emphasize a frozen point in time even with more strength than a single exposure would: a single slow exposure shows movement of people, waves, clouds, cars, etc., especially if panning is used. But not this series. Take, for example, the picture at the beach in the original website; the people at the beach are frozen in one spot, something that never happens in a beach, which has some much movement of waves, clouds and people. I agree with those, like ljmac below, who think that this is just trickery. However, again, the pictures are beautiful. They just don't show the passage of time.

0 upvotes

Creative. I might try it myself if I ever get the time.

1 upvote

"... if I ever get the time"

He, he ... was that intentional?

0 upvotes

I prefer the more traditional approach to the problem.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/wvs/227907329/

Comment edited 5 minutes after posting

0 upvotes

Me to. Even though you could be a little more inventive than that.

I think the major problem with the images in this article is that they don't give me a notion of passing of time.

0 upvotes

It just doesn't work for me - it looks like he's superimposed translucent strips of colour over a base image or something. And given that you have a single set of fireworks stretching over three time periods (for example), this is obviously true to an extent. The clouds are the same throughout the first image too. If he wants it to work, he should do what he says he is doing without this trickery.

Comment edited 2 minutes after posting

2 upvotes

I was wondering about the tides in one of the photos. There seems to be little movement, which made me wonder what kind of time lapse is he working with. I also suspect a bit of trickery here, too.

0 upvotes

I agree with you; see my comment above.

0 upvotes

Who ever thought of this is a GENIUS

Excellent concept !!!!!

0 upvotes

Although an interesting concept, unlike previous pictures I have seen using this kind of approach (it's not really that original), I don't feel these convey the passing of time.

1 upvote

Beautiful work!

1 upvote

Obviously using the Panasonic 20mm lens. Those high-ISO banding issues again.
EDIT.
Oh, I can't restrain myself. These are truly horrible. They look like the sort of pre-framed kitsch you buy in the Ikea "art" section.

Comment edited 2 minutes after posting

2 upvotes

i thought it's because he used the electronic shutter.

0 upvotes

give him credit, this is cool. Good that he made the more interesting part of the town night and the boring one day. A time lapse collage done like this is somewhat original.

Comment edited 3 minutes after posting

2 upvotes

Very interesting!

1 upvote

Artist at work! Great job!

1 upvote

A 2 to 4 hour timespan, and the clouds are more or less in the same place? I don't think so;) Interesting concept but needs more work.

3 upvotes

Clever, modern, original - I'll bet the prints sell well.

4 upvotes

The assumption seems to be that ordinary photos are just a fraction of a second when in fact, some of the most interesting photos are long exposures. So, when you look a photos like Joel Myerowitz' Cape Cod, you're seeing something that's a composite of many "slices" of time. Without the stripes, though.

Comment edited 39 seconds after posting

1 upvote

Really quite lovely, very graphic.

2 upvotes

Great idea, but the result is so so, I would say.
I don't see the flow of time in those images.
Needs more thought and work.

3 upvotes

Nice sense of design. I don't think the technique would be nearly as interesting with a basic mechanical approach to dividing up the images.

0 upvotes

Reminds me of the time-lapse camera panning in Life and Planet Earth.

On the other hand, I feel the sense of "passage of time" is not strong enough. I got to try it sometime.

0 upvotes

nice!

0 upvotes

I'd love to try this, but then there's no way I could sit in one spot for 20 hours to do this . . . .

0 upvotes

Says these were 2-4 hour compositions, not 20 hours.

0 upvotes

2-4 hour slices . . . . and there are ~10 slices

1 upvote

"many slices taken in a 2-4 hour time span"
Not "each slice taken in a 2-4 hour time span"

2 upvotes

don't you see daytime slices as well as night time ones?

0 upvotes

You just set your intervalometer and come back hours later

0 upvotes

[[You just set your intervalometer and come back hours later]]

...to find that your camera has been stolen. Now there's an art project! Have the photos uploaded to a cloud service, then combine them all into slices. The last slice is the moment before the camera was taken!

Comment edited 2 times, last edit 1 minute after posting

0 upvotes

Total comments: 33

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