Ngauruhoe hides in the clouds

This is one of my favourite spots above Whakapapa ski field. The view is pretty epic, and on days like this, ever changing although in realtime, the clouds were hardly moving so I opted for a 4 second interval.

Here’s a fun tip for you, and it’s something I should have considered but didn’t think about when setting up. I noticed a very slight unintentional tilt effect after rendering the video. You won’t notice this because of the zoom I added in post, but I was a little surprised since I’m usually pretty good at tightening my tripod head.

After a bit of headscratching it was fairly obvious. What do black tripod legs do in the sun? They heat up, which, over the course of 30 minutes, means that they slowly sink into the snow.

Fortunately I’d positioned my tripod with one leg facing backwards, taking most of the weight so it ended up causing a very gentle upward tilt. Far better than a drunken roll to the left or right.