Matthew Vandeputte, Timelapse Photographer
Part 2 in our Creator Spotlight series
We interviewed one of our top creators, Matthew Vandeputte, aka @matjoez, for the next installment in our creator spotlight series. The interview has been edited for concision and clarity.
Gfycat: Tell us a little about your account. How would you describe the GIFs you make?
Matthew: I use Gfycat to extract the most visually appealing shots of my timelapse photography. I like that it’s a non-intrusive auto-play. It appeals to a lot of people.
The nature of my work is showing off the world in a new way — a way not a lot of people get to see. When I shoot the sunset or astro-photography or special clouds, people think they know what it looks like. But when you speed it up, it’s like it’s coming from a different dimension. So it engages really well with people. I think what you guys [Gfycat]are doing is good. It’s made things a lot easier. The far side of the spectrum of GIF... do you say GIF or JIF?
We say it with a soft G, but we don’t care that much.
The other side of the spectrum in making GIFs is — have you ever tried to do it in Photoshop?
Once. It was terrible.
I was on a job for one of the biggest zoos in Australia. They wanted to create a GIF keyboard for their Facebook chat. They wanted to create animal reactions of native Australian animals. And I was like, “Cool, I can do that. I’m sure it’s not that hard making GIFs.” While I was there I was shooting animals and I tried making a GIF with Photoshop. It wasn’t the most straightforward thing. But then when I sat down and had to actually make 30 different GIF reactions in Photoshop, it took 40 minutes to create a really sub-par GIF. I realized, “Oh, this is going to take me days.”
Then I remembered I got this email from someone on your team saying, “Check out GIF Brewery.” So I tried that and literally, within 30 seconds, I could transform a bit of video that I’d shot into a GIF. High-quality, customizable, with custom frame rate and everything. And I was like, “This is it! This is what it always should have been like.” So that helped me out; it saved me a ton of time. And I’ve since then forwarded to so many people to use that as a GIF creation tool for their video content.
Are the GIFs you create part of your business? How do they advance your business?
Anything I do on social media is part of my business. Those GIFs all tie into the strategy. Being active on Twitter, on Instagram, on Reddit, all those things tie into building my profile and becoming known as Matthew, the timelapse guy who lives in Australia.
I’m always trying to do stuff in a different way, in a new way. That’s why I bought a drone, ages ago, before anyone else. I’m always asking, how can I set myself apart from everyone else? GIFs tie into that, because it’s a new way of showing stuff. It goes into an email, it’s lightweight, non-intrusive, and it condenses footage into its essence.
What about time lapses do you think makes them so compelling?
They show us patterns of movement. It can be a swarm, the way traffic moves, how clouds behave, what a sunset looks like, what the night sky looks like. They’re familiar, constantly around us, but we only see them from one angle. If you speed it up, it looks way different. I think it’s exposing this hidden dimension in our day-to-day lives. You can captivate people by showing them, “This is what your intersection looks like, that you drive through every day.” It looks like this funny little dance of cars.
They see clouds and think, oh the clouds are pink, that’s cool, but do you know how they move, and how that light actually comes in waves over the sky because of the way the sun and the earth are moving? It sweeps all the way across, and the colors change, the shadow hits — people don’t know that. They just see static images all the time. Speed it up, and you show something way different.
Do you have a favorite GIF that you’ve made?
Yes, from when I was camping on the beach. That was the most amazing, fun, spontaneous trip that we did. All of the elements worked together. I did bring a basic set of gear, but I didn’t plan on shooting much because it was clouded over. But I decided to set the camera up and capture the behind-the-scenes of us camping. Usually I try to keep it clean, just the Milky Way and not any of the noise that happens behind the camera. But this time I had two set ups, the one shooting just the Milky Way and the other behind the scenes, which is the messier shot. You can see the campfire and lights and people moving in the tents. Right when the core of the Milky Way started rising, all the clouds disappeared. The sky opened up as we were there. There are lights on the horizon from ships passing by. We were sitting there thinking, oh, this is the best.
Another one, flying over Iran. When I was flying from Belgium, where I’m from, back to Australia a couple years ago, I got a free upgrade to first class. That gave me two windows to shoot out of. So I propped my bag up to one side of the window, put my camera there, and taped all the windows so there’s no reflection from the cabin. And I started taking a couple hundred photos, because I thought I could see some interesting things. Because the camera’s sensors are so sensitive, it picks up more light than our eyes. To this day, I’m not entirely sure what I captured. A lot of people had theories. Some people say it’s gas fires burning in the mountains of Iran that are spontaneously combusting. Other people say it was oil rigs. I don’t know. They were everywhere, and it looked amazing.
For a behind-the-scenes look at Matthew’s photography, check out his YouTube channel.
