Now that many digital cameras, from point-and-shoots to high-end SLRs, can shoot video, you might not think that time-lapse movies are relevant. But there's something unique about time-lapses that neither video nor still photos can match. Now Gunther Wegner's free LRTimelapse software helps you create professional-looking time-lapse movies from RAW or JPG files.

As the software name hints, LRTimelapse was originally designed to be a preset for Adobe Lightroom, but it's also compatible with Adobe Camera RAW and Adobe Photoshop Extended. Whatever program it's working with, LRTimelapse's main strength is to synchronize development settings over all of your individual images. You can use it to remove flicker, smoothly change white balance or color saturation over time, and even pan and zoom (also called the Ken Burns effect).

Wegner created the following time lapse using almost 8,000 individual still photos:

Alpine Skies - LRTimelapse.com from gwegner.de on Vimeo.

To get a feel for how LRTimelapse works, watch the tutorial below:

LRTimelapse - English workflow tutorial including deflicker from gwegner.de on Vimeo.

Thanks to John Nack for bringing LRTimelapse to my attention.