Caterpillar Transforms Into Chrysalis Time Lapse

[imlatinoguy]

Must Spawn More Overlords

[jcmegabyte]

Indeed! They're good at that XD Thanks for checking it out =)

[razim25]

Lol nice orgasam

[smowl666]

have u guys ever seen an lobster switch skin? if not, then u missed a cool thing!

[jcmegabyte]

I haven't but that sounds like a very cool thing to time lapse as well! =)

[nusua]

I'm so confused. The skin of the catipillar comes off to reveal a containment that is containing the catipillar? wtf? How could it even use its legs if there was nothing under its skin but a crysalis carrying the capitillar?

[jcmegabyte]

These are fascinating critters, and their metamorphosis is even more so... Caterpillars are basically bags of juice, guts, and some basic muscles. Once a caterpillar straps itself in, it grows another skin under its old one, and then sheds the old one after a couple of days, revealing the new soft pupal shell that hardens in a few hours. Inside, it liquifies and forms to the new pupa shape. Over time the liquid inside completely reforms into an adult butterfly. Amazing stuff! =)

[xKJx25]

@jcmegabyte Could you like explain one thing there. So the liquid inside becomes another insect? So is it like, a new personaity? the other caterpillar dies? xD Theyre weird >_> but awesome, I love watching ur videos xD

[jcmegabyte]

Butterfly/moth metamorphosis is truly a miracle of nature. The caterpillar not only changes its outside shape, but liquifies itself inside too. While it is a pupa, it re-forms itself into the adult insect, on a molecular/cellular level. It never dies, it just becomes a soup of living cells that changes state. Throughout the process there seems to be some basic nervous system, perhaps a network between the liquid cells, which can respond to touch and make simple movements. Truly amazing :-)

[Maiyatsumi]

That sort of reminds me of a sponge. At least I think it was a sponge, where the if you break it up and keep it into a pool of water, it'll just reconstruct itself from all the broken pieces. That's very interesting knowledge on caterpillars. How long have you been doing these sorts of things?

[jcmegabyte]

I've been interested in insects since I was a little kid, but only really into studying them and documenting their life cycle for the past 7 years or so. It's interesting how much one can learn about life in general by studying insects, and the stuff they do is pretty amazing :-)

[EBAudition]

@nusua I can answer that...GOD.

[MrJabberzz]

@nusua I wonder if part of the muscles of the four pairs of legs came off with the skin. Cause by the time the caterpillar is pupating, those legs are pretty much dried up and dead.

[jcmegabyte]

The shed skin, appears to be only the skin itself. All the underlying tissue is apparently pulled back into the main body and absorbed into it. Interestingly, the external shape of the pupa is in the shape of the adult insect, all folded-up neatly into a compact package. You can see the head, eyes, wings, legs, antennae, etc. in the pupal skin. The adult insect then forms to fit that shape. You can see the time lapse development and skin separation in my "Painted Ladies Develop" vid. :-)

[ShadowTheReaper13]

looks like a metapod

[jcmegabyte]

I believe the Pokemon were designed after insect life phases. Thanks for watching!

[tora1001]

@jcmegabyte yes u are correct most Insect type pokemon are based after insect life :D

[mmmmmarcus]

@ShadowTheReaper13 Caterpie, metapod, and butterfree are all designed after a swallowtail butterfly.  its most apparent in caterpie though. He's even got the little stinkhorn, and the snake-eyespots

[mic121000]

is will turn into a butterfly?

[jcmegabyte]

Yes - this caterpillar turns into a Pipevine Swallowtail Butterfly. You can watch the whole life cycle documentary here: watch?v=u2cE86AA1q0

Thanks for visiting! =)

[mic121000]

@jcmegabyte wow is look so amazing bu i watch more then i comment it thank you to let me watch it look amazing!

[Cronopioslover274]

Thanks for this video, is amazing to watch how the catterpillar makes his cocoon.!

[jcmegabyte]

Thanks so much for watching and commenting! Glad you liked :-)

[121Swaleskid]

that is amazing o_o

[jcmegabyte]

It's fascinating to watch the whole life cycle - especially the slow parts in time lapse... Thanks for the view and nice comment! :-)

[121Swaleskid]

no no, thank you for uploading :)

[Asdflvr]

At the start of the video it looks like its on one of those really old weight loss machines that just shook you hehe

[jcmegabyte]

You're right! I never thought of it that way... funny XD

[494c6f7665416c6578]

The fat just peels right off!

[Roserietta]

They TRANSFORM? I thought they transformed into a butterfly!

[jcmegabyte]

It would be interesting if they could go directly from caterpillar into butterfly, but the metamorphosis process is so complex and complete that they have an entire life cycle stage (the pupa or chrysalis stage) devoted just to that. Amamzing little bugs! =)

[malik0tak0]

That looks amazing. . .

But I don't think I would have the patience to watch that in normal speed.

[jcmegabyte]

Indeed - most of the process is pretty boring. There are about 3 days of hardly any movement at all, then the critter molts in about 2 minutes,.followed by several hours of reforming into the final shape which is barely noticeable in realtime. I let the camera watch those slow parts! Thanks for watching and commenting! :-)

[subarianEra]

How much memory did u have for this camera to record that many days?

[jcmegabyte]

This whole event only took about 90 minutes, and was recorded with a MiniDv camcorder (tape), so there is 90 minutes-worth of still frame video capture (at about 1 frame per second). Not sure what the total number of frames and files sizes were, but probably something like 30MB is all it took. :-)

[jazminz3p]

That's so cool. :O

i didn't know pupas writhed after forming. :O

Great video. ;)

[jcmegabyte]

I was surprised to see that too. I figured they must move a little but I didn't know how much until I sped it up. Some species are so transluscent that you can see the insides moving too (my california dogface video show it in HD v=tPGrmBESSTU) Interesting stuff! Thanks for watching :-)

[TopracAk47]

=D dead

[AndreONEz]

Cool...Is it real that butterflies live just for one day?

[jcmegabyte]

Many butterflies get eaten or hit by cars on the their first day out, but if conditions are perfect with no predators, they can live for 1-2 months. Some species that hibernate as adults over the winter can live for 3-4 months but I think that is unusual. The average lifespan of a butterfly is probably only 1-2 weeks. Good thing they breed in huge numbers and have long-term survival strategies! :D

[jules10109]

I love seeing this stuff! Especilly in fast time...There's no way I'd stand there for..well, as many hours as it takes to pupate! lol ;p

[jcmegabyte]

The actual molting of the skin (pupation) only takes about 10 minutes, but even THAT short, "action filled" part is pretty boring in realtime speed. I usually set up the camera and then go do something else for 3 hours while the camera does the boring part! :D

[microfunguy]

Is there any way the very first stage of pupation can be detected and the time-lapse recording only then started ?

What time interval between each frame ?

Thanks.

[jcmegabyte]

I watched a bunch of them for many days, and found very subtle signs that pupation was about to begin. In realtime, the larva will make very slight, slow squeezing/spasming movements for 10 min or so, then pause for about 5 minutes. Pupation then starts immediately and is over pretty quick. Frame capture rate is 1fps (30x) for the molting part, and then about 1 frame every 5sec (150x) for the remaining morph into its final shape. :D

[microfunguy]

Thanks for that very useful information.

So far, every time I am 'briefly' occupied with some chore they start to pupate !

No problem, I have dozens to study.

I am making a stereo timelapse.

[jcmegabyte]

Cool - I'm looking forward to it - Please feel free to post it as a response to this video :D

[microfunguy]

I have done the first stereo time-lapse.

Unfortunately, they are blocking my attempt to define an external download URL.

I need to start the sequence earlier and slow it down.

As you say, one image per second would be about right.

[jcmegabyte]

Do you need an external link to it? I was able to for "Stitching the Sky" by excluding the protocol prefix. It probably also helped that the URL wasn't a d0t c0m.

You should be able to upload your stereo video normally, and YT will automatically generate a stereo version of it in HQ. Then just provide your viewers with a the URL in the description. Just tack &fmt=18 onto the video URL for the HQ stereo version. YT WILL allow internal (YT) URLs in the vid description. :D

[microfunguy]

I give up.

I uploaded the video and included the altered url in the body of a posted message.

I could not see a way to edit the title to include the url if I had already created it.

Remember, these are side-by-side images so they are small displayed here.

I don't know if there is a way for people to download the full-size originals.

This site is not really suitable, that is why I am trying to provide a different download site.

[jcmegabyte]

Ahhhh I get it - stereo VIDEO! I was thinking audio! Hahaha XD Yea, all you can do is send a reduced side-by-side image in 4:3 or 16:9 (preferable) aspect ratio and let YT have its way with it. Thanks for sending the AVI in email. (more in reply) You should be able to post an off-site URL in the video description, but you'll probably have to tweak it a bit since YT filters certain common URL text sequences. :D

[luxeden]

It is really nice!

[bugvision]

Very cool! Looks like a lot of work.

[carpenoctem66]

I've been wondering, what is the Chrysalis made of anyway?

[jcmegabyte]

It's basically a skin that hardens into a semi-rigid shell. As the adult develops inside, the shell is slowly dissolved away from the inside, used-up to make the insect's body. After the adult emerges, all that remains is a tissue-paper-thin skin, similar to the skin on a peanut.

[carpenoctem66]

Cool! Thanks!

[AlterEgoTrip]

That was a really nice one! I like it, my son is going to love it!

[xxskylinexxx]

Meraviglioso è dir poco!! wow!

[GeraldBoyClassical]

Amazing how it has that little bit of "string" that holds it on.

[copperfists]

wow...

[woosteria]

It never ceases to amaze!