Code I used to record time-lapse webcam images, and then convert them all into a movie.

jpg-to-movie.py

#
# 1) Take pictures
#
# Hardware: Logitech Webcam
# Software: 
# a) OS X 10.6.8
# b) Python 2.6+
# c) isightcapture
# I use a freeware program for OS X called "isightcapture". It's not open source,
# but you can find open source equivalents with a wee bit of googling.
# The image capture itself takes about 3 seconds to complete, combined with a 1 second sleep,
# I recorded one image about every 4 seconds.

#!/usr/bin/python
import os
import time

def take_picture(counter):
    try:
        os.system("/usr/local/bin/isightcapture ./pics/time-lapse-%010d.jpg" % counter)      
    except:
        print "Exception!"  

i = 0 
while True:
    print i
    time.sleep(3)    
    take_picture(i)
    i += 1

# 
# 2) Find 'missing' files
#
# Find the places in the sequence where an image didn't get taken by the webcam.
# Why? Well, you need to have a perfect, unbreaking chain of increasing sequence 
# numbers for ffmpeg to encode the entire directory of jpgs into a movie. To 
# fix the problem, I find where the chain was broken and duplicate the previous 
# image, using the 'missing' file name to fill the gap. If I had planned ahead, 
# I would have accounted for this issue in step 1.

#!/usr/bin/python
from glob import glob
files = glob('time-lapse-*.jpg')

for i, file in enumerate(files):
    file_number = int(file.split('time-lapse-')[1].split('.jpg')[0])
    if i != file_number:
        print file
        break    

#
# 3) Convert all images files into one movie
# 
# At a command prompt:    
ffmpeg -sameq -f image2 -i time-lapse-%010d.jpg -r 12 -s 640x480 your-awesome-movie.mp4