super 8 novice

Hello, I am relatively new to super 8 film making and had a question regarding time lapses and in camera dissolves. I noticed on the back of the film cartridge there was a little rewind tool, is this what i would use for a dissolve? Also regarding time lapses I saw this beautiful little 8 mm film entitled flowers for mum in which the film maker used a lot of time lapse photography. I have a shutter release on my camera but was curious as to how this is achieved?

Some super 8 cameras (for instance the Minolta XL401) have an intervelometer that allows for time lapse photography. I suppose you could also accomplish this by hand if you have a single-frame function on your camera but it would take a lot more effort.