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Yeah, but how's my Blu-Ray gonna look...?
What kind of frame rate does your TV have?
Personally, I am willing to give this a shot. I have seen my fair share of TruMotion high frame rate atrocities in Best Buy and the like, but the film displayed was never intended to be shown that way. I am interested in what this would be like, though I likely won't get the chance up here in Syracuse.
Personally, this excites me way more than 3D.
Makes me worry way more than 3D.
If this stuff really does feel like the TruMotion crap on HDTV displays at Best Buys...
FUCK IT.
HONOR THE OLD WAYS!!!! Hahahahaha
I have a shameful secret.
Sometimes I like to watch movies with TruMotion turned on.
I can't be the only one??
Now TruMotion isn't the same as 48fps...it has a lot of ugly artifacts, for one thing, but the overall 'soap opera' effect of the increased framerate is apparently the same, at least according to Devin at Badass Digest.
But I kind of dig it. The first time I tried it after getting my new TV I had the same reaction as everyone seems to be having about the Hobbit...the magic veneer of movies was stripped away and everything looked cheap and tacky. But it also made everything look immediate, like it was happening now. That's the best way I can think to describe it. Using a literary metaphor, 24fps is like past tense, high frame rate is like present tense.
I tried watching a lot of movies with it, because I was curious as to what they'd look like, and I started to warm to it.
I think certain styles will work better than others at a high frame rate. For some reason, at a high frame rate, the artifice of movies becomes really apparent. So something like Captain America, which is kind of gaudily or artificially lit in some places, will look even more artificial in a high frame rate. But movies more shot more naturalistically, like, say, Children of Men or United 93, look pretty good. If it catches on, I think it will effect the way movies are made; from lighting, to camera style, even to editing.
But whether it'll catch on or not, I dunno. I can understand why people hate it. But I think it's got potential!
All those cinematic luddites can pucker their lips, press them right on my asshole and kiss my shiny metal ass. I hate this "24 fps is more cinematic" crap so so much. They're just trying to affix intrinsic positive values to what simply is the way they're used to having things. These things they keep bringing up aren't features of cinema, they're bugs to borrow a programmer saying. I'll take infinite FPS at infinite resolution and in 3D if they can pull it off, the rest of them can go back to their kinematoscopes.
Faraci also said that the interior stuff on the Hobbit looked like TV version Dark Shadows so take from that what you will.
Personally I'm all for it. It's not like vinyl vs CD where you do lose something, its an actual upgrade in quality isn't it? So yes, I'll take as much improvement as my eyeballs can physically take thanks.
And if it means people have to pay more attention to detail on sets and costumes, then I'm happy with that too.
The first thing I saw on some Trumotion type system was the new Spiderman trailer, and boy it looked terrible. I don't understand exactly what's going on there, but it's true, it did suddenly look like interlaced video from twenty yrs ago and it was suddenly apparent that everything was fake. It's guy in a plastic suit on a cheesy set. Which it already was, but before you could ignore it somehow.
It's surprising since I kinda want higher frame rates as standard. But if it does that all the time, then no I don't. It could be that no one's figured out how to light and shoot artificial elements for this yet, or some filter to ease the effect somehow. But, damn, was it really just a bit of film shutter blur giving us the distance to suspend disbelief? Shit!
If so and they can't do anything about it, then yeah, any sci-fi, set and makeup based show should steer well clear of this technology. Leave it to nature documentaries and location based stuff.
What kind of frame rate does your TV have?
TV framerate's got nothing to do with it. Blu-ray 3D tops out at 1080p24, since HDMI can't handle any more than that. They'll most likely be mastering the 2D blus from a 24fps source, too.
Now I can imagine the raise in framerate giving a bit of a 'video' feel (Not look - feel) and would not be surprised if it did present fresh challenges in term of lighting etc. I can also understand it feeling a bit weird with such realistic movement in the frame. However, a lot of these reports stink of fanboy blogger bullshit to me. 'Like a Spanish telenovela' (As Yahoo put it)? Come the fuck on.
All those cinematic luddites can pucker their lips, press them right on my asshole and kiss my shiny metal ass. I hate this "24 fps is more cinematic" crap so so much. They're just trying to affix intrinsic positive values to what simply is the way they're used to having things. These things they keep bringing up aren't features of cinema, they're bugs to borrow a programmer saying. I'll take infinite FPS at infinite resolution and in 3D if they can pull it off, the rest of them can go back to their kinematoscopes.
High framerates aren't new, they've been around in some form for decades but never caught on because it just doesn't look very good. I Claudius is brilliant, but it looks stagey and dated because of it. 24fps really *does* look more cinematic - it gives images weight. I'm certainly intrigued by this whole thing and trying to keep an open mind, but the early reactions make 48fps sound as shitty as it always threatened to be.
High framerates aren't new, they've been around in some form for decades but never caught on because it just doesn't look very good. I Claudius is brilliant, but it looks stagey and dated because of it. 24fps really *does* look more cinematic - it gives images weight. I'm certainly intrigued by this whole thing and trying to keep an open mind, but the early reactions make 48fps sound as shitty as it always threatened to be.
Could someone explain to me what statements like that mean? Because all I'm seeing is "It looks different than I'm accustomed to."
If people think that the framerate is gonna affect my decision to see this they don't know my Tolkien obsession well enough.
I grew up watching plenty of UK tv shows filmed on smooth video. It makes everything look kind of stagey and hokey! Then they'll step outside for location shooting bits and all of a sudden it feels like a film (albeit a grainy, ugly film).
If high framerates were really the revelatory future of cinema, at some point over the last 40 years wouldn't people have looked at those old shows and thought "Man, why aren't we shooting hollywood movies like that?", instead of "Man, those shows were great, shame the look so hokey and dated because they weren't shot on film"?
I grew up watching plenty of UK tv shows filmed on smooth video. It makes everything look kind of stagey and hokey! Then they'll step outside for location shooting bits and all of a sudden it feels like a film (albeit a grainy, ugly film).
Exactly. It's like sitting in the audience watching a play. It just looks bad.
So it looks different than you're accustomed to.
No, it does look pretty stagey and bad. I'm not subscribing to this "24fps is more cinematic" bilge, but in my experience higher framerate does more to damage the illusion of reality than it does to enhance it.
If high framerates were really the revelatory future of cinema, at some point over the last 40 years wouldn't people have looked at those old shows and thought "Man, why aren't we shooting hollywood movies like that?", instead of "Man, those shows were great, shame the look so hokey and dated because they weren't shot on film"?
I don't think they were thinking any of the above at all. I think they were thinking it'd look like film but smoother if they sped it up. No one would have said "because video looks like this, film will too". There's too many factors to the image, from the sensor, to the interlacing, to the broadcasting and the CRT flicker. It all makes a difference.
24fps isn't perfect either. I seem to be the only person I've ever encountered who is bugged by this, but when I see something projected on the big screen there's a noticeable juddering when a shot pans above a fairly low speed. I'd happily get rid of that.
There's surely some way to mask this particular effect people just haven't figured out yet. Maybe the ol' 180 degree shutter rule no longer applies and we have to use 270 now or something. I don't know. I think Devin's point was sound though (and that of some BAD commenters ): its probably not a good idea to blaze this trail on your big budget fantasy film that supposed to visually line up with LotR.
Wait, people prefer that tru-motion look? Screw "looks different than I'm accustomed to", it looks shitty. I was starting to get annoyed that every new TV had this as the default setting, because outside of live sporting events and animation, it makes everything else look akin to behind-the-scenes EPV. It may be the future of 3D, so I get why Cameron and Jackson have boners for it, but I don't see how this helps the motion picture industry overall.
But what do I know? Maybe if you're a kid now and have been growing up with that look to your movies on your fancy new HD TV you'll think this is also awesome. My heart sank when I read Devin's column.
This is NOT Tru-Motion though. Not even close. Not to get too technical but Tru-Motion takes existing video and inserts frames in between the existing ones. This results in weird looking animations, because they are mathematical averages of existing ones, not actually recorded frames. 48 fps video is recorded at these framerates. Every frame is "real." Lumping 48 fps with the Tru-Motion stuff is like saying DVD video upconverted to 1080p is the same as actual 1080p video.
So it looks different than you're accustomed to.
No, because like I said we've been able to compare the two side by side for years and years, and one of them tends to look good and one doesn't. You could also say those early digitally shot movies just 'look different than you're accustomed to', but years later Inland Empire still doesn't look half as good as Mulholland Drive.
Cinema, especially genre stuff, isn't about the tireless pursuit of realism. You don't really want to be aware that there is artificial lighting everywhere and your dashing leading man is really 5 foot 7, caked in makeup and wandering around a set in a studio backlot. Suspending people's disbelief is a delicate balancing act, you need to tread carefully with anything that messes with a tried and tested formula.
Cinema, especially genre stuff, isn't about the tireless pursuit of realism. You don't really want to be aware that there is artificial lighting everywhere and your dashing leading man is really 5 foot 7, caked in makeup and wandering around a set in a studio backlot. Suspending people's disbelief is a delicate balancing act, you need to tread carefully with anything that messes with a tried and tested formula.
Wasn't pretty much the exact same stuff said about HDTV?
If people didn't mess with tried and tested formulas, we'd still be watching silent movies. While I get what people are complaining about (I grew up watching a lot of BBC video-shot dramas, so I get what Devin and others are saying about the 'I, Claudius' factor), I'm reserving judgement until we see the finished film. There's too much hyperbole flying around at the moment to take the more colourful/melodramatic criticisms too seriously. I don't know if I'll like the way it looks, but I'm willing to give it a shot. Either way, it seems like 48fps is going to have its own demands on things like lighting, production design makeup etc.
The thing that gives me pause is that I'm struggling to see how these changes will pay off in terms of improving the medium.
Wasn't pretty much the exact same stuff said about HDTV?
Almost to a word.
If people didn't mess with tried and tested formulas, we'd still be watching silent movies.
And it's not like early talkies had 100% perfect sound reproduction right out of the gate either. I doubt industry people are going to look at the first batch of 48fps films and say, "Welp, that's that, can't be tweaked at all."
That said, I'm not going out of my way to see The Hobbit in 48fps. Seems like a classic fantasy shouldn't be seen in such a clear and vivid format. It needs that sheen of age to it that 24fps would give it.
What intrigues me is the increased capacity to portray motion in the frame. More information means more fluidity, and with the increased detail levels can help create more interesting foreground/background movement. I can see outdoor footage benefiting from it in skilled hands, especially. On the other hand, that increased information could also open up possibilities for small, subtle movements as well, which could make for interesting closeup work or environmental detail (Rain would be a lot easier to shoot, for starters).
Of course, the question The Hobbit brings up is, does it work with traditional Hollywood filmmaking techniques? No-one really knows yet if it'll answer that question with a 'yes', but I can see independent/experimental filmmakers having a ball with the tech and creating techniques that will eventually be co-opted by commercial studios and adapted for the blockbusters of the future. I think it's just as valid an alteration of what goes into the frame as 3D.
So THE HOBBIT is the only upcoming release that's being released in 48fps? What cinema is going to spend ~$10k upgrading their projectors for just for one film?
Tip of the spear, I guess.
Like 3D, the idea of high frame rate cinema has been around for ages, specifically with Douglas Trumbull's Showscan format. The reason he championed high frame rates was simple; it intensifies the emotional response of the viewer:
For decades, film had been run at 24 frames every second (technically speaking, 24 frames, each flashed twice). Persistence of vision means that the brain interpolates the frames, and we supposedly perceive smooth motion. Indeed, 24 fps was historically chosen because most people would start to see strobing if reduced any lower. Even at 24 fps, some sensitive people still see the flicker.
But was 24 fps optimal? Do we really see smooth motion at that speed? That's what Trumbull wondered. So he set up a series of tests with 35mm stock filmed and projected at various speeds, and wired up test audiences to biometrically test their responses.
What Trumbull found is that as the frame rate increased, so did the emotional reaction. Trumbull discovered that although we see smooth motion from film displayed at 24 fps, we are subconsciously still aware of the flicker. This awareness reduces the emotional impact of the film. As the speed of projection ramped up, so did the emotional response, peaking at 72 fps. After that speed, no further improvements were noted.
For a variety of technical reasons, Trumbull decided to settle upon 60 fps. At this speed, the 65mm film stock it used moved through the projector at 1.4m per second. Think about that: 1.4m of film flying through the camera and projector every single second.
And there was the downside. In the theater itself, Showscan is brilliant. 65mm film stock projected onto a large screen looks great, but the 2.5x increase in frame rate means that each frame is sharper. Even IMAX with it's horizontally filmed 70mm frames doesn't come close to the emotional impact of Showscan. The increased frame rate somehow turns off the little warning in our heads which says "this is just a movie ".
Which is why all those seasoned moviegoers in that theatre ducked. In their minds, this wasn't a movie. It was a log coming at their head.
Like 3D, the idea of high frame rate cinema has been around for ages, specifically with Douglas Trumbull's Showscan format. The reason he championed high frame rates was simple; it intensifies the emotional response of the viewer:
Not only that, it seems to have intensified the emotional responses of people who haven't seen it.
I'm by no means tech-savvy or particularly interested in chasing the cutting edge (at home I watch DVD's on an old cathode-ray tube I got for free, and I still have a good number of VHS tapes), but here's my 2¢ nonetheless.
My experience of >24 fps movies (whether shot that way or Tru-Motion) is pretty much limited to TV's on display at Best Buy, but I don't like it. It lacks that sheen or finish that makes a movie look, well, cinematic. Maybe that's something inherent in it, or maybe, as stelios said, it's just what we're accustomed to. Even if it's the latter, though, it may be a situation like the QWERTY keyboard, which was designed to be inefficient and slow typing down to speeds the oldtimey typewriters could accommodate; keyboards haven't had those technical typing-speed limitations for a long time, but we've kept QWERTY because we've gotten so used to it that changing to a theoretically more efficient key arrangement would be more difficult for those of us trained on QWERTY. The idea that movies only look like movies at 24 fps may just be ingrained in too many of our brains at this point to see it differently.
That said, though, I'm not writing 48 fpm off quite yet. As Dickson said, we shouldn't assume that 48-fps technology won't improve, and even in its present state I can see it having roles to play, both technical and stylistic. On the technical side, Muzman is very much not alone in noticing that "juddering" effect, that blurriness in the picture when the camera pans too quickly; if 48-fps film could eliminate that, its existence would almost be justified by that alone. On the stylistic side, Rockley's comment about the immediacy conveyed by 48-fps film, 24 fps being past tense and 48 being present tense, makes me think of all the creative possibilities for that effect. For example, flashbacks could be in 24 fps while the present is in 48; dream sequences in 24, waking in 48, or vice versa; 48 fps could convey a character's tension or fear; etc. It could become simply another tool at filmmakers' disposal. Of course, all this is predicated on the assumption that movies would be able to switch back and forth between framerates that easily, and I have no idea whether that's the case or not. I'm just saying that while I'm very attached to 24 fps, I can foresee 48 having its uses as well.
The thing that gives me pause is that I'm struggling to see how these changes will pay off in terms of improving the medium.
There are two areas it improves:
1. It massively reduces eye strain for 3D presentation
2. It allows the audience to become more emotionally involved in the story
Now before you balk at #2, realize that Doug Trumbull did tests of higher frame rates in the 80s. He recruited an audience and showed them filmed images at 24, 48, 60, and 72 frame per second. What he found was, the higher the frame rate went, the more emotionally involved the audience became in what they were seeing. He had scientific equipment to measure these responses.
I'm torn about this. On the one hand, I love 24fps, it gives the images a dream like quality that fictionalizes the story and separates it from reality. On the other hand, innovations are part of life, and it's easy to let personal bias blind you from advancing technology. And this new technology has obvious benefits like I mentioned above, so it's not like it's been done for the fuck of it.
Part of it is studios and filmmakers are trying to find ways to get people back into theaters and away from TV, which now rivals cinema because of the increased resolution, screen sizes and lowered cost. Nolan is doing it with IMAX, Jackson and Cameron are doing it with 3D and higher frame rates. The same thing happened in the 50s when TV started dominated households and hollywood responded with Cinerama, Technicolor, 70mm presentations, etc. The only reason Cameron and Jackson are doing higher frame rates, is because it's the only way to make 3D viable because of the reduced eye strain and headaches, so I can see where they're coming from. 2D films I can little benefit from the higher frame rates, but it apparently does further emotionally involve the audience in the story. It may look "shitty", but moments like the end of Return Of The King that left the audience in tears would have an even greater impact at 48fps...
The highs become higher and lows become lower...the trade off is it no longer looks like a dream, but real. I will honestly have to see it for myself to come to any definitive conclusion about this.
What intrigues me is the increased capacity to portray motion in the frame. More information means more fluidity, and with the increased detail levels can help create more interesting foreground/background movement. I can see outdoor footage benefiting from it in skilled hands, especially. On the other hand, that increased information could also open up possibilities for small, subtle movements as well, which could make for interesting closeup work or environmental detail (Rain would be a lot easier to shoot, for starters).
Of course, the question The Hobbit brings up is, does it work with traditional Hollywood filmmaking techniques? No-one really knows yet if it'll answer that question with a 'yes', but I can see independent/experimental filmmakers having a ball with the tech and creating techniques that will eventually be co-opted by commercial studios and adapted for the blockbusters of the future. I think it's just as valid an alteration of what goes into the frame as 3D.
What Doug Trumbull is experimenting with is 24fps films, but with higher frame rates peppered throughout during fast motion sequences...so it still looks like a "movie", but doesn't have excessive motion blurring and juddering whenever there is action.
They have to do it with big budget films because it's the only way the studios will accept the format. That's why Cameron used a huge budgeted Avatar to test 3D...it had to be a huge hit for studios to allow 3D to continue. Of course they also go overboard and want EVERY big movie in 3D, even when it's not shot native 3D, thus kind of ruining the point. But there is always going to be a certain amount of spillage that way. But it's important to understand the thinking behind Jackson's decision. 3D doesn't have a future unless the frame rates increase, it's as simple as that.
So THE HOBBIT is the only upcoming release that's being released in 48fps? What cinema is going to spend ~$10k upgrading their projectors for just for one film?
One film? That one film comes from a multi billion dollar franchise. If there is a chance you could get even MORE people than usual to see the film because a new technology is implemented, the theaters will do it.
Cameron brought 3D back into theatres... and quickly, tv copied that. Soon there will be tvs that can give you 3d without having to use glasses. Major advantage home cinema.
Now increasing the resolution and framerate to make movies special again doesn't really seem that clever to begin with, does it? Certainly TV can copy that too, easily. Again, advantage home cinema. But it won't ever be able to copy IMAX, so why not concentrate on that? Oh, because IMAX is less of a draw than 3D. You can obviously sell Star Wars 3D as a re-release, but not Star Wars IMAX.
Still, whatever 3D technique they're counting on, tv will easily imitate it and do it even better. A race that can't be won.
Cameron brought 3D back into theatres... and quickly, tv copied that. Soon there will be tvs that can give you 3d without having to use glasses. Major advantage home cinema.
Now increasing the resolution and framerate to make movies special again doesn't really seem that clever to begin with, does it? Certainly TV can copy that too, easily. Again, advantage home cinema. But it won't ever be able to copy IMAX, so why not concentrate on that? Oh, because IMAX is less of a draw than 3D. You can obviously sell Star Wars 3D as a re-release, but not Star Wars IMAX.
Still, whatever 3D technique they're counting on, tv will easily imitate it and do it even better. A race that can't be won.
3D without glasses will be in theaters as well.
The thing that gives theaters an advantage is the huge screen, which homes can never copy. The thing they're trying to do is increase the resolution and frame rate of those already huge screens to draw people back because theaters still offer the larger than life content and there is the social factor. 3D is simply not viable at 24fps, especially on big screens, which is why they're upping the frame rate.
Like 3D, the idea of high frame rate cinema has been around for ages, specifically with Douglas Trumbull's Showscan format. The reason he championed high frame rates was simple; it intensifies the emotional response of the viewer:
The problem is that's not simple at all. I don't take Trumbull for a bullshitter, but measuring emotional response is no straightforward thing and has changed over the years. I can't find what method they were using and how much testing they did, after a cursory search, only repeats of the supposed findings. It'd be interesting to know.
Also worth noting is that Showscan was a film system and this ain't that. It could have something to do with what people are seeing in accidentally creating a video effect.
Really interesting stuff here. I hadn't heard of Tru-motion before and now I know excactly why my father-in-law's new state of the art kickass television looks like shit.
3D without glasses will be in theaters as well.
Do you have a source on this?
Try and imagine what theoretical glasses-free theatrical 3D would entail. Either the image would have to be some kind of genuine hologram, in which case you'd be stuck looking at the movie from the side if you got a bad seat (just like a stage play), or it would have to employ a parallax-barrier system with a limited number of sightlines on a (likely prohibitively expensive) specially-engineered screen.
48fps is getting a push because it's the other cool trick that can give digital projection a marketable edge over 35mm film. And as I've said so many times before on these here boards, it's not happening because artists want to advance the art. It's happening because distributors want to get out of the 35mm business entirely, and that means finding something that will motivate exhibitors to convert their theatres to digital.
48fps may have a better chance of accomplishing this than 3D, due to the reportedly visceral effect of virtually eliminating persistence-of-vision from the viewing experience. Plus, it sidesteps having to answer to all the folks who, pardon me, will not stop BITCHING about having to wear special glasses. As for the queasiness factor: if the 19-year-olds I work with, who refuse to watch anything in black-and-white, are any indication, we're only half a generation away from unquestioning mainstream acceptance of even higher frame-rates.
So THE HOBBIT is the only upcoming release that's being released in 48fps? What cinema is going to spend ~$10k upgrading their projectors for just for one film?
Two. The Hobbit is a two-part film, with the second half hitting screens December 2013.
Cameron will be shooting the Avatar sequels at 48fps as well. Depending on which producer you talk to, those will show up in 2014/2015 or 2015/2016. Jackson and Cameron seem to be the only two blazing this particular trail at the moment, though it's only a matter of time before more fall in line.
Could someone explain to me what statements like that mean? Because all I'm seeing is "It looks different than I'm accustomed to."
There's actual film theory on the subject of the human eye being exposed to 24fps of still frames plus the subconsciously registered "black" bits of the shutter.
I can watch 70s Dr Who fine. But this is the death of cinema as we know it. Maybe guys like Trumbul will invent a sort of "fps gearing" mechanism that allows the frame-rate to ebb and flow like a form of music (ie: use fps as an artistic tool rather than an ugly hammer to more effective pound 3D into people's eyes). But we're in for some fucking ugly cinema until he does.
I really like the look of Collateral. The video-ness adds to the story and immediacy and I really want to see what guys like Mann and Nolan do with this stuff. But it won't work for everything and many signature "styles" likely won't survive the transition. 24fps was brilliant because it hid so much - it was equal parts reality and "shadow play" if you like. You could trick it and be impressionistic and artistic. So many lightning-in-a-bottle victories happen in productions thanks to last minute saves using cleverly placed pieces of chewing gum or gaffers tape. But 48fps looks "more real than real" so "real looks fake". That's possibly death for some really great and clever filmmakers - or at least their unique styles developed over decades of experience. Sure they'll adap if they've got the juice, but again - that still means we're in for some fuck ugly cinema while people work out the kinks or audience just stop giving a fuck "arty farty" lighting etc.
And I don't know about you but that "Mexican Soap Opera" look actually makes me feel tense and sick, like air is being sucked out of the room (could this be Trumbull's "emotional response"?). Going into a cinema and watching a movie in "traditional" 2D 24fps actually FEELS really great as an experience, whatever the movie may be. There's a palpable change in my mood when I watch a projected film that's absent from TV etc. I'm sure I'm not the only person who's noticed that.
I'll happily watch the old 50fps 70s BBC productions of Dr Who and the like. But they don't have the "magic pixie dust" of 24fps cinema and yes, can be an airless grind at times if the pacing is a bit slow.
As an aside: I'm sure it's different with nature docos. Something like Baraka done with this new tech would be incredible. But my worry is more for fictional/narrative work as the extra frames don't just "expose artifice" - it seems to create a sense of artifice where there is none. 24fps is closer to the "human experience" of the world. We don't see "everything" in vivid detail at all. We see a small central focal area and the rest is filled out by our "persistence of vision mechanism" (sorry, total lapse as to the actual term) - you can test this by staring at a single point for 30 seconds without allowing your eyes to flick around and refresh the peripheral image - you'll soon notice that your vision fades away at the edges. THAT'S what 24fps is an analogue of. If anything 48fps etc may be an oppressive overload of information that causes it's own form of fatigue/disengagement, like a Michael Bay movie.
"He had scientific equipment to measure these responses."
LOL - he doesn't fly around the countryside in a glowing craft does he?
First of all, why are people incredulous at the "scientific equipment" bit? They exist and have been used in scientific research for decades now. Emotional stimulation does create observable and measurable physiological responses. From eye tracking, to iris measurement, to heartbeat monitors, to brain scanning, to skin conductivity sensors, to you getting an erection by looking at a naked woman. Just so we get this out of the way.
Second, I don't buy the "too much visual information" bit. Sure, 48fps will provide twice the information 24 fps will but it still is drastically reduced from the amount you receive any time you have your eyes open. Moreover, it is not getting pumped directly into your brain. You still watch it with your eyes and it is still subject to all the effects and limitations the human eye introduces. There are overly busy frames with so much stuff going on you have trouble focusing and end up distracted and frustrated but that's just bad film making and has nothing to do with the frames per second the image is presented.
Originally Posted by Nardo
Maybe guys like Trumbul will invent a sort of "fps gearing" mechanism that allows the frame-rate to ebb and flow like a form of music (ie: use fps as an artistic tool rather than an ugly hammer to more effective pound 3D into people's eyes). But we're in for some fucking ugly cinema until he does.
The Trumbster's got you covered, dude, that's one of the things he's been working on:
Although
- This seems to be a system that downconverts to 24fps, not Trumbull's Full Fat Showscan
- You can't really judge the quality by a YouTube video
Do you have a source on this?
I don't remember the source, but Cameron said it at one point. And I trust him over you, so there's that (no offense).
If I have time I'll see if I can dig it up.
48fps is getting a push because it's the other cool trick that can give digital projection a marketable edge over 35mm film. And as I've said so many times before on these here boards, it's not happening because artists want to advance the art. It's happening because distributors want to get out of the 35mm business entirely, and that means finding something that will motivate exhibitors to convert their theatres to digital.
48fps may have a better chance of accomplishing this than 3D, due to the reportedly visceral effect of virtually eliminating persistence-of-vision from the viewing experience. Plus, it sidesteps having to answer to all the folks who, pardon me, will not stop BITCHING about having to wear special glasses. As for the queasiness factor: if the 19-year-olds I work with, who refuse to watch anything in black-and-white, are any indication, we're only half a generation away from unquestioning mainstream acceptance of even higher frame-rates.
It's another cool trick, sure, but the primary reason is the headache and eye strain factor. Too many people are complaining about 3D and something had to be done about it. Cameron wanted to shoot Avatar at 48fps, but the studio wouldn't allow it, so this was before 3D even had a foothold. Cameron has been trying to address the eye strain thing from the beginning, so it's unlikely to be an ADDED gimmick.
I don't remember the source, but Cameron said it at one point. And I trust him over you, so there's that (no offense).
If there's one thing I've learned, it's never second-guess James Cameron. But I just don't see how a glasses-free theatrical system could be affordably engineered, or work in existing theater layouts. Link us up if you find that article.
If there's one thing I've learned, it's never second-guess James Cameron. But I just don't see how a glasses-free theatrical system could be affordably engineered, or work in existing theater layouts. Link us up if you find that article.
The only possible method I can see working, at least in the near future, is using multiple projectors combined with a type of lenticular screen.
