Hobbit at 48FPS

Started by rcallicotte, April 14, 2011, 10:25:03 AM

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efflux

#30
I tried watching some higher frame rate movie clips here. The fluidity of movement was quite unsettling i.e. when people were moving around. As though you were too much in the scene. I can see it would be cool where landscapes were involved. Nature programs and such like. Action movies would benefit. The more options we have the better but different media capture and playback methods definitely create different mood and effect. An old black and white movie can be just as good as one done in colour HD. I believe there are certain cut off points where extra quality begins to matter less because the story content is prime. Unfortuately nearly all movies that rely on high tech effects are actually rubbish movies because the story, charactors, etc are very poor. I think this has to change at least to some degree because the effects will not have the novelty value anymore. Early moving pictures must have been amazing for people to see but stories had to come to keep the audience. Back in the 1930s, watching Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs was astounding for people when they were used to black and white movies of real life.

I recently watched the Pixar movie called Brave. I noticed some better story content than usual. They are obviously attempting to up the content in line with older Disney animations. That's what made this movie better although some of the 3D effects have improved as well which definitely enhanced things because this type of animation can be a little boring to look at after we get used to it.

Another movie I recently watched which was interesting was Ted because they used the tech as a mean to bring the bear to life. The movie was not about the tech. When you watch that, you strangle become completely unaware that you are watching an animated teddy bear. He is totally a charactor in the movie.

I'm pretty much forced to use my digital SLR camera because digital versus analog film is no contest in convenience. The digital SLR has crystal sharp picture but somehow lacks the colour content created with my analog SLR.

Coming from doing music, I can say that digital high definition perfection in this area is defintely not an ideal at all. Often the sounds need that lo-fi dirt or it's just too in your face. That "low-fi" dirt of analog processors also requires very high end analog to digital convertor to capture properly so it is actually adding enrichment as well. Unfortunately, standard audio convertors are not good at all. People don't seem to mind too much though about the digital to analog conversion loss or crappy speakers. Why? because although I'm obsessive about it since I'm actually capturing the sounds and I want them to be up to par well into the future, most people are more concerned with the content.

Is an analog movie converted to digital exactly like watching the original movie? It might not be. It certainly won't be if viewed through an LCD or plasma screen. Unless you've got extremely good speakers the sound won't be up to much cop either but is this more important than the story content? I think the idea that everyone is going to want giant 3D screens with ultra high definition is flawed. Is everyone listening to high end surround sound playback systems for music? No, it's a step further than is really necessary for most people.

Yes, we need to be concerned about the tech with High frame rates, real looking scenes etc but it's always the content that rules. Unfortunately, even if TG2 gets used a whole lot for movies, it's almost a certainty that most of it will be garbage anyway. When I see that kind of garbage use, I don't care how impressive the 3D is. It doesn't impress me. It's a waste of time.

Digitally created 3D images is a much vaster leap that creating digital sounds though. That's what interests me about apps like TG2. You can create entire three dimensional worlds that have no equivalent outside of the computer. You can't paint it, or even make models and have it look anything like the same. In this sense, the more high definition and high frame rate we have the more we can create believable worlds that will be impressive to see. Unfortunately though the technical side of things is a pain. I'm not actually primarily interested in what this fractal does or how to hook that node up to get this effect, what's that motion blur going to look like etc except for that fact that I have to learn that as a means to the end which is to create the interesting content. I lose interest because of these problems that don't occur when drawing or painting.

As for movies in general though, another point is that providing the viewer with way too much high tech high definition gloss can reduce their ability to use their own imagination. Reading a book can be equally as enjoyable as watching a movie. It's just that reading a book requires more imaginative input from the reader. All this high tech immersive garbage entertainment will make people brain dead. People are as dependant on TV as junkies are on herion. It is incredible. Try taking a TV away from someone who is regulartly watching it. They don't know what to do. I've never personally owned a TV. I've just lived in some houses where there was one.

Oshyan

Quote from: efflux on December 01, 2012, 11:09:55 AM
I tried watching some higher frame rate movie clips here. The fluidity of movement was quite unsettling i.e. when people were moving around. As though you were too much in the scene.

Precisely. This is what you hear a lot from people who have seen this stuff, and it's been the same with my limited experience as well. I do think it will be less odd-looking over time, and eventually seeing old 24fps content will just look bad (by comparison, for equivalent scenes). But it will be a while before we even get past "48fps looks weird", I think.

- Oshyan

TheBadger

QuoteThe fluidity of movement was quite unsettling i.e. when people were moving around. As though you were too much in the scene.

I think I just don't understand what you guys are experiencing. What do you mean by "too much in the scene"?
It has been eaten.

Oshyan

I think what he meant by "too much in the scene" is you feel like it's real, right there in front of you, like *you* are IN the scene, and that sounds like a good thing, but somehow it's not. ;) I'm pretty confident you simply can't and won't understand until you see it.

- Oshyan

TheBadger

Your response is making me obsessive now. Now I must experience this for my self!!! It sounds like a certainty that this is the future. To much in the scene? Yes! Do it!

On a another note. If its as immersive as you are making me imagine... I remember a class I took about implementing film theory in production, or something like that. One of the classes was on how pornographers are leaders in bringing their product to market via new technologies before almost anyone else. And last week I saw part of a documentary on web addiction/sex addiction. It also had some parts about escapism and how much time the average person watches TV every week...

This Frame rate thing sounds like its guaranteed to happen. Based on your descriptions of the experience. And what I mention above.

It has been eaten.

Oshyan

I personally would not describe it quite like Efflux does, although many people do say it looks "too real". I'm not prepared to be so specific, I can't really put my finger on it, it just looks "wrong", or perhaps one could say "bad". The best comparison I cam come up with is it looks like it's "shot with video" rather than "shot with film" (i.e. cheap production, home video, vs. expensive, film production). By no means is this a good thing! I'm not saying it's *not* better, just that for *many* people the effect *LOOKS BAD*. I know you think it must look better, it must be great, I thought it would too, but it doesn't (to my eyes, and those of many others). Then again I hate most 3D, so... ;) That being said, I do think that higher frame rates will become the norm over time (unlike 3D), but it's going to take some getting used to.

- Oshyan

efflux

#36
I'll use another music analogy here since music requires less high tech and hence is further forward in recreating extremely real sound as in it sounds like it's in the room. I have some ATC speakers here. Incredibly realistic sound reproduction.

For years I didn't have such good gear. I even used cassette a lot of the time. Now I have an extremely high end convertor, really good mics and speakers. I can record an acoustic guitar and the end recording sounds like it's in the room. I haven't got surround sound but that could take in even further. However, what I find is that instead of the sound appearing to exist in another space it's like it's in my face. That sense of the speakers being a window to somewhere else isn't there so now that the speakers can bring the sound right into the room I have to choose to use sounds where the speaker is like a door to some other less realistic space. The beauty is that I have that choice now. I still use tape and have tons of gear with valves because that less sharp and coloured distorted sound has it's own characteristic. As convertors keep improving and gear gets cheaper people will be wowed by this realistic effect but they will start to notice the murkier effects of tape and such like creates it's own atmosphere.

The major problem with a lot of modern music production is that it goes even beyond realistic. They create a kind of hyper in your face effect by compressing the hell out of all the dynamics. Music like this is fatiguing to listen to. I predict that high definition 3D movies will eventually have this same fatiguing effect as they push it too far.

efflux

Just another point. I usually watch movies here on my Macbook. I could get Blue-ray. I have two Eizo monitors. One is new and incredible picture quality. I have the ATC speakers and amazing audio convertor but I still watch movies as DVDs on my Macbook. I even sometimes listen to music through it's speakers or I use headphones from the Macbook and those don't sound like headphones plugged into my high end convertor. This is because I've heard and seen stuff at amazingly quality but it's so much less important than the content that I'm not that bothered about the reproduction quality. I just want to know my music production will sound great on a high end system as well as a poor one.

TheBadger

Oshyan,
I get what your saying about it looking bad, I mean I understand. You have been pretty specific and consistent in your explanation of what you saw. I'm inclined to believe I would see it too based on your explanation. Having not seen it my self yet. But clearly it very interesting stuff. And if there is a future in this, I am sure people will work just as hard at cleaning up issues as developing it in the first place. What I mean is, I don't think it will be a matter of "this or that". It is reasonable to think that as the pioneers develop the tech, They will modify it to cake care of the things you described, I would hope. But I think you said something pretty similar.

Efflux,
You said a lot of interesting things. But I just want to focus in on one point you made for the moment.
QuoteI still use tape and have tons of gear with valves because that less sharp and coloured distorted sound has it's own characteristic. As convertors keep improving and gear gets cheaper people will be wowed by this realistic effect but they will start to notice the murkier effects of tape and such like creates it's own atmosphere.

It sounds to me like you are viewing the medium as a component of the reality.
Yes, while the tape or the speaker is real, it is not really a guitar even though you can hear a guitar from it. I know you and everyone knows this, of course. But what I am saying is that its clear you do not expect to hear a guitar when you turn on one of your devises. You are expecting to hear a device make a sound like a guitar. And then even alter the guitars sound. So at that point the medium becomes another instrument, playing with the guitar. Brilliant musicians probably know this, count on it, and include it in the planning. Thats cool and good. You sound like you do this your self.

So likewise when you turn on a TV or see a film you are also expecting to see a representation of something, rather than looking out a window. Thats normal I would say, or at least it should be as things are.
But I would like to see that unreality removed. When I listen to a recording of a guitar, I want to hear the guitar and nothing else. I am not saying that the other things are not good. Just that I want to be able to pick and choose at my leisure.
It has been eaten.

efflux

#39
All I'm saying is that there are lots of ways of treating a movie just as there are with audio. Certain lenses have certain effects for example or a more flickering slower frame rate could be seen as an effect. I'm pretty sure lots of movies have a lot of colour editing. It doesn't always look like the natural colour. The more real the end movie can look the more options we have because less high definition effects could be used deliberately. People usually think these old looks are no good anymore. Some black and white movies are still made. When colour took off it was probably presumed that nobody would ever use black and white again. Sin City is a cool movie that uses an unreal look to good effect. That's because they realized that they could create a better effect by being closer to how the comic looked.

Oshyan


TheBadger

He only discusses the effect of high frame rate in a 3D context. Frankly it sounds good to me. I always get a headache behind my eyes from 3D movies.
I am sure I will see this movie twice overtime anyway, so I will be sure to see both the standard and 3D versions so I can at least satisfy my curiosity on this subject.

It will be very interesting to hear from more people in the community once the film is released and we have all had the same experience.

It has been eaten.

Walli

to me it seems, that after the film has been released, mostly experts that "knew" about the problem before are still complaining. Most reviews from "regular" people seem to be like "wow, looks great" (in contrast to story and the like, which seems to receive mixed feelings).
I wait until I can see it on my own ;-)

Chinaski

#43
Maybe it' my lack of english language understanding but, seriously, I don't get it. How can we have "too much information" with 48 fps? And how can we consider 48 fps as a hight framerate (HFS™, haha, this joke)? It's a very poor framerate. 85 frames per second (and per eye, if you're making 3D content) will be a passable frame rate. 100 is good.

I've played to a lot of multiplayer first person shooters since Quake (Hmmm, Doom in fact), and under a 85 frames per second value you just can't perform well... Because you just don't have enough visual information when you do, for example, a fast rotation. A 180° rotation, in 1/10 second (wich, in gaming context, is slow, very slow), with 24 frame per second = 2.4 poor images (one each 75°, I hope my math are good): Not so much if you looking for Tutu75, an enemy sniper, in the jungle.

You'll say gaming is not cinema, it's an active media, but that's exactly the same problem if you give Stanley a steadicam to film "The Shining", if you want to film StarWar 7, or a new american crappy licence like "Transfomers vs robocop vs Marvel Super heros vs Godzipredator". Fast action, and fast camera mouvements, need a fast frame rate, period. And don't get me wrong, I prefer good cinema.

Does Kurosawa's movies would be better with 100 frames per second? I doubt that. Does it be damaged? I doubt that to. In fact until you don't colorize it, don't change the ratio, don't put some noisy sound effect, and stay in original langage version, I'm good with it. Give me "Apocalypse Now" or " Heaven's Gate" with a 200 fps framerate and I'll push pause button on each frame.

The only real issue I see here is picture editing: Okay, a 85 fps format need more postwork. Calculate CG background is longer. It cost dollars. Others ("press") comments are just new school (young people) vs old school (older people) same old bullshit.

Now, I didn't see the film, maybe it's horrible, but, in this case, I'm pretty sure it's not because of the 48 fps, but because the merge technic of these 48 frames. Also it can be a silly movie. Hoping I'm not too much off topic. :D
You don't understand me ? That's normal, I don't speak english.

Oshyan

Chinaski, the problem is you are confusing technical superiority with *perceptual* superiority. Perception does not always align with what is "right" or logical. In this case, because we are used to 70+ years of 24fps film and the experience that goes with it, and likewise we are used to 30+ years of "home video" with higher frame rates, we have psychological associations between the technical elements (e.g. screen size, frame rate, resolution) and the content (e.g. expensive, well-made film, with good effects vs. cheaply made TV show or home video). These associations bias our perceptions of the content based on expectations of the relationship between technical merit and content quality/production values. When we see 30+FPS full motion video, we generally think of *cheaper* production, because this is where most people have seen such frame rates. In time the perceptual bias will be corrected, but for now it is a potential issue, one which has little or nothing to do with the benefits of the technology, and almost everything to do with expectation bias.

- Oshyan