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James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

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Re: James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

#21

Post by gaius »

ck2 wrote: post #8

I'd guess our brain fills in data when the frame rate is only a few per second. When it's much higher we have to directly absorb what we see without mental filtering. This is why 24fps is more "cinematic".

Well, you see at barely 1 megapixel, in the sense that that's how many photoreceptors there are in your eyes. But you don't notice this because by the time it reaches your level of actual perception, lots of scenes from every small movement of your eyes have been stitched together. Your brain has a ton of hardware for doing interpolation. 24fps seems to mesh well with that hardware. But we're not machines... Higher numbers in the lab don't necessarily translate into better human experience.

Another case in point: people still shoot and love photos on Tri-X, a grainy B&W film, even tho' you can buy cameras that do a dozen or more full-colour megapixels off the shelf...

Re: James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

#22

Post by alabut »

Film geeks in here will eat up the story of MaxVision48 - it's an equally inexpensive upgrade to existing film capture and projection that results in a much higher picture quality, way higher than even the Red camera.

Check out this infographic on Roger Ebert's blog comparing the different formats:

http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/assets_c/2011/01/resolution%...

The full blog post is well worth a read, especially given the story of a single passionate entrepreneur trying to change Hollywood and his story of trying to get Christopher Nolan to champion the format:

http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2011/01/more_than_ever_the_f...

Re: James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

#23

Post by mikey_p »

modeless wrote: post #7

The problem is that 24 FPS is now part of the Hollywood "look". 24 FPS is associated with high quality high budget productions in people's minds; 60 FPS looks like a home movie or low-budget TV sitcom. It may take a while to change people's perceptions.

When I was in college and doing alot of video work (I worked at a TV station, and volunteered in the video editing labs in my free time) one of the most requested features from students doing short films was doing a 3:2 pulldown* to convert their editing video to 24 FPS and then reconvert back to 29.97, thereby giving them the appearance of having originally shot on film (at 24 fps).

Sadly we were using first generation G4s with Final Cut 1.0, so to do this for any any film over about 5 minutes meant that the render time would be measured in days, not hours.

* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3:2_pulldown#23pulldown

Re: James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

#24

Post by jrockway »

I'm a big fan of 60fps video. It takes a bit of getting used to because it looks so different, but after you watch 60fps content for a while, 30fps content looks like a slideshow -- almost unwatchable.

(And there's plenty of content that's 60fps, just not a lot of American content that's 60fps.)

Re: James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

#25

Post by DanielBMarkham »

kwantam wrote: post #17
Florin_Andrei wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"120 fps ought to be enough for everyone."

Given the way your eyes work... yes! 120FPS is beyond almost everyone's internal "frame rate," so going any higher really doesn't make much sense except in special cases (trying to deliver different frames to each eye using higher frame rate and shutter glasses, for example).

I think people read my initial comment as some sort of plea for more and more tech, but that's not the way I meant it.

My point was for archival purposes. If you record data at a degree or two higher level than human perception, you can always add whatever post-processing you want to get any kind of artistic effect desired. You want that old jerky 24fps stuff? Fine. Post-process it to get it. People 200 years from now will be able to watch it in 24fps, in black-and-white, in 2-D, or whatever the initial artistic intent. But future audiences and artists might also choose to remix or to see it with more data.

We are currently in a situation akin to knowing how to shoot color movies but refusing to because everybody liked black and white so much. Or being able to record audio but being afraid of putting all those movie pianists out of work.

This kind of thing can be framed up as artistic all day long, but in reality it's just about fear of change -- more to the point, fear of mucking around with your business model too much.

So having learnt that 120FPS is the limit, I'd shoot for 240 or 480FPS.

Re: James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

#26

Post by erikpukinskis »

alabut wrote: post #22

Film geeks in here will eat up the story of MaxVision48 - it's an equally inexpensive upgrade to existing film capture and projection that results in a much higher picture quality, way higher than even the Red camera. Check out this infographic on Roger Ebert's blog comparing the different formats: http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/assets_c/2011/01/resolution%... The full blog post is well worth a read, especially give…

That chart is seriously misleading. They wanted to represent the 2x increase in framerate, so they showed that as a 4x increase in resolution, which doesn't make any sense.

And they seem to suggest that RED made the entire chart, which they didn't. RED made the accurate part of the chart, but MaxiVision48 added their own nonsense.

The impression I get about this company is that they tried to sell a product to a bunch of people who didn't want or need it. The reason RED is so successful is that they actually made a camera directors wanted to use. Directors want to be able to do long takes, they want to see instant footage, they want to be able to go directly into the editing room after shooting, and they want a cheap medium. MaxiVision doesn't offer any of those advantages. In fact, if it ends up being harder to process, it's actually worse on all those points.

MaxiVision48 seems a little like BluRay. It's the next generation of a dead technology. Film will always be useful for certain films, but the benefits of digital go way beyond high resolution.

Anyway, interesting story, thanks for the link. Gives me some food for thought about my own business.

Re: James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

#27

Post by jwr »

Notice he's leaning towards 48p as opposed to 60p, which is an already standardized framerate that your modern TV likely supports.

I do not think that is an accident. After all, once we all buy our new 3D TVs, something will have to happen for people to buy new TVs again in 3-4 years.

And before you mention bandwidth considerations, I do not have actual data, but I suspect that when using H.264 High Profile, the difference in bandwidth between 48fps and 60fps won't be that large. There is a limit to how much you can change visually in a single second: human perception.

Re: James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

#28

Post by ChuckMcM »

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #13

> The filmmaker said that when he begins shooting the "Avatar" sequel in about 18 months, he will be shooting at a higher frame rate, though he has yet to decide if that will be 48 fps or 60 fps. He said George Lucas was "gung-ho" to make the conversion, and also called Peter Jackson one of his allies. Jackson, he said, had at one point been heavily weighing shooting "The Hobbit" at 48 fps. Awesome! It's finally happ…

I'm not a cinematographer but having gone to USC I met and talked with some (both aspiring and those who came back to give guest lectures). There was a digital projection system back in the 80's which had 60fps video, the output was much more 'real' in the sense of looking at the screen seemed more like you were looking at real life, and it jarred folks. One of the directors who was giving a lecture on the future of film felt it was the future but acknowledged the following counterpoint.

24FPS celluloid, with its known gamut limitations and temporal resolution creates an ambiance for the film. This is not unlike the way that canvas and oils create a certain ambiance about an oil painting. Now is the future of 'art' digital printers that can reproduce what an artist might have painted in oils, something they can paint using a Wacom tablet and Illustrator? No, not really. The medium is part of the art, its part of the palette.

Do digital films at high FPS have a place? Of course they do (art is pretty liberal in what it will accept as a medium :-) but will 24fps celluloid be consigned to the history books? Answering that question is less obvious.

The change from hand cranked to mechanically operated shutters was a clear win for cinematographers because it took some randomness out of what the audience would see, talking pictures did the same. The change from celluloid to video is however a medium change not a technique change.

I believe the comment at the particular talk I attended was "If Leonardo could have taken a picture of Mona Lisa instead of painting her, would it be in the Louvre today?" Can't easily answer that.

Re: James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

#29

Post by bartman »

jrockway wrote: post #24

I'm a big fan of 60fps video. It takes a bit of getting used to because it looks so different, but after you watch 60fps content for a while, 30fps content looks like a slideshow -- almost unwatchable. (And there's plenty of content that's 60fps, just not a lot of American content that's 60fps.)

Could you give some examples?

Re: James Cameron champions faster film projection rates (from 24 to 60 fps)

#30

Post by deskamess »

What would be the impact on movie theaters? I am looking at this from the perspective of the simple 2D (non 3D) projection system.

I assume if they have a modern digital 2D playback system this may not be a problem. However, what if they have just good ol' projectors that require film reels?

Questions on my mind:

- Can we roll film at a higher speed on the projector? Can we double the reel intake rate it if we go with 48 fps? Is it tougher to do fractional speed increases (like 60 which is 2.5 x 24)

- Are there any refresh issues - I assume no since the light is always turned on.

- How about sound? [The assumption here is sound is on the same reel - but I could be wrong]

If there are any projectionists in the HN house, I would appreciate you filling us in...

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