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The Hobbit: Why 48FPS Makes Film Less Magical

blog.vincentlaforet.com

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Re: The Hobbit: Why 48FPS Makes Film Less Magical

#52
When I saw The Hobbit 3d 48fps, I wasnt looking for any specific differences from the status quo. And i didnt notice any. If someone has to really look for the differences to notice them, then they are relatively unnecessary. I like that they are trying to push the envelope tho.

Re: The Hobbit: Why 48FPS Makes Film Less Magical

#53
post #25

I saw it last night in HFR 3D. It's actually the first proper feature film I've seen in 3D and I enjoyed it a lot. There definitely were moments where it looked like you were looking at actors on a set. The fidelity was so good that it was obvious the characters were wearing prosthetics and makeup. However there were plenty of scenes where the increased detail and clarity were a huge advantage, especially some of the…

I really liked the 48fps version too. It has so many advantages over 24fps, especially in 3D. I would quite like to see a 48fps 3D version if only for the increased brightness but that doesn't appear to be a thing yet :( I guess they had to cut it down from the already ridiculous number of variations though.

Re: The Hobbit: Why 48FPS Makes Film Less Magical

#54
> "I’ve always preached that a director or photographer should INCLUDE elements in a frame or shots that add to the story, and EXCLUDE elements or shots that detract from it."

The genius of Tolkien is in the detail of his world, a detail no author I have read is yet to emulate.

Re: The Hobbit: Why 48FPS Makes Film Less Magical

#55
At the risk of drawing this thread off-topic, I saw it in 24FPS and didn't think much of it. No amount of HD or FPS can make up for a mediocre film, in the same way that fantastic graphics don't make a good game.

(Spoilers ahead.)

Bilbo and the dwarves were caricatures - overdoing their roles as a surprised hobbit and a fat, funny disney character with a single personality. (Seriously - there's a fat one, a stupid one, an Irish one, an old one etc...)

That would be ok, since The Hobbit is a children's book, but this is certainly not a children's film. I did not like the mixture of comedy and seriousness that was attempted. Whereas LOTR (which I really enjoyed) had moments of Merry and Pippin being funny, these dwarves never seemed to stop taking everything as a joke (obviously apart from Mr. Serious Dwarf). Some bits were genuinely funny (dwarves with Elrond), but they're in obviously safe environments.

If the overarching plot is to kill a dragon, there are some difficulties when trying to stretch it out into 9 hours of films. Sauron had a command structure and it was perfectly possible to kill mini-bosses (Saruman) and get some feel that you're doing something useful. A dragon has no such web of power, so the various evils they vanquish in the film appear disconnected and irrelevant to the main plot.

Gandalf has seemingly random amounts of power at any given time. I guess this also cropped up in LOTR, but it was much more obvious here.

Graphics for graphics sake. Rock battles?

Gollum was good.

Re: The Hobbit: Why 48FPS Makes Film Less Magical

#56
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would imagine you wouldn't notice first, but when the scene changes half through the movie you would say "hey, somethings different now"

I suppose you could use that for stylistic effect. Like a change of mood in the story, or a changed attitude of the character.

That's exactly the approach that Douglas Trumbull wanted to use in Brainstorm where the replayed experiences of others would have been displayed using his 60fps Showscan techbology:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brainstorm_%281983_film%29

Re: The Hobbit: Why 48FPS Makes Film Less Magical

#58
After I saw The Hobbit at 48fps, I'm having a hard time watching 24fps movies. Yesterday I watched The Shining by Kubrik. It was jittery, and that's a slow film. HFR is superior to 24fps in every conceivable way. I suppose color and sound were not considered "cinematic" back in the day just like HFR now.

3D on the other hand... I wish it would die. You have to converge at a distance and focus at another, and that's really hard for some people. There are a huge number of cues[1] that are important in depth perception, but 3D movies make use only of parallax confusing the brain. The depth of field is usually shallow, and that's great for 2D, but catastrophic for 3D. In real life, objects that I make an explicit effort to focus to are not blurry, but in 3D they are.

Another annoying aspect of 3D movies is that they artificially augment the parallax to make the 3D effect more extreme. That's equivalent to objects being really close. Apart from strain on the eyes, that's really annoying for wide outdoor shots, where things should effectively be at infinity. It's like you are looking at a miniature, not at a vast valley.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depth_perception

Re: The Hobbit: Why 48FPS Makes Film Less Magical

#59
post #55

At the risk of drawing this thread off-topic, I saw it in 24FPS and didn't think much of it. No amount of HD or FPS can make up for a mediocre film, in the same way that fantastic graphics don't make a good game. (Spoilers ahead.) Bilbo and the dwarves were caricatures - overdoing their roles as a surprised hobbit and a fat, funny disney character with a single personality. (Seriously - there's a fat one, a stupid on…

> If the overarching plot is to kill a dragon, there are some difficulties when trying to stretch it out into 9 hours of films.

From what I've gathered the dragon will be dealt with in the second movie (hence the name), while the third movie will deal with the aftermath, as well as being padded with content from the LOTR appendix. Personally I think the first movie will make more sense in light of the sequels, though that of course doesn't really defend the somewhat lackluster nature of it.

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