James Cameron Wants Game-Like Frame Rates for Film

[mattaui]

There's a brand or type of television that basically does frame smoothing already to sort of accomplish this, and it definitely gives a lot of movies the 'soap opera' effect. I can't quite recall the sort of technology that does it, but it definitely takes some getting used to.

 

[inzesky]

I can easily see this working for digital film making, but you know what, that other type of film making, the one where they use ACTUAL film, can in no way adapt to a 60 fps format. An IMAX camera uses 65mm film with a negative image area of 69.6 × 48.5 mm, ergo the amount of film you need for a single second is overblown from 1,68 meters to a whooping 4,2, and film is expensive, also it weighs, also very pretty results. And there's the fact that film remains the preferred method for shooting motion pictures in Hollywood. Digital is certainly on the rise and will eventually overshadow it, but this will take time and when it is achieved Cameron's idea could easily become reality.

 

[Nautical Honors Society]

Wow Cameron sure does love to take the soul out of his films...he should just melt down his oscar and go work for kodak or something.

Frame Rates in film are fine now.

 

[Uri]

hmm ill wait for movie bobs responds on that one

 

[inzesky]

go work for kodak or something.

I doubt the nice gentlemen at Kodak would like what Mr. Cameron is proposing.

 

[Analogy]

I believe most Soap Operas are now shot at a higher framerate. If you need an accessible example.

Soap operas have always been shot at TV frame rates because their production schedules and turnaround requirements dictated the use of video cameras and equipment rather than film. Interestingly, some soap operas switched over to 24 fps video when the technology became available and viewers rejected the look.

 

[Blue Musician]

It would be interesting to see movies in a higher framerate, but to be honest I care more for better movies with better stories and soundtracks and not technology advancements.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

I suppose 60 frames per second would allow filmmakers to give a better experience to the audience.

Incidentally, I have seen HD TV and I still don't see what the big deal is.

 

[Anarchemitis]

59.96fps has been part of NTSC framerate standards alongside 29.97 ever since the started it, so basically lots of everything has been compatible for a long time already.
Cameras just don't shoot it. :|

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

Anyways, if it doesn't cost anything for movie theaters to upgrade hardware and movie studios can do it, why dont they.

Because it would cost them something. They would not only have to upgrade their projectors to be capable of running film twice as fast, but the film itself would also be more expensive since each movie is twice the frames. I had heard about this complaint before, and was thinking about it realistically. I don't know about your movie theaters, but most of the ones in my area are barely staying afloat as-is. If they had to suddenly buy a bunch of 60fps projectors and more expensive film? Not happening.

While I can agree with Cameron, unless he's willing to buy every theater in the world a new projector, his vision isn't happening in the near future. It just isn't cost-effective for a large majority of theaters.

 

[Baresark]

This is not really a debate. I'm sure he could make movies at 60 FPS if he wanted. The real issue is forcing theatres to buy even more cutting edge equipment. I got bad news, if $10.50 is a lot for a movie, then this certainly isn't going to change that for the better. Go for it.

Edit: Also, I don't think the cost of new equipment and the cost of movie prices rising is worth something that doesn't enhance the movie experience at all, IMO.

Also, for people who are misinformed, digital HD televisions operate mostly at 30Hz, only recently have they done anything with 60hz. Go ahead america, buy more televisions, that'll help the economy... derp.

 

[fulano]

I am all for 24 frames per second 'cause, honestly, I like it when it doesn't look realistic. Also, it makes it harder for people to add believable special effects which will undoubtedly impact the indie scenes the most.

Anyways, whomever wants to give this a crack I'm in favor of, I just don't want people dissing movies that run at 24 fps.

And finally, I wouldn't mind if games just set everything at 24 fps and just tried to get as good graphics as possible. Drawing to the screen is an expensive operation, and doing less than half the standard would certainly benefit the usage of memory for other things.

 

[dragongit]

My complaint is that unlike games which take models with a texture pack slaped on characters and coding to tell them how to move in that world, Movies are single frames of pictues back to back. When a game renders a scene, it renders a bunch of information, but then only has to deal with the computing of the movement from there on. Thats why you can have an 80 hour game and only a 2 hour movie. Surprisingly a 1080p image costs more data to run for 2 hours then a game. Even with blueray they are reaching the limits with their movies.

The problem with 60 frames per second in the theater is thus. They would need gigantic reels in order to play the movies, specially made projectors that will run the film at 60 frames per second. We might look at 30 dollar tickets if we want to see Avatar 2, just to cover production costs for the theaters.

With home theater, even now the Blueray seems to be able to handle the length of a full movie and some extras, and nothing more. And thats just running at 24 frames a second. 60 frames is litereally more then double its current rate. A movie like the original Avatar done in 60 FPS may not even be able to fit on a single Blu Ray on its own.

This is my assumption though, I may be completely wrong, but I see the downfall of sheer storage limitations hurting this project.

 

[Albino Boo]

Not going to happen. The poeple that own the screens have just shelled out large wads of cash for 3D, they are not going spend millions on re-equipping those brand new projectors for higher fps. At $150,000 per screen they wouldn't have made the money back yet on the investment in 3D projectors.

Both digital projectors and TVs usually operate at a 60Hz Minimum...

Refresh rate and fps aren't the same. Most monitors have refresh rate of 60 Hz, yet you can get more and less than 60 fps. What happens is that the video card, at the final output stage, sends the monitor the contents of the frame buffer each time it refreshes. Now remember that it doesn't do this all at once 60 times a second, but rather loops through it from top to bottom over and over again, and it takes 1/60 of a second to get from top to bottom and begin again. The projector is only sending the frame buffer every 24 seconds even though the projector is refreshing at 60 hz.

 

[The Shade]

I don't think so. Like Greg says in the article, many consumer digital cameras already have the capability to record at 60 FPS. I'm sure the expensive ones that Hollywood uses already have this capability as well. At most, they'll need a software upgrade.

It has nothing to do with software. Most Hollywood movies are shot on film, whether it's 35mm or 65mm or whatever. Only a rare few major productions are using digital methods, like the Arri Alexa or the RED One, and even those are still operating at 24fps because it looks like what movies are supposed to look like. (True that both can shoot up to 60fps, but that's reserved for slow-motion shooting.)

The shift to 60fps movies means doubling the amount of film running through the camera, not to mention equipping playback machines (ie. the movie theatres) with projectors capable of handling that much film running through it at such speeds. No one would try to defend those kinds of costs right now, especially right on the heels of the 3-D craze that forced theatres to massively overhaul their hardware.

People need to get over this bizarre belief that "more frames per second is best." 24fps and 60fps are different, and have historically had very different purposes. If you're playing games on a monitor, 60fps is fine. It looks smooth and fluid. 23.97fps is the standard for movies because they're meant to be viewed from a film projector in a theatre. Now, with the advent of BluRay technology, we're moving the theatre experience home more and more. It's still going to stay 24fps though, because as anyone who has seen a live-action film in 60fps will tell you, it looks weird.