The Big Picture: Frame Rate
- Thread starter MovieBob
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I've already provided one very good source for you. I'm not hunting down Biology, and Neurology text books or experiments that show the image on the human eye being upside down and resetting.Aardvaarkman said:
The only part of your argument about the differences that has any weight is a Field of View Argument, and if you want a fish eye lens and a concaved screen to display it on your welcome to it, but it wont change the film being used. You're also mistaking the focal length for the center of the eye. You can be looking at something with the center of the eye and it be completely blurry due to focus. Your eye has to adjust the focal length in much the same way as a camera man does. Your brain is sensitive to motion regardless of which part of the eye it's in, but we focus using the center to orchestrate stereoscopic vision using both eyes.
Being able to tell that the cones and rods reset at a given rate doesn't indicate that we're capable of seeing at a faster rate. There are tests that can make them run slower, but nothing has ever made them run faster. Even adrenaline tests using bungie jumping couldn't get the eye to send images to the brain any faster.
At 48fps we're actually displaying 3.2 fluid frames on the retina each with a gap of time between them so ~3 gaps.
At 24fps we're only showing 1.6 fluid frames on the retina with ~1 gap.
As far as the brain is concerned it only sees 1 fluid frame but one has a lot of gaps in the motion information and the other has very few gaps. Keep in mind, the only reason we didn't settle on 15fps is because of optical effects that were happening. The brain does a good job filling in the missing information but that's because it does this anyways, but the brain is lazy and doesn't like added work.
The problem is the lack of understanding of what a Fluid Frame is. Think of a single Fluid Frame as a continuous stack of still frames. The brain can extrapolate a lot of information from that single frame. In part, that is way people don't think they see as slow as 15fps, but that's because they think of a frame as a still drawing and not as a 1/15th of a second continuous exposure of information.
By going to 48fps they've made fluid frames look more like still frames. That gives you clarity, but at the sacrifice of the fluid motion. The brain actually cares more about that fluid motion than it does about the clarity of the image.
If all they wanted was clarity they should have done something with the resolution first. Getting the maximum number of dots on the screen for the average theater seat would have been a better bet, and I believe that's only an issue because of Digital and not an issue with 35mm film.
I'm not sure if it was the new frame rate or not, but the special effects in this movie seemed worse to me than Fellowship had over a decade ago. I don't know if the frame rate was affecting that, and THAT is what critics are complaining about, or if it was because Peter Jackson is working with a much smaller budget for the Hobbit trilogy.
I readily admit to having little knowledge in this field, but it didn't matter to me because I still really enjoyed the film start to finish.
I readily admit to having little knowledge in this field, but it didn't matter to me because I still really enjoyed the film start to finish.
I managed to see the movie in 48 frames, and I must admit that I didn't really like it.
On paper, a higher frame rate sounds great: more=better, and all it does is provide a higher image clarity, right?
Well, not exactly. First of all, yes, the image is stunningly clear, which is great. On the other hand, as Bob explained in the video, this is why some of the props and prosthetics in this particular movie look a bit fake. Obviously, this isn't a big problem, and even movies without so many special effects will have no problem with this.
However, my biggest complaint with the 48FPS video is that it gives movement a very "unnatural" feel. When characters move, they look ever so slightly too fast, as if the video is being unintentionally played at a higher speed, but not constantly. As a result, human movement looks a little bit too quick and jerky at times. It's hard to explain, but it kind of looks like a video-game cinematic that keeps slowing down and speeding up (like when you have a weak GPU). The result is an immersion-breaking "feel" to the movie. You do kind of get used to it if there is constant movement, but if the pace of the movie slows down and then speeds up again, you start noticing it again.
The most ironic thing is that human movement in the new 48 frame technology actually reminds me of the footage from old hand-crank cameras from the beginning of the 20th century, for example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJNbO1Mbl2w
On paper, a higher frame rate sounds great: more=better, and all it does is provide a higher image clarity, right?
Well, not exactly. First of all, yes, the image is stunningly clear, which is great. On the other hand, as Bob explained in the video, this is why some of the props and prosthetics in this particular movie look a bit fake. Obviously, this isn't a big problem, and even movies without so many special effects will have no problem with this.
However, my biggest complaint with the 48FPS video is that it gives movement a very "unnatural" feel. When characters move, they look ever so slightly too fast, as if the video is being unintentionally played at a higher speed, but not constantly. As a result, human movement looks a little bit too quick and jerky at times. It's hard to explain, but it kind of looks like a video-game cinematic that keeps slowing down and speeding up (like when you have a weak GPU). The result is an immersion-breaking "feel" to the movie. You do kind of get used to it if there is constant movement, but if the pace of the movie slows down and then speeds up again, you start noticing it again.
The most ironic thing is that human movement in the new 48 frame technology actually reminds me of the footage from old hand-crank cameras from the beginning of the 20th century, for example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJNbO1Mbl2w
I saw it in 48fps and it was great. I don't know what people are talking about where it makes things looker faker than it normally would...
Seriously! I do music videos for fun, and some wanker posted a comment about it having "slow fps". As if 24 was now arctic slow. Next they'll say smart phones are something "my grandpa uses." Whiny entitled brats.Eabus said:
As far as the movie went, I didn't notice, or gave it a pass on how it looked. The only place I did a double take was Gollum looked... different. 'Course, that could have been an update on effects overall, and not the frame rate. Won't know till the extended edition DVD comes out.
WHEN DOES IT COME OUT?!?
Thanks for the clarification. I was confused as to why it looked the same as any other movie when I saw it, but considering I live in Montana it's more than likely that it was in plain old 24 FPS.
It's not the speed, necessarily. It's the amount of frames per second. More frames in the movie means more real-looking motion. Doubling the framerate makes the movie look noticeably different. It's like a flip book. It looks better when it has more papers.Hutzpah Chicken said:
I had a lot of trouble adjusting to HD at first but now I am on board. I just don't understand how this FPS has any bearing when I thought almost everything was recorded and shown digitally. Why use film at all? I can't comprehend a scenario where film would have an advantage over digital. Of course, I know next to nothing about film and am probably the last generation that even used film in home cameras.
I got really distracted by how fast the swooping panoramic shots seemed to move. Saw it an an iMAX and some scenes intended to be impressive were very reminiscent of old Benny Hill sketches. Everything moved just a tad too quick - I guess an adjustment in camera movement could solve this.
Just last year 3D became a thing over here, and then every movie theater got at least one room with 3D, from previously having just one movie theater with one 3D room in the whole country. So I'll probably get to see this "48fps" sorcery during 2020, or a bit later.
No, you didn't. You linked to a book that just flatly stated the eye's effective "frame rate" without citing any actual sources or research for the statement. Not even a footnote. That's a terrible source. Especially as it was a book that had very little to do with the topic. There are lots of these kind of "rule of thumb" or "received wisdom" statements that just get flung around without any fact-checking.medv4380 said:
As for the rest of your arguments, again, they are unsupported folk wisdom, not facts.
We do NOT see in frames!medv4380 said:
Our eyes have no shutters!
They send a constant stream of data to our brain!
If you used some simple logic you would know that if our brain could only see at 15FPS then anything higher would not make any difference!!
Objectivity we can see more than 15FPS! Just about all people can show that in a blind test!
Photons hit our eyes many more times that 15 in a second, why does really life not look fake?!
Also, a higher frame rate can not make anything look faster, only of the film was shot at something like 24FPS then played at double speed to get 48FPS!
A film shot at 48 FPS and displayed in realtime at 48FPS will not be faster or slower.
P.S A higher framerate will not make anything look "fake", people and objects don't move at 24 discrete positions per a second!
Everyone keeps comparing the 48 frame film to the frame rates in video games, but it's apples and oranges.Nurb said:
A high frame rate in games produces a more natural look and motion. In movies, however, a 24fps version already shows a perfectly natural motion, and adding frames just offsets it.
The movie looks slightly like Benny Hill in the 48FPS version. Believe me, it's distracting.
Image clarity should be achieved with higher resolution photography and cameras, not fiddling with the frame rate. That way, you could get a clearer picture, but you wouldn't unintentionally mess up motion.
