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linuxelf
spymaster@theonering.net
Apr 13 2011, 2:22pm
Post #1 of 32
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Will Peter Jackson's The Hobbit change cinema for ever?
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Peter Bradshaw at The Guardian has an interesting article today about what the future holds now that Peter Jackson is filming in 48fps:
The cinema, said Jean-Luc Godard, is truth, 24 times per second. That's not truthful enough for some people. This week, Peter Jacksonannounced that he is shooting his new version of The Hobbit at 48 frames per second, a massively more expensive process that captures movement and detail with far greater accuracy. In his blog, Jackson says that we have tolerated the sprockety old 24fps speed for far too long, and this is like "the moment when vinyl records were supplanted by digital CDs". Jackson calls for cinemas worldwide to switch over to 48fps projection speeds to show his Hobbit, which is of course in 3D; he dismisses "purists" unhappy at the consequent textural loss of blur and strobing – comparable, perhaps, to art historians who lament the cleaning of an Old Master canvas, which removes its grainy, characterful darkness. Are we witnessing that most unreliable phenomenon: the game-changer? [Read More] (Thanks to Ringer Irfon and QuackingTroll for the tip!)
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AinurOlorin
Gondolin

Apr 13 2011, 8:18pm
Post #2 of 32
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I just hope the higher cost of this 48fps filming doesn't eat up too much of the films budget
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The huge amount of money going into this suggests that they will be afforded the ability to do even more with The Hobbit than was managed with LOTR. . . unless all the funds are devoured by the fancy new filming technique??
"Hear me, hounds of Sauron, Gandalf is here! Fly if you value your foul skins, I will shrivel you from tail to snout if you step within this circle!" "Do not be to eager to deal out death in judgement. Even the very wise cannot see all ends."
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Welsh hero
Mithlond

Apr 13 2011, 8:21pm
Post #3 of 32
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not like they have to spend money on the film
Twitter: @IrfonPennant
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Estel78
Dor-Lomin
Apr 13 2011, 8:30pm
Post #4 of 32
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That article is wrong, it's not "massively more expensive"
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I'd rather trust James Cameron ("higher framerates add about 10% rendering costs") than some journalist who doesn't even name sources for the claim that it's "massively more expensive".
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Eruonen
Gondolin

Apr 13 2011, 10:45pm
Post #5 of 32
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A related bit of info I came across from a diffferent perspective...
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Dr. Stuart Hameroff (a consciousness investigator) is being interviewed and he speaks of brain cycles http://www.skeptiko.com/stuart-hameroff-on-quantum-consciousness-and-singularity/ "Well, first of all, ask the question is consciousness a continuum or is it a sequence of discrete events? I think there’s a lot of evidence that consciousness is a sequence of discrete events. It appears continuous but just like if we see a movie or a video it appears continuous but it’s actually a sequence of discrete frames. I think consciousness is also a sequence of discrete frames. William James talked about this although he vacillated on it. If you go back to the Buddhist texts–and I’ve documented this in a couple of papers-thousands of years ago meditators were able to count flickerings in the nothingness that they achieved and somehow counted I think 6-1/2 million in a 24 hour period. If you do the math it turns out to be right in the high gamma frequency range, something like 75 Hz or 80Hz, something like that. Anyway, gamma synchrony, let’s just say 40 Hz which is typical, is the best marker of consciousness. That’s correlate of consciousness. And suggested there are 40 frames per second in our consciousness. We don’t notice the gaps but 40 frames. The Tibetan monks that the Dalai Lama selected and sent to Davidson’s lab, when they meditated they went to like 80 to 100 gamma synchrony or 80 to 100 conscious moments per second. There’s a lot of lore about the fact that when you’re excited-let’s say you’re in a car accident and the car is spinning. The outside world slows down. Michael Jordan, when asked why he’s such a good basketball player says, “When I’m playing the defense is in slow motion.” That means that under altered states when we’re excited or enlightened even in the monks’ framework, we’re having more conscious moments per time. We go from 40 to 80 for example. The outside world then appears slower to us because we’re actually going faster and having more conscious moments per second. That means the outside world is going at its normal rate but appears slower. This is consistent with a lot of phenomenology about being in the flow and time slows down and this and that. When you meditate that happens. I think when you go to a higher frequency of conscious moments per second the outside world would appear slower." So, our brain normally is cycling around 40 'CM per S" equivalent to FPS...so shooting at 48 fps exceeds the normal waking brain ability to differentiate.
(This post was edited by Eruonen on Apr 13 2011, 10:46pm)
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Mixel
Lindon
Apr 13 2011, 10:50pm
Post #6 of 32
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We should rather question whether The Hobbit will change cinema by its actual content.
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Ataahua
Forum Admin
/ Moderator

Apr 13 2011, 11:29pm
Post #7 of 32
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Thanks for posting it Eruonen! :)
Celebrimbor: "Pretty rings..." Dwarves: "Pretty rings..." Men: "Pretty rings..." Sauron: "Mine's better." "Ah, how ironic, the addictive qualities of Sauron’s master weapon led to its own destruction. Which just goes to show, kids - if you want two small and noble souls to succeed on a mission of dire importance... send an evil-minded b*****d with them too." - Gandalf's Diaries, final par, by Ufthak. Ataahua's stories
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Estel78
Dor-Lomin
Apr 14 2011, 12:46am
Post #8 of 32
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I dunno how it could change cinema by its content...
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Which movie was the last one that did that?
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sphdle1
Hithlum

Apr 14 2011, 1:25am
Post #9 of 32
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I think our consciousness is completely fluid, and doesn't work on frames...we could take in a billion frames per second and find subtle differences...I think it is at infinitum. I bet I could differential 48fps from 60fps with no problems.
sphdle1 "You shall not pass!"
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sphdle1
Hithlum

Apr 14 2011, 1:32am
Post #10 of 32
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He is paving the way for doubling the frame rate and creating a cinematic experience that is unlike anything in the past 90 years. He is getting rid of the judder and blur that people have become so accustomed to as being 'cinematic-like'. PJ will cause 1000's of cinemas across the globe to upgrade to 48fps...that is huge!!! I had to laugh out loud when reading this line and thinking about it logically .."."purists" unhappy at the consequent textural loss of blur and strobing" ... I find it highly amusing anyone who is unhappy about lossing blur and judder, as if it should be a natural part of cinema for all eternity. Why go see a movie that has smooth panning, when you can see the one that is blurry and juddering...lol
sphdle1 "You shall not pass!"
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Eruonen
Gondolin

Apr 14 2011, 5:14am
Post #11 of 32
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He could be wrong, but the analogy was interesting.
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Some info I found that may of interest concerning the relationship between fps, vision and differentiation. Brain Gamma waves, associated with perception sensory processing ranges from around 30-100 hertz. Our visual cortex takes about 20-30 ms to process the info into recognizable information. 20 ms = 50 hertz......30 ms = 33 hz 48 fps = 20 ms = 50 hz 100 fps = 10 ms = 100 hz I don't know the upper limit of visual fps but most sources indicate differentiation possibly up to 100 fps......I doubt that our brain could differentiate at billions fps...due to innate processing time limitations.
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sphdle1
Hithlum

Apr 14 2011, 11:22am
Post #12 of 32
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Now that it quite interesting //
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sphdle1 "You shall not pass!"
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sphdle1
Hithlum

Apr 14 2011, 12:08pm
Post #14 of 32
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Every film ever made up until the Hobbit...hope that narrows it down :-)
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I was totally conditioned as were most people. It wasn't until blu-ray made the contrast more apparent that it started to bug me, but then a week or so ago I happened to watch a clip of a movie at Walmart...2 TV's side by side, one regular and 1 120Hz turned on. During more still or non-panning scenes, there was virtually no difference, but as soon as there was any movement, I was shocked at the difference, and couldn't watch the regular TV without thinking "Holy cow, I can't believe how bad that looks". The judder and blur has always been there whether DVD, VHS, movie theatres, etc., because it is at 24fps, and the human eye can detect the jumps when things are moving, especially with panning scenes, but high def makes it even more noticeable than ever before, I think because of the contrast of clearer still images to blurred and juddered panned images...something that with non-HD wasn't as drastic or noticeable, but was still always there...we were just conditioned...
sphdle1 "You shall not pass!"
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Flagg
Dor-Lomin

Apr 14 2011, 5:46pm
Post #16 of 32
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While I find all this consciousness discussion endlessly fascinating, it doesn't carry over to the frame-rate debate. I have played games at various framerates, and I can tell you with absolute certainty that there is a noticeable difference between 40fps and 60fps.
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Eruonen
Gondolin

Apr 14 2011, 6:11pm
Post #17 of 32
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I don't doubt you, but could you tell the difference between 100 and 200 fps?
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At some point, and I don't know for certain what that is, the brain can only process so much information in detail. For example, we cannot see a speeding bullet - 2400 + feet per sec - fly past our face in any detail, if we see anything it is blurred motion. It is very similar to the digital camera megapixel debate. At some point, the human eye/brain cannot tell for example a 4x6 6 megapixel photo from a 20 megapixel. Normal human vision cannot see the pixels at 2.1 megapixels at that size.
(This post was edited by Eruonen on Apr 14 2011, 6:16pm)
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Flagg
Dor-Lomin

Apr 14 2011, 6:42pm
Post #18 of 32
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Perhaps not, but that's beside the point.
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I've never seen a 100fps or 200fps display – I may we wrong, but I don't think such monitors are even commercially available. Perhaps I would find myself unable to distinguish between 100fps and 200fps, but considering the fact that everyone's brains and eyes do not operate at equal speed, I don't think my own personal perception matters. I'm sure there are plenty of people who would notice the difference between 100fps and 200fps, and I think the highest frame-rates possible should be used for their sake. (If you want to get really long-term, think about the people a few centuries from now – advances in genetic engineering and biotechnology will probably mean that their eyesight will be much better than ours. Think of super-high frame-rates as extreme future-proofing!) The current standard for film capture is 24fps, and it's an arbitrary and illogical one. The best solution (in my opinion, of course) would be to capture our films at the highest frame-rate possible, so that absolutely everyone (no matter how good their eyesight is) will be able to enjoy the film's visuals to the greatest possible extent, without interference from judder. A film captured at a high frame-rate can easily be downsampled to 24fps – but when a film is captured in 24fps, a great amount of potential information is lost forever. Capturing at a low frame-rate does not automatically make a film bad, and adopting a high frame-rate as the new standard does not cause all previously-captured films to become awful – absolutely nobody believes this, and I wish the detractors of this new technology would stop implying that this is how its advocates regard the world of cinema. Dissatisfaction with our current technology does not imply hatred for everything created with it. (Sidenote: the videogame industry sees rapid advancements in visual quality every few years; perhaps my familiarity with this medium is responsible for my willingness to see similar improvements in film?)
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Eruonen
Gondolin

Apr 14 2011, 7:10pm
Post #19 of 32
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Some informative fps film discussion
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frame_rate " Douglas Trumbull, who undertook experiments with different frame rates that led to the Showscan film format, found that 72 FPS was the maximum frame rate at which emotional impact peaked for viewers.[7] 72 FPS is the maximum rate available in the WMV video file format." That speed is still experimental.....so 48 fps is an incremental improvement. See the content under Visible "frame rate" (a misnomer) There is no one answer, it depends on conditions.
(This post was edited by Eruonen on Apr 14 2011, 7:12pm)
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LordMaximus
Ossiriand

Apr 14 2011, 7:33pm
Post #20 of 32
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I read in an article some time ago about James Cameron had been testing higher framerates with 3D film and the overall quality of motion of objects in 3d was significantly improved with 48 fps. I will try and find a link. Regardless, I think it will is worth doing, and the quality will be more or less 'noticable' to 99% of people if the two formats were side by side. Problem with it being 'noticable' is what do you notice if you don't have something to compare it to? Some people just can't tell without an obvious comparsion.
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sphdle1
Hithlum

Apr 14 2011, 8:59pm
Post #21 of 32
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they will start to notice the judder, especially that first time that it takes them out of the movie for a second unexpectedly... of course it will take some longer than others to get to the point that they are used to 48 and notice 24 without side by side comparison, but eventually 24 will become a thing of the past, and be used as an effect for movies in the future to represent older times, way back in the year 2011...
sphdle1 "You shall not pass!"
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KAOS82
Nargothrond

Apr 14 2011, 9:08pm
Post #22 of 32
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Surely TH will be a milestone in cinema's history but imho the introduction of 3D in the movie has been the most important sign of change in recent period however TH will do a swift clean at Movie Awards as ROTK
TÚRIN TURAMBAR DAGNIR GLAURUNGA & NIENOR NÍNIEL
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Flagg
Dor-Lomin

Apr 14 2011, 9:10pm
Post #23 of 32
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I think 48fps is a more important development than 3D
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Its benefits are much less debatable and more concrete. There are also fewer drawbacks. I believe that 48fps will become the standard for films, even if 3D does not.
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Darkfalz
Registered User
Apr 15 2011, 1:18am
Post #25 of 32
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Why don't they just shoot on video?
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48 fps film is no different to 48 fps progressive video. It won't look like film, it'll look like a TV show, or video. It will also make the down conversion to 24 fps look bad (like the video-to-film conversions we've seen in the past) - if they blend 2 frames at a time together, it does not create the same effect as content shot at 24 fps motion wise. Also, HDTV take a 24 fps progressive input, or a 50 or 60 Hz one. What about the home cinema? We'll all need new TVs. I think this is a crazy idea.
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