Super Slo Mo Without The Use Of A High FPS Camera

[datdude1988]

When I slow it in post it's cheezy looking and choppy. What do you peeps use?:'(

[Jcg64]

Unfortunately, I don't think you can avoid that. If you've got, say a two second shot, it has like thirty frames, depending on the camera, each lasting a fifteenth of a second. When you slow that down to six seconds each frame lasts a fifth of a second, making it look choppy. If you want an awesome 300-style slo-mo shot, you need to shoot more frames. I can't think of a way of getting around this, but that's not to say its impossible.

EDIT: Sorry, I know you're not stupid and know how frames work, I'm just illustrating my point

[WesScog]

http://www.vimeo.com/1245371

You can get some pretty amazing results just with programs, this guy talks about his workflow under the video.

He filmed in 60i, interpolated them and extracted a 60 frame progressive image from that, then used Twixtor time remapping, and then slowed it down 60%.

Then he imported it into Premiere and exported it as a 24 progressive.

And as you can see, I think the results are quite nice looking, and although they have a slightly digital look, I think they are still quite good.

[Macaholic]

i second the Twixtor way
http://www.revisionfx.com/products/twixtor/

[Skycarl]

That's another pricey little piece of software. Looks like they have a demo. Might
want to try that first. ( or put that dough towards the monster camera of your dreams )

[rick3000]

There is really nothing you can do with a digital camcorder to get around choppy slow motion, unless you have a camcorder that costs a few thousand dollars. I would recommend shooting in progressive, at 30FPS, 30p, because that way you will not have combing problems when you slow it down. I would also turn on frame blending.
But this also depends on what camera you have and what software you have.

[WesScog]

I would suggest against shooting in 24 or 30 progressive, and instead shoot in 60i.

When you interpolate the frames and export a 60p stream, you'll loose some of your resolution, but immediately double your framerate with no jerkiness.

If i'm going for slow, i'd rather have a 60 frame source file that has less resolution, than a progressive file that has the full resolution.

[greyroompictures]

I shoot interlaced footage and halve the speed in my edit program. Any more than half will create a choppy look...

...having said that, I have noticed that some of my slowed footage can judder up and down in some formats (due to the interlaced fields being slightly out of alignment I presume ?) but it looks fine on DVD. I've got some slowed footage at the start of my latest show... check the Tony's Tunnel Christmas Special at www.youtube.com/greyroompictures and see what you think. 31ish second into it there's a slowmo explosion.

[WesScog]

Well, like I said it's a good idea to interpolate the frames, and make them progressive.

The reason why you might not see it on a DVD player, is that some players and some TV's have built in de-interlacing systems, to make the interlacing in some video sources less noticeable.

So if you didn't see it on your TV, it might have been because it was compensating for it.

[Fisherking]

There are a variety of tricks (shooting 60i and then converting to 60p) and several motion-vector-based programmes which will produce 'intermediate' frames (Twixtor, as mentioned).

These things will work to a limited extent, but are not preferable options: Case 1 will halve your resolution, case 2 will give... mixed results.

You're far, far better off shooting at high fps -- if you're made of money, you could rent a PhantomHD or a RedOne for a day.

[thepie]

There are a variety of tricks (shooting 60i and then converting to 60p) and several motion-vector-based programmes which will produce 'intermediate' frames (Twixtor, as mentioned).

These things will work to a limited extent, but are not preferable options: Case 1 will halve your resolution, case 2 will give... mixed results.

You're far, far better off shooting at high fps -- if you're made of money, you could rent a PhantomHD or a RedOne for a day.

It would be far more cost effective to just shoot 16mm on a http://www.cameraservice.com/rental/camera/16sr3.htm (the high speed version), get one or two rolls of 16mm stock (~180 each w/ processing) and a http://www.cameraservice.com/rental/camera/lens35_HS.htm for $75 than to rent a full RedOne or Phantom for a day. You can buy film directly from Kodak, or from B&H.

Plus, the Red goes to 150FPS at 2k, and assuming 16mm is around 2k, it goes to 150. The Phantom is 555fps, but thats out of the price of most here.

[WesScog]

There is some issue using film.

First, depending on where you live, you can get a Red One for 500 a day, not the "regular" rate, but I know some friends that have their own Red, who'll shoot it real cheap if you cover their plane tickets. (PM me if you want their contact info).

Second, it depends on the circumstances, you'll have to use a faster stock, because since you're upping the frame rate, the film is going to be exposed for a shorter amount of time. As a result, slow-motion done with film will invariable be a bit darker and grainier looking than normal film.

If you've seen Superbad, watch the sequence where is trying to catch the falling bottle on the bus, notice how the blacks get darker, and everything looks a bit "bleak", it's because of the high-speed (although I do believe that sequence was shot with the Phantom, while the rest of the movie was shot with the Genesis).

To me, personally the Phantom looks way better slow-motion than any slowmotion i've ever seen on 16mm, as far as sharpness and noise is concerned.

But the way I see it, rent a Red One for the day for about 500, or rent the Arri for a day for 375+180 for film, processing, and telecining (WAY extra to get it mastered and sent to you in 2K HD) so really, they could end up costing around the same (the 16mm possibly a little more), except you'll have to wait a week to get your footage back from the 16mm.

I think you could get a cleaner, sharper image from the Red, although you might get a slightly higher dynamic range with the 16mm.

Either way, you're going to have to plan it out and light accordingly.

[datdude1988]

I appreciate all the info people. That Twixtor is a little on the high side. Lucky me, I can afford such things. I think I'll wait though until I can purchase a high speed cam. I'm not too sure that it'll be worth it unless I plan on slowing down EVERYTHING to get my money's worth. That said, the information you all provided is priceless. Thanks for contributing folks.

If I finish my project soon, I'll post it on here and tell how I went about it.:)

[punkandska66]

I normally use 30p or 24 with my HV30, but I tried some slow motion and it turned out jerky. I was using 30p. So should I just use the "HDV" (instead of "HDV24, or HDV30" mode, is that 60i? And then when I render, what would I choose? Would I choose: "None", "Blend fields", or "interpolate fields" (deinterlace method). And from feild order I'd stay with progressive scan, right? Forgive me if I'm not getting some of the terms correct. Especially from the HV30, because I'm using mine right now, and I can't mess with it, so I can't see what the exact terms are.

[JackLawrence]

... check the Tony's Tunnel Christmas Special at www.youtube.com/greyroompictures (http://www.youtube.com/greyroompictures) and see what you think. 31ish second into it there's a slowmo explosion.

There was a Tony's Tunnel Christmas Special?!?!?!?
How did I miss this?!?!?!
Will watch right away.

EDIT
That was awesome.

[C2Films]

http://www.vimeo.com/1245371

You can get some pretty amazing results just with programs, this guy talks about his workflow under the video.

He filmed in 60i, interpolated them and extracted a 60 frame progressive image from that, then used Twixtor time remapping, and then slowed it down 60%.

Then he imported it into Premiere and exported it as a 24 progressive.

And as you can see, I think the results are quite nice looking, and although they have a slightly digital look, I think they are still quite good.

At 60%, you're still playing at above 30FPS if the original film is 60FPS. Why would it look bad?

[WesScog]

At 60%, you're still playing at above 30FPS if the original film is 60FPS. Why would it look bad?

Could you please explain what you mean?

[C2Films]

Could you please explain what you mean?

Why would you need special software if you are only slowing down to 60% of 60FPS? I would think that above 30FPS is more than good enough.

[WesScog]

If you're trying to get a slow-mo effect, you want more frames.

You see, when you are watching something in slow-motion, you're actually watching more frames go by.

If I am playing something at 24 frames per second, and I want to show it at half speed, I will film the same scene at 48 frames per second, then project it at 24 frames per second, thus looking slower.

60 Frames per second will give you a source file that has more frames than 30fps. If you're trying to slow something down you want more frames so it doesn't look jerky.

You want as many frames as possible to work with, so filming something in 60i would be the best bet, as it's capturing movement at it's quickest, and you can extrapolate 60 frames out of that stream, and have a twice as many frames to work with than with 30fps.

I also think you might be misunderstanding what "Slowing down" means when you're dealing with video.

Let's say I have a clip that's 24fps, and it's a minute long, that is 1,440 frames in the entire sequence.

Now lets say that you're slowing it down by 60%, that means the clip will last 1:36 and be made up of 2,304 frames.

If you're filming at a higher framerate, that is more frames to work with, thus more frames to make the motion smoother looking.

If I film in 60i, and output that to a progressive stream, and the clip is a minute long, that is 3,600 frames from the entire thing.

If I convert that to a 24fps stream, then instead of being a minute long, it'll be two and a half minutes long, thus I can slow something down by almost 250% simply by filming in 60i and projecting in 24.

If I filmed in 30fps for a minute I get 1,800 frames, and converted it to 24fps, I barely get 15 seconds of additional play time.

60i is BY FAR the superior choice if you're looking for smoothness in your slow-motion.

[Dinoslayer]

Definitely MotionPerfect(Google it).

[woodentoe]

This may sound cop-out-ish, but you can buy a used 16mm filmo windup for less than 100.00 pick a low grain/moderate contrast 16mm color reversal stock, and shoot it on 16mm film at a high frame rate. When you get the reel processed, just tell them to transfer it on dv tape at normal speed. Whamo! super smooth slow mo. just do the math beforehand so you know what framerate to use.

I have 3 of these cameras. they're very durable. you can even drop them off a building and use them as a crash cam and they continue to work. Thank you WWII US military propaganda films for distributing 16mm filmos across both theaters of war so there are plenty on ebay these days.

Just in case you wanted to go old school. color correct it to match your video footage, and you're in business.