Hobbit why 48fps

I can honestly say I found it visually repugnant at times harsh words I know—but you have to realize I almost RAN out of the theater within the first 5 minutes.

Yet when I saw the exact same scene in 2D guess what? I loved the lighting. The depth of field wasn't there anymore. The image was cinematic. And this was with the exact same scenes And guess what else? I connected with the actors. I was left to let my eyes wander and tunnel vision if you will to the detail or actor that I wanted to "listen" to or see.

I caught every joke and chuckled. I became immersed. And I found this absolutely fascinating—even stunning to the point that I had to ask myself even though I knew the answer whether the same scene had been re-light and re-shot in 2D it wasn't—they simply used only one of the 2 cameras they shot with. And this is coming from someone who has been studying lighting and the visual medium for 22 years. I then saw the same scene towards the end of the film with Gollum in all 3 formats.

In 3D—I got into it and I actually liked it just fine. In 2D—I made the closest connection with the actors even though one was but a CGI character of the pioneering and amazing actor Andy Serkis who's defined motion capture. The first battle scene was also fascinating and in many ways a death blow to 3D HFR for me.

The purpose of HFR is supposedly to make these very fast moving scenes much easier to see. Everything was in focus and semi-sharp—but I didn't know where to look. I found it horrendous. The same scene in 2D was easy to follow, very dynamic and poignant when the severed king's head rolled by at the end of the battle.

Because of the motion blur It worked. The 3D HFR. Not at all. When Richard Armitage's character Thorin picked up a sword to cut the main opponent's forearm off—I couldn't make out the sword in the 3D HFR at all ironically—and this was confusing as he had been fighting the creature with the trunk of a tree which had been split in two I didn't know how he'd managed sever an arm with half of a tree trunk.

In the 2D version—my eye was able to "punch" in on the wider frame and easily catch him picking up a sword. So with all of this here's the "Master Class" that I took away, and that Peter Jackson shared with every filmmaker out there that is willing to study these 3 versions of the same film:. Shallow depth of field, motion blur, lack of sharpness, and movement all help to create movie magic. If images are too sharp and you see too much detail The Canon 5D MKII showed us that in many ways—it's large sensor and resulting lack depth of field combined with what was a relatively "soft" image relative to video cameras made it what it was when I shot " Reverie.

High frame rates belong on bad TV shows and perhaps sports. That is unless this next generation of video game players change the rules on us of course.

I can see this working for animation, sports and nature films though. I'd also like to see it used on only certain moves fast ones in a film perhaps and not the entirety of a film. It highlights the weaknesses of both techniques exponentially. In fact just yesterday afternoon a VFX friend of mine said, verbatim: "Motion blur is extremely important to what I do This latest technological "advance' reaffirms one of my key beliefs: We're far too focused on technology these days we are creating a lot distractions to what can make a film truly powerful.

So many of these new technologies threaten the magic of film by making the experience a little too "hyper real" if you will. Having only one of 8 characters in focus during an important soliloquy, or another person crossing frame out of focus and motion blurred can be a good thing to make the audience become more immersed in the film Log in or link your magazine subscription. Account Profile. Sign Out. Photo: Warner Bros. Tags: the hobbit 48 frames per second critics majority opinions movies More.

Although Jackson and co-writers Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens and Guillermo Del Toro flip around some of the exposition, the film largely hews faithfully to the first chunk of Tolkien's classic. Hobbit Bilbo is recruited by wizard Gandalf to "share in a great adventure. Skeptical elves decode a treasure map.

The journey's destination? Lonely Mountain in the former dwarf kingdom of Erebor. There, fire-breathing dragon Smaug guards a trove of gold that once belonged to the dwarves. Wired : Startling fast-frame visuals spawn awesome goblins while Bilbo Baggins, Gollum and Gandalf beguile on the strength of the acting.

Tired : It's hard to understand screechy-squawky Gollum and the Wargs look slightly fake. Read Underwire's movie ratings guide. He also writes twisted pop songs. Topics J. Like 3D, proponents of high-frame-rate argue that it just takes time to get used to the more realistic images.

Perhaps fearing more audience backlash, Jackson has decided not to release any 48 fps trailers for the film — saving the faster frame rate for its debut in theaters on December Of course in this case 48 fps could be used just for the scenes which need to be in slo-mo, with the rest of the film recorded in 24 fps. Even for full-speed scenes, 48 fps has advantages.

Action scenes are definitely smoother and more lifelike. These changes may be disconcerting to those used to viewing movies at 24 fps, but new moviegoers could quickly become addicted and not want to go back.