September 8, 2007...11:39 pm
High Speed Camera
Does anyone know of a high-speed camera (video, not photo) for prosumer* use on the market? (*That’s like a consumer, but positive but someone who is more of an enthusiast than just a casual user) Something relatively cheap? And digital? A cheap, digital, high-speed camera? Am I asking for too much?
I may be very naive about these things, but I need to learn somehow! I’m interested in filming some super slow-motion scenes.
On a related note, I’ve been wondering why video editing programs don’t have digitally simulated slow motion yet? It seems like a pretty simple concept - Calculate the distance between pixel movement on key frames and digitally insert the same pixel information between those key frames so that you can stretch a 30 FPS shot to something more like 1,000 FPS. (which would slow your shot down by over 30 times, right?) Or maybe they already have it and I’ve missed it? Or I’m making it sound way easier than it actually is?
I took an animation art class back in high school, and what we did was draw keyframes in the animation (which is fun), and then fill in those key frames on the trajectory lines that match up on key elements (which is not fun). We could, of course, stretch out the time by adding in more frames between each keyframe.
You’ve also got codecs like DivX that reduce file size by operating in much the same way, only changing the colors of pixels based on keyframes and movement. (Which is why when there is a coding error you get some crazy things going on in the video) Actually, this is just how I imagine DivX works, and I really have no idea what I’m talking about.
But, if it’s true, then it seems like it would be really simple to apply the same idea to “digitally stretching” low FPS videos into high FPS. Then I could just use my crappy video mode on my point-and-shoot camera, and then use software in the editing stage to simulate what I want.
But, yeah - If you know of any cheap high-speed cameras, please let me know!
7 Comments
September 9, 2007 at 12:07 am
Well animation and film is what i took in college!! I really doubt you can find a cheap affordable highspeed camera. My teacher in school used to fool around with them but these cameras can cost like 65 000$ or more or maybe some could be a bit less.!!!! You can play around with timing and change frame rate in editing programs The problem is that the computer cant make up/process any extra frames that you havent filmed or digitally composited. Its like those zoom in programs you see in movies where the FBI zooms like 100000% into an image and somehow the computer cleans up the pixels into a clear image. You can do that to a certain degree but its mostly impossible to do especially to the degree you see it in movies. The computer cant really make up whats there. Animation is differently though. I mean you can tell the computer to calculate/move a square from left to right at whatever FPS setting you have and itll do it. I can imagine that one day the computer would be powerfull enough to simulate and be able to add extra frames automatically or be able to move those pixels into the right spots to simulate highspeed. A pixel is a pixel its just a matter of the computer analyzing the film and try to fill in the gaps based on how slow you want it to go.
Well as for divx it has to do with Bitrate. YOu can encode a movie in divx that looks like a DVD but the file size will be bigger. THe lower the bitrate of the video the less info it can put on screen. Soo thats why when things move really quick like a car chase or action scene .. like things blowing up or peopel jumping around and things are happening in short amount of time Thats when youll see those blocky pixels because the info cant be put on screen fast enough since the bitrate/info was compress to low. Soo i guess there wasnt enough pixels being pushed to express what was happening.
IYou have to reaslise what divx is doing is pretty much take out information/ lower the pixel count to compress the film smaller. ITs alot easier to take out pixels/ info then to Tell the computer to add pixels into a film. You would need a computer that can basically analyse shape and colour and individual pixels so that it would know how to automatically fill in the gaps. It sounds simple but i can assure you that the computer would do this process in a very linear way which would make the film unatural. For example in 3d animation if you let the computer do all the inbetweens to your character animations Everything is going to move on a straight line because your telling the computer move here to there. Inbetweens are SOOOO important and are what determines the path of the movement. Thats why 3d animators need to end up tweaking most paths/ inbetween by hand.
September 9, 2007 at 1:17 am
Actually, I think 1000 FPS is way more than I actually need. (I watched a hummingbird beat its wings 72 times within a second of footage spanned over 30 seconds shot at 1000FPS…I don’t need it to go that far)
I want a camera that could take me up to maybe 240 FPS. And I’m looking to do this for $500. So, I’m probably living in a fantasy world.
September 10, 2007 at 11:05 am
Actually, screw buying a high speed camera. I bet you could buy a machine that slowed down nature for less cash. It’s probably in the back of those boys life magazines with the do-it-yourself hovercraft kit (vacuum engine not included).
September 10, 2007 at 11:06 am
Actually, screw buying a high speed camera. I bet you could buy a machine that slowed down nature for less cash. It’s probably in the back of those boys life magazines with the do-it-yourself hovercraft kit (vacuum
enginemotor not included).September 10, 2007 at 11:27 am
I saw that episode of mythbusters, too!
March 21, 2008 at 11:46 am
Hmmm…someone has rage issues.
March 21, 2008 at 5:40 pm
Man, come back from a long absence required for moving and some dude has cussed up my blog!
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