SloMo in The Darjeeling Limited

flimflamfilms

flimflamfilms

Well-known member
Good afternoon,

An early sequence in The Darjeeling Limited by Wes Anderson has Adrian Brody and Bill Murray running for the train. There is a quick glance by Adrian Brody and then a cut to a slow motion sequence of him hopping aboard the train. The slow motion is beautiful and absolutely without blur of any kind. There is a very similar sequence at the end of the film as well.

Out of curiosity, how is this done? Fast shutter speed? Fast frame rate?

Check it out if you haven't seen it.
 
I think he is referring more to the clean nature of the motion blur (or lack thereof.)

This can easily be done by speeding up the shutter, to say 90 degrees, or lower. Similar to shooting at a 1/120th or 1/250th in digital terms.
 
So, in real world terms (DVX users and such) this is the logic behind 60i at 1/120 slowed to 40%. Yes?

But 72fps!? Can a digital camera achieve this kind of slow motion excellence?

Cheers.
 
Only in post. After Effects does a pretty decent job but you can help it by shooting in a certain way.

I would think shooting at a higher shutter speed would help the slow motion algorithm as there wouldn't be any blur that it has to work with. Also keep motion minimal and/or smooth.

The HVX allows you to shoot at 50fps (PAL) but that isn't anywhere near the slowdown required for the Darjeeling Ltd type of shot.

Not sure what HVX 50fps + After Effects would do? Be an interesting experiment!
 
Uhhh, doesn't the HVX let you do 60fps in 720P NTSC onto the P2 card? 60 is decently slow. However, the DVX can't do anything above 30fps.

Matthew
 
The Dvx can shoot 60fps.....and 30fps and 24fps

60 is just what normal video footage is

it can look pretty good slowed down and the right shutter speed, but
I will say Im still left wanting when it comes to even slower motion
 
For me things don't really start looking like serious slow-mo until you get up around 96fps. I the film industry a standard highs-peed 35mm camera will run up to 120fps,
with some exotic cameras being capable of 300fps pin-registered. Those have multiple registration pins and pull-down claws to spread out the stresses on the film, as the inertia of 35mm will cause it to rip at those speeds as it comes to a full stop for each frame.

Some 16mm cameras can go to 500fps (less mass), and then there are rotating prism cameras that can shoot something like 2500fps (the explosions in Star Wars), but the footage has to be stabilized. The film never comes to a stop, it just zips straight through like cash through a wood-chipper.

The latest thing seems to be a kind of "drum" camera, where an endless loop of rawstock is allowed to get up to tremendous speed before the shutter is engaged by a laser operated trigger.

I love the fact that my HVX can shoot 60fps, but most of the slo-mo you see in the cinema is shot at a somewhat higher speed.

The limiting factors for digital are the massive amount of data that has to be moved quickly, the refresh rate of the sensor (a frame of film is always brand new when it reaches the gate), and the difficulty of getting enough light at such short exposure times. Each limitation is getting pushed back all the time.

Many highs-peed film cameras have a strobe sync connector that triggers a massive strobe at such high frame rates the light just looks continuous. Strobes can have extremely short flash duration, so each frame can get loads of light with almost no motion blur, yet the subject doesn't burst into flames from the heat of the lights.

Those units have power supplies the size of a typical refrigerator.

There, that's probably more than anyone ever wanted to know about slow motion...

Cheers
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top