Ang Lee's 3D 4k 120fps footage screens.

Batutta

Batutta

Major Contributor
Ang Lee's next film is being shot in 3D, at 4k resolution, 120fps per eye. An 11 minute sequence screened and apparently blew people away. Many said at first it felt video-like, but then became something completely different, a level of immersion they'd never felt before. Will be interesting how audiences take this, or if it will be another Hobbit HFR failure. I got used to the Hobbit's HFR after a while, but it always felt like video, and I felt they probably didn't go far enough with the frame rate if the goal was to eliminate 3D artifacts. I'll see this just because it's an Ang Lee film.

https://variety.com/2016/film/news/ang-lee-billy-lynns-long-halftime-walk-footage-stuns-1201755151/

This article says Lee is varying the frame rate throughout for creative purposes--

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/behind-screen/nab-ang-lees-billy-lynn-884425
 
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Interesting but the article says theaters need dual projectors and even then they'd probably only be able to do 60fps not 120 with commercially availed projectors. Might be really cool but sounds like it's a pretty far off before the general public can check it out.
 
Sounds very interesting, though I highly doubt 99% of people will ever even get the chance to see it projected properly... at which point, I'm not really sure what the point is.
 
Very cool. The Hobbit changed my mind about HFR. I'm pretty picky about movies having that movie look about them. Yet I was taken in, especially with the third Hobbit film even though I had seen the prior two the same way. It looked like a very epic stage play to me. I thought it was great. My girlfriend on the other hand hated it. She liked the movie enough but not the HFR. She was the one complaining it looked too much like a soap opera. Usually our roles are reversed.

So I'm optimistic about this technology. But I'd have to see it. The Hobbit was 2K at 48fps in 3D so I can only image 4K at 120fps/variable in 3D has an even more drastic look to it.
 
Grug said:
Sounds very interesting, though I highly doubt 99% of people will ever even get the chance to see it projected properly... at which point, I'm not really sure what the point is.
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Studios and theater owners are trying to get people back into theatres by creating theater exclusive formats like this. If people respond to it, I'm sure it will be available at more venues. They are also doing regular regular 24p versions. What I find interesting is that Ang is using it for artistic purposes, having the regular scenes at regular frame rates, and then raising the frame rate during combat footage for a hyperreal feel and impact.
 
Batutta said:
What I find interesting is that Ang is using it for artistic purposes, having the regular scenes at regular frame rates, and then raising the frame rate during combat footage for a hyperreal feel and impact.
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Very cool. Doug Trumbull has been talking about that approach for years, and it's always been something I've wanted to experience.
 
Gillvane said:
Interesting but the article says theaters need dual projectors and even then they'd probably only be able to do 60fps not 120 with commercially availed projectors. Might be really cool but sounds like it's a pretty far off before the general public can check it out.
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The human eye really can't tell a difference beyond maybe 75 fps. Most, probably more like 60-65.
 
Batutta said:
having the regular scenes at regular frame rates, and then raising the frame rate during combat footage for a hyperreal feel and impact.
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Some people may like it. I think a lot of people will be taken out of the story by it.

The "fictional feel" vs. "reality feel" will still be in effect. What you'd have is a fictional feel that suddenly becomes "real," and I think it could be jarring.

We'll see what people say. Trumbull has always managed to find test audiences who miraculously backed up what he wanted to prove about HFR, but reactions to it in the wild tended to be . . . somewhat different.
 
Gillvane said:
That may be true for 2d but I believe that changes in 3D.
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They are discovering too that human perceptions are very fluid, and can change depending on the situation. The dynamic range of the human eye for example is difficult to translate into photographic terms because our eyes process light and dark regions of the same image differently. In extremely stressful situations, the speed or frame rate of our eyes can also increase dramatically.
 
I was not a huge fan of The Hobbit HFR, but I would be interested to see this. I think that HFR might be less distracting in films with more modern (Billy Lynn) or sci-fi (Avatar 2) subject matters, as opposed to the Hobbit.

I am especially interested to see how Ang Lee puts the different frame-rates to use, though I imagine that this could highlight the issue where you perceive the characters moving in fast-motion during the HFR scenes, even though it is really just your brain trying to come to terms with the difference, and the characters aren't moving any faster than usual.
 
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