Comment by eudamoniac
14 hours ago
The soap opera effect is only a problem because no one is used to it. Higher FPS is objectively better. These motion interpolation settings are now ubiquitous and pretty much nobody cares about said effect anymore, which is great, because maybe now we can start having movies above 24FPS.
To preempt replies: ask yourself why 24 frames per second is optimal for cinema instead of just being an ancient spec that everyone got used to.
Personally, I have no issue watching things that are shot at 60fps (like YouTube videos, even live action) but the motion smoothing on TV shows makes it look off to me.
I dunno if it's just a me thing, but I wonder if a subconscious part of my brain is pegging the motion smoothed content as unnatural movement and dislikes it as a result.
Personal guess based on the impression I get from my parents' TV: You know how when you pause video while something is moving quickly, that object is blurred in the frame? Motion smoothing has that to work with, and causes the blur to persist longer than it should, which is why it looks bizarre - you're seeing motion blurs for larger movements than what's actually happening. Like the object should have moved twice the distance for the amount of blur, but it didn't. Something recorded and replayed at a high framerate wouldn't have this problem.
The motion smoother also has to guess which parts of the picture to modify. Is the quarterback throwing the ball the important part? The team on the sidelines? The people in the stands? The camera on wires zooming around over the field to get bird’s eye views? When it guesses wrong and enhances the wrong thing, it looks weird.
Also imagine the hand of a clock rotating at 5 minutes’ worth of angle per frame, and 1 frame per second. If you watched that series of pictures, your brain might still fill in that the hand is moving in a circle every 12 seconds.
Now imagine smoothing synthesizing an extra 59 frames per second. If it’s only consider the change between 2 frames, it might show a bright spot moving in a straight line between the 12 and 1 position, then 1 and 2, and so on. Instead of a circle, the circle of the hand would be tracing a dodecagon. That’s fine, but it’s not how your brain knows clocks are supposed to move.
Motion smoothing tries to do its best to generate extra detail that doesn’t exist and we’re a long way from the tech existing for a TV to be able to do that well in realtime. Until then, it’s going to be weird and unnatural.
Film shot at 60FPS? Sure. Shot at 24 and slopped up to 60? Nah, I’ll pass.
easy... because 24fps has that dream like feel to it.. second you go past that it starts to look like people on a stage and you loose the illusion... i couldn't watch the hobbit because of it
movies above 24fps won't become a thing, it looks terrible and should be left for documentaries and sports
> The soap opera effect is only a problem because no one is used to it. Higher FPS is objectively better.
But synthesizing these frames ends up with a higher frame rate but with the same shutter angle / motion blur of the original frame rate, which looks off to me. Same reason the shutter angle is adjusted for footage that is intended to be slow motion.
> To preempt replies: ask yourself why 24 frames per second is optimal for cinema instead of just being an ancient spec that everyone got used to.
"Everyone" includes the filmmakers. And in those cases where the best filmmakers already found all kinds of artistic workarounds for the lower framerate in the places that mattered, adding interpolation will fuck up their films.
For example, golden age animators did their own interpolation by hand. In Falling Hare, Bugs' utter despair after looking out the window of a nosediving airplane is animated by a violent turn of his head that moves farther than what could be smoothly animated at 24fps. To avoid the jumpcut, there is a tween of an elongated bunny head with four ears, seven empty black eye sockets, four noses, and eight teeth. It's absolutely terrifying if you pause on that frame[1], but it does a perfect job of connecting the other cells and evoking snappier motion than what 24fps could otherwise show.
Claiming that motion interpolation makes for a better Falling Hare is like claiming that keeping the piano's damper pedal down through the entirety of Bach's Prelude in C produces better Bach than on a harpsichord. In both cases, you're using objectively better technology poorly, in order to produce worse results.
1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAPf5fSDGVk
Agreed, the idea that there’s anything “objective” about art is kind of hilarious. Yes, it may be technically better in that there are more frames but does it make a more enjoyable film?
You’d need to actually support your assertion that higher FPS is objectively better, especially higher FPS via motion interpolation which inherently degrades the image by inserting blurry duplicated frames.
People are “used to” high FPS content: Live TV, scripted TV shot on video (not limited to only soap operas), video games, most YouTube content, etc are all at 30-60FPS. It’d be worth asking yourself why so many people continue to prefer the aesthetic of a lower framerates when the “objectively better” higher FPS has been available and moderately prevalent for quite some time.
Films rely on 24 fps or, rather, low motion resolution to help suspend disbelief. There are things that the viewer are not meant to see or at least see clearly. Yes, part of that specific framerate is nostalgia and what the audience expects a movie to look like, but it holds a purpose.
Higher frame rates are superior for shooting reality. But for something that is fictional it helps the audience suspend their disbelief.
Does the suspension break in games, which are not reality? Is there any evidence lower quality is better?
I think that whole complaint is just "people getting used to how it is". Games are just worse in lower framerate because they are interactive and because we never had 24 fps era, the games had lower framerate only if studio couldn't get it to run better on a given hardware
With one caveat, some games that use animation-inspired aesthetics, the animation itself is not smoothed out but basically ran on the slower framerate (see guilty gear games) while everything else (camera movement, some effects) is silky smooth and you still get quick reaction time to your inputs.
I'm not sure I buy that it helps the audience suspend their disbelief.
If it did horror films would be filmed at higher frame rates for extra scares.
Humans have a long history of suspending belief in both oral and written lore. I think that 'fps' may be as functionally equivalent as the santa clause stories, fun for kids but the adults need to pick up the bill.