Let me explain, The movies and TV have been gradually been increasing frame rates resulting in a better understanding how an action scene is more crisp and clear during a fight scene or a chase scenario...Its only when The lord of the rings film "The Hobbit" claim to put higher frame rates to allow the audience to see every detail of every movement... Somehow it had both positive and negative reactions to the overall presentation... As most people remember the good old days when 24 frames per second was the only technology that captures cinematic movement...
Eventually There were technical difficulties that presented itself through the median of television... 24 frames limited the clarity of the new screens...Bandwidth allowed higher frame rates and data for luminescence and Color detail...
Take gaming for example, the use of 24 frames refresh rate would be just terrible, to any self respecting first person shooter... Why?, Because when the senses are at their sharpest in a combat situation... A slow refresh rate would be the equivalent of a slow flick-book Movie that's hard to follow as it looks unnatural... Your combat instincts wont trust your eyes or hardware as the enemy jump cuts through the combat arena...
But a crisp clear fast frame rate isn't always needed, In a car race you wont need to have the landscape to be clear all the time.. As your brain would only need to see whats important... Game makers tend to put motion blur on car races to get the sense of movement and to mimic the tunnel effect which helps in some circumstances judge virtual distances... As the parallax effect is often needed to perceive speeds... ( the motion of foreground and background in relation to your overall movement) The brain tends to filter out the information as motion blur to allow whats really important for the task that's involved... Its probably what most people complained about in the "Hobbit" movie as some motion blur would of been needed for the audience to focus on what important in the action movie... But instead the crisp clear action looked like a speeded up action scene... Which didn't sit well for people who are used to the cinema format...
The reason Why I mention this is that Droners have the same problem of, dare I say it... But to mismatch the Frame rate to the purpose of the shot... Including my self...I feel I need to mention that Cinematic shots had their day back when old reels of celluloid flickered on the screens...
But over the years we've been spoon fed faster frame rates on our televisions for decades... So why would we want to dial the frame rate down to a refresh rate that no self respecting gamer would want to have...?
To me, I started questioning my quality of film making as I viewed the playback...
Now dont get me wrong, Motion blur is a good thing for focusing your attention to something...
Take photography, we can stir the observer to a subject if we put a halo of blurriness around a subject... It's called Bokeh!!! It enhances the subject and make it artistic, as the sharp image is what our eyes are drawn to...I guess in the same vain as artistic Motion blur can be the same... But When a bunch of Photographers trying to tell you to motion blur your video... For one reason to ignore them is because they are just photographers, whose traditions with the old ways of shooting film since the 1940's... Its not always the wise choice... And rules are meant to be broken so that we can at least grow...
In this case I think a higher frame rate, especially in follow action can be done...On the premise that crisp detail in a action sequence is more important then the artistic ways of old cinema...
Think of the viewer experiencing the drone footage... a process of which can make the viewer wonder his eye all around because he is a passive observer... There is no concentration involved to blur out the scene, unlike what the pilot is experiencing at the time of his flight...
Unlike the car game the presentation isn't engaging enough, motion blur filters out the information especially when the landscape is presented as a moving picture... Photographers sometimes like to pixel-peep and see all the pictures to help determine the quality of the camera... A slow moving landscape picture that's high above the land needs to be nice and clear with little motion blur...
But Action shots for me, needs to be at a higher frame rate... Because I believe the drone action follow footage can have the best of both worlds...Its only the ground that needs to present motion blur... and from experience flying closer to the ground at 60FPS looks a lot better then at 30FPS or lower...
You can film cinematically in 24 fps for a 4K resolution as some drones have limits to 4K at higher frame rates... But since I post to you tube and many online video websites... The quality usually down scales to HD... Only the higher costing drones such as the inspire 2 or the P4P have 4k at 60 FPS...
Its likely the next mavic pro may be able to adjust to the higher frame rates, but for now just know the limitations of a slower frame rate and how to work around it...For example a slower frame rate of 24 FPS, I would use to film distances of 150ft or more... The motion blur seems ok when traveling at your top drone speed at long range...
Any distance below 150ft, then you lose some detail... Motion blur seems to be exaggerated more... So 60FPS just brings back clarity... Also if you shoot at 60FPS and break the 180 degree shutter rule ( shutter value at twice the frame rate) By increasing the shutter value then twice the frame rate you eventually increase your motion blur...
If you dont believe me then, I suggest you film your drone at high speed with both frame rate speeds, and see which you like the best... A little experimentation can help decide your preferences and perhaps obtain a type of film look that’s equal or better then the old ways...
If people mind so much of the "uncanny valley" of motion capture, then a new set of rules should be written about higher frame rates to maybe artificially capture motion blur in fight sequences and sport related scenes in film... Its still a relatively new science which was shot down harshly by the critics...
In a way technology is now matching our reality and that "virtual reality" will probably push the frame rates at higher speeds as the gaming world allows higher speeds for a realism that no other median can sofar offer,,, Its only when we see the sales figures of such displays and entertainment systems, the you can possibly see which direction technology is going... With that in-mind you will definitely have to reconsider your film settings to future proof your play-back format...
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