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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Bullet Time Rig?

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davidave

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Are devices are currently commercially available for doing bullet time rigs nowadays? The most important aspect would be slaving together numerous DSLRs. I'm doing some spec for such a rig, but I've come to the conclusion it may be easier with a high speed camera and moco. It really doesn't seem like anyone rents these rigs or components anymore.

edit: don't yell at me, I put in for my real name months ago, but nothing came of it. It's David Fu.
 
Not sure what you want a high speed camera for?

Unless you want some movement in your shot. Then you can of course use something like speedtrack and you will get the feel of it being almost still, since you've catapulted the camera through your frame.

But a motion control won't do it
 
I know some guys in the Republic of Georgia who have a 60-camera bullet-time rig, and are willing to travel, I think. PM me if you want info. I know those guys post here as well, so maybe they will drop in on this thread.
 
Fredrik Callinggard said:
Not sure what you want a high speed camera for?

Unless you want some movement in your shot. Then you can of course use something like speedtrack and you will get the feel of it being almost still, since you've catapulted the camera through your frame.

But a motion control won't do it
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bullet time doesn't necessarily mean it has to be a stop, in fact it rarely was in the original matrix
 
any have any info for construction such a rig?
 
You could also shoot motion with several HD cameras with overlapping FOVs, and then morph between cameras, creating a virtual bullet-time move.
 
davidave said:
any have any info for construction such a rig?
Click to expand...

If you're looking to build your own rig...good luck! :thumbup1:

There are plenty of professionals that can get it done for you (another one is The Big Freeze: http://www.bigfreeze.com/).

Otherwise if you want to persevere with building your own rig a quick Google search uncovered this guy (Jerry Hill) who's home-made his own basic rig (no easy task!), perhaps you could try & contact him for some advice?

http://www.videoforums.co.uk/cinematography/20320-time-slice-rig-trigger-challenge.html


More stuff here:

http://www.fxguide.com/article323.html

Good luck!
 
We shot a kind of timeslice vid recently using a weisscam at 400 or so FPS (I forget) and a very FAST and circular Dolly move, with actors holding still. I guess it would be hard to get that trinity flying kick pose, but it worked for us.
 
andrew, that's really close to what i'm thinking. do you have any footage of that? if anyone is considering this the old fashioned way there is this software: http://www.breezesys.com/

i am still trying to figure out how to link the laptops together.

thanks to everyone else for the info. keep it coming!
 
Rent the Vincent Gallo film Buffalo 66. They did a "poor mans" time slice of a crime scene with still actors. They also used red beads to simulate blood drops floating in space.

You can accomplish a good cheat with fast dolly move - still actors - high speed - and some key props to dolly past in the foreground.
 
There is a great book called "New Cinematographers" and Lance Acord talks about how they did it.

"...the make up artist glued these blown glass replicas of liquid splashing - used for shooting cranberry juice commercials - to his head and dripped blood on it"
 
Ok, so it's not exactly bullet time... but it is 1200 fps 1080P Raw and it is a full 360. You can see a test shot I did at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7oCpZAeN-8k on youtube... or on my website at www.hdmweb.com in the theater in the "other" section. If you are interested in knowing how I did this you can PM me.
 
thanks dylan for the headsup about the entry in cinematographers. lance acord also mentions harris savides' work with michel gondry on this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuGjBNSRi1c that used only 3 still cameras and morphing. the effect is quite good in the beginning so i may do some test.

andrew, the demo is very good! i think the problem will be ramping the dolly speeds with the shooting speed. i'm currently looking at mrmoco's linear motion rig that may be able to resolve this issue.
 
davidave said:
andrew, that's really close to what i'm thinking. do you have any footage of that? if anyone is considering this the old fashioned way there is this software: http://www.breezesys.com/

i am still trying to figure out how to link the laptops together.

thanks to everyone else for the info. keep it coming!
Click to expand...

Sorry, it was for a video I didn't even get to see. (Quite literally) Top Secret Military stuff.
 
davidave said:
bullet time doesn't necessarily mean it has to be a stop, in fact it rarely was in the original matrix
Click to expand...

Absolutely but if you read my post I'm asking why you want a high speed camera with a motion control? I'm also asking if it's because you want this bullet time to be "slightly" in motion.

As for speedtrack. It's a rig that literally catapults the camera forward. You can use this with a high speed camera and you'll catch your action in a tracking motion as the camera sweeps by, very effective. I also think it has a little of a moco feature. As in it can repeat the track in normal speeds etc, as well, but I'm not sure how well that works. If this is of interest PM me and I will find out where you'll find it.
 
Heya,

Let me check in one of my Cinefex magazine. I remember seeing an add in there for rig rentals. A very legitimate piece of equipment. Similar quality and precision as the ones used to film the Matrix.

Now here are a few questions that come to mind. Once you get all the cameras mounted and aligned, what system will you used to trigger the cams? I know the NIkon D3 does wireless but the fun comes from dialing in a delay between the cameras. That way you get to play with the speed of the action while rotating around it.

As for your virtual set, did you have anything in mind?

Definitely the fun stuff here! Let me know as I'd love to hear more about it.

-J
 
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