Comments

wvg wrote on 1/3/2002, 9:39 AM
Indeed. Begin by using split event from the edit menu to select which portion of the timeline you want to play in slow motion. If not at the end of the timeline you'll need to make two splits. Hover your mouse over the right end of the split event until you see a double sided arrow. While holding down the Ctrl key on your keyboard drag the event right and you'll start to see a ziz zag line running through the event. The more you drag, the slower the motion. You can speed up an event by reversing the drag direction creating faster playback.

Avoid running over any timeline events to the right of the one you're working on by first dragging them right on the timeline.

Chienworks wrote on 1/3/2002, 9:44 AM
Yes. several ways, in fact.

The absolute easiest thing to do is to drag the end of the clip out to the
right (just like if you were trimming it), but hold the Ctrl key down while
dragging. Instead of including more of the clip, it stretches out what's
on the timeline to take more time. You can stretch it out up to a factor
of 4, which will then run at 25% speed. You can also "squash" by a factor
of 4 to get faster speed as well.

The second option is to open up the clip's properties (right-mouse-buttton
click on the clip) and set the playback rate (anywhere from 0.25 to 4.0).
This won't resize the clip on the timeline though; you'll have to re-trim
it manually afterwards. This method also only affects either the audio or
video, not both. So you'll have to do them both individually.
Finatic13 wrote on 1/3/2002, 12:57 PM
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wdorr wrote on 1/4/2002, 3:57 AM
I was thinking about this a few days ago, but in a slightly different manner...

I know VF2 can do slow motion, but if a project is being done at 29.9 fps (for example) and you decide you want it to go at 1/2 normal speed for a clip, should the original footage be captured at about 59.8 fps so when it the playback is slowed down it plays at about 29.9fps?

(Not done this yet, but I do recall all those 'behind the scenes' show showing them filming prop explosions at super fast fps, then slowing it down to a normal playback rate on the finished product...)

Chienworks wrote on 1/4/2002, 9:34 AM
That would be ideal. Of course, you need a camera and capture system
capable of handling the higher frame rates. I believe the new Canon
XL-1s can do it, but by itself it costs much more than my entire camera
and editing setup.

I've found that, depending on the type of motion you have in your clip,
slowing it down to even 1/3 speed (about 10fps) often still gives good
results, especially if the clip is very short. Video Factory will interpolate
frames to fill in the spaces and make some types of movement smoother.
If objects move less distance across the frame than their own size during
each frame, it looks very nice indeed.

Sometimes this interpolation is really ugly too. I wish there was a way
to disable it and have the render just duplicate frames as necessary
instead of interpolating. One slow motion shot i tried making was of an
egg falling off a counter, and the egg moved about 3 times it's width
each frame. The interpolated frames show two ghosted eggs and it looks
very fake.