I don't know what they call it...

PeterMac wrote on 12/2/2002, 1:21 PM
For ages now, I've been enthralled by that trick they do in the movies where everything seems to freeze in mid-air and the camera then circles all the way round the frozen objects. It's like a 3D freeze frame.
You can see the effect in Swordfish, when some poor girl emulates a claymore mine. There, right in the middle of the explosion, the camera circles round the exploding cars, flying limbs and God knows what just as if they were bizarre statues.

How do they do that?

-Pete

Comments

kkolbo wrote on 12/2/2002, 1:31 PM
Well, in the Matrix, it was done with a circle of 35mm still cameras on a trigger. They were behind a Chroma cyc. A talented CG and SFX gentleman here in Orlando named Art Smith (the Doctor) was busy trying to bail them out and make it look right up until a couple of weeks before the national release.

K
Former user wrote on 12/2/2002, 1:44 PM
Read all about it at:

http://www.virtualcamera.com/
Former user wrote on 12/2/2002, 1:57 PM
Here's another URL that talks about the Matrix movie effect specifically:

http://tinyurl.com/35sw

BTW - The URL is truncated using TinyURL so that it hold up within this message.
vonhosen wrote on 12/2/2002, 3:09 PM
You can see a little bit of that done with VV3 & the Winmorph plug-in from Satish

http://www.creativecow.net/articles/kumar_satish/bullet_time/index.htm
JonnyMac wrote on 12/2/2002, 3:11 PM
It's called "Bullet Time" by the folks who did the special effects for "the Matrix" -- though I believe the technique was developed in England. There is a link to a Vegas tutorila in this message:

http://www.sonicfoundry.com/forums/ShowMessage.asp?MessageID=139722&Page=1

You'll need Satish's WinMorph plug-in for Vegas to pull it off.
PeterMac wrote on 12/3/2002, 6:30 AM
Thanks, everyone.

But, phew! that's a helluva lot of work for just a few seconds screen time, isn't it?

-Pete
Chienworks wrote on 12/3/2002, 7:10 AM
PeterMac: how many more tickets were sold just to people who wanted to see that few seconds again? I'm sure the effort was more than paid back in box office sales. It also helped establish the reputations of those who did the work. I'm sure they're not sorry about putting in the extra effort :)