Minute by Minute

You may have seen recently that Peter Jackson is releasing The Hobbit with a different framerate to any other feature film that has ever been released. Instead of the standard 24 frames per second, it is being shot in 48fps, and this has bothered some people who have complained it looks too much like a cheap TV film.

Film has been shot in 24fps since the late 1920s for a few reasons, including the cost of the 35mm film and the difficulty of maintaining audio fidelity back then, and since this time has been the industry standard. As a bit of a film-making pioneer, Jackson has argued that “Looking at 24 frames every second may seem OK…but there is often quite a lot of blur in each frame…” and that “Shooting and projecting at 48 fps does a lot to get rid of these issues.”. He is pushing for cinemas and directors alike to take the new 48fps techniques on board, but not everyone is convinced.

Will The Hobbit be a cinematic triumph or will we prefer the old ways?

After screening a ten minute trailer of the new Hobbit film at CinemaCon in 48fps, there were critics almost immediately. They said the film looked “too real” or that the scenery was looked artificial, that the movements were reminiscent of a TV movie and had lost the “cinema magic” that the older style offered. Whether this is just because we are used to the slower framerate of films at the moment and we will get used to the new technology is anybody’s guess, but Peter Jackson and a few other high profile directors are backing 48fps fully, and he is defending it quite strongly against those who doubt its potential.

He hopes for thousands of cinemas to have the technology to screen The Hobbit as it was intended by its release date of December 2012, and due to the digital projectors that most cinemas own now, this may only require a simple update in the software instead of a completely new piece of equipment.

What will this mean for the cinema industry, and for the film-going public as a whole? Well, we will have to wait until December to truly know what 48fps is like, as Jackson has said he will not be releasing any trailers in the new framerate, possibly so there isn’t any more audience backlash, or possibly just so it will be a bigger surprise when we finally see it!

The history of film adaptations of books stretches back to the dawn of film-making, with classics such as “All Quiet on the Western Front” and “Dracula” being released in 1930 and 1931 respectively. While these films have been rightly classed as exceptional, there seems to be a trend recently that appears to me to be a little less positive. It seems that quite a lot of the big budget films brought out at the cinema are adapted from books, and not all of them do the original work justice. Now, I’m not saying that all book to film creations are terrible, but sometimes the filmmakers seem happy to cut out important parts of the story, change characters or just destroy the point of the book.

LotR set the bar for modern film adaptations.

A good example of a successful (in my eyes) film adaptation are The Lord of the Rings films. Now, I know they missed out a lot of content from the books, but in their defence that would have meant many more millions and many more hours to sit through! At their core though, they stayed true to the feel of the characters, the lore of the world and managed to bring to life the sights and sounds of Middle-Earth, and even made the story coherent and enjoyable without prior knowledge of the books. This may seem like a really obvious aspect to get right, but I’ve seen more than a few book to film translations that have made no sense, and I knew the story from reading the book! A prime example of this is The Northern Lights (or The Golden Compass if you want to use the film name), a huge disappointment, not just for me but evidently for the people who invested their money in it.

The Northern Lights was the first book in a trilogy written by Philip Pullman, and was also a book I read many, many years ago. I was enthralled by the world in which the book was taking place, surprised by the twists and turns of the plot and disgusted by the evil that was Mrs Coulter. I got the next book, The Subtle Knife, and then the final book The Amber Spyglass; and thoroughly enjoyed each one. I have re-read these books on multiple occasions, and am always impressed by them. When I heard they were making a film adaptation I was quietly optimistic, as I hoped they would do it justice as with The Lord of the Rings. How wrong I was.

The one redeeming feature of the film - that moustache!

It’s not just with this film either, and it has happened before, where a book has to be cut down and reshaped to fit a more acceptable film length of 2 hours or so. I just find it to be a pity that the films get made at all, as a bad adaptation is a hundred times worse than no adaptation at all. This is why I am a little apprehensive about a forthcoming film, World War Z. This book is set in the near future, 10 years after a zombie apocalypse almost wiped out the entire human population, and tells the stories of people who lived through those dark days through the medium of an interviewer. But, the more I read about the potential storyline, the more I grimace. It seems they plan to change the entire premise, keep a few characters (perhaps by name alone) and fob it off with the well known name of the book. Whether I’m right or not I will have to wait and see, but I’m not holding my breath.

If only big film making companies would try to do the original works justice, rather than just try to make millions of pounds from the loyal fans of the books, then I would be exstatic every time I heard of a film adaptation of a book. But now I just pray it’s not another Golden Compass.

The way we document our home lives has changed considerably with the invention of digital cameras, and it has also had a massive effect on the world of art and science. It is now very easy to buy a cheap digital camera and use it effectively, as the technology has now become so widespread that you do not need to spend a lot of money on an expensive piece of kit, when you can buy a similar product for a fraction of the price.

Cameras on phones replace standard cameras for some people.

Back when digital cameras were first released, the resolution at which they took photographs wasn’t that great, only 1 or 2 MP (megapixels), whereas nowadays they are hitting an average of around 10 MP, and as high as 20 MP. Even on mobile phones the cameras are quite impressive for a low price, with 4 MP cameras available on low to mid range phones and iPhones boasting a mighty 8 MP! All of this means that high quality, crystal clear images are within the reach of almost everyone with a little disposable income, and because digital cameras don’t require a processing lab in order for you to view the photographs it makes it even easier for people to enjoy taking (and appearing in) photos.

Memory storage for cameras has increased along with image resolution, as with a higher resolution image a larger filesize is presented. The size of the image increases as the resolution increases, and with the cameras available today it is not out of the ordinary to see SD cards that canhold dozens of GB of data. SDXC cards can even hold up to 2 TB of images! While this may be unnecessary for the average camera user, a professional photographer using a high resolution camera who also requires the ability to take many hundreds of images without problem may well find this development extremely useful.

Technology has advanced to such an extent that it is becoming impossible for digital cameras to get any smaller than they already are, without having some sort of detrimental effect on the size of the viewing screen. Memory cards are already incredibly small, and the fact that they can be inserted and removed without harming the integrity of the camera means that in a memory capacity they cannot be any smaller, either. This would mean that the technology may need to develop in other ways, perhaps in ways that have not been fully explored yet.

Will digital photo frames replace standard frames altogether?

One downside to the ease of use and convenience of digital cameras is that while you are able to view the photos there and then, you rarely get them reproduced in a physical form. It’s easy to post the pictures to Facebook, or plug your camera into the TV to get them on the big screen, but there is no replacement for having a batch of photographs in your hand to pass round or put in a frame. There are development centres in certain stores across the country which allow you to print off your digital photographs, so it’s not impossible to do, but when you can just put them online and view them there; the incentive to print them off is lost.

One invention related to digital cameras that I find exceptionally good are the digital photoframes. With the ability to load on many, many digital photographs and either put on a loop of the selection or just set to a certain photograph, they are a worthy replacement of traditional frames and pictures.

Whether you own the latest gadget or you are lusting after it, you cannot deny the importance of small, electronic, portable devices that make our life that little bit better. Smartphones, cameras, RC cars, even as far as GPS glasses are all available at fairly reasonable prices, and due to the Western worlds’ obsession with technology we are all drawn to them like moths to a flame.

How much is too much?

Almost everyone will own a piece of technology that can be classified as a gadget, whether it’s a smartphone, mp3 player or perhaps even remote controlled helicopter; and for many people life would not be the same without them. As an example, could you imagine going an entire day without sending a text, checking Facebook on the move or hearing your favourite song while on the bus? Even an hour is too much for some! Just a short time ago these things would have been impossible, or even beyond imagination, but nowadays it is just seen as the norm.

You can’t go anywhere without seeing people using gadgets – phones, tablets, mp3 players, handheld games consoles or even robotic dogs. OK, perhaps that last one is a bit far fetched, but the prevalence of electronic devices sometimes seems to have reached a point where it is difficult to imagine the world getting any more saturated, but it will be. There will always be something new and must-have that is released, or something that makes our lives that little bit easier and more convenient. Even those who, stereotypically, have been averse to technology, such as grandparents, are becoming more and more used to living with gadgets and gizmos in the house; the rise of the silver surfer has opened up a whole new generation of people who are utilising the internet, mobile phones and other such technology.

There a quite a few sites out there that sell a vast range of questionably-useful gadgets, and although they may not be essential for day to day activities they are always fun!

It won’t be long before we watch television through our computers and we will only need a monitor with no capability of receiving a television signal!  Until then we still need a television but even these choices have changed.  The traditional cathode ray televisions that used to take up a large space in a living room are no longer widely available and will soon be obsolete.  Many of these older televisions are not capable of displaying a digital television signal and this will be the only broadcast available in the next couple of years.

The cheaper option for a new television now is LCD or Liquid Crystal Display.  These TVs are slim line and have a flat screen, taking up much less room than TVs did previous to this new technology.  A flat screen TV can be wall mounted so no TV stand is necessary and it does not clutter up a flat surface.

The difference can be quite impressive!

A feature to look out for on LCD TVs is High Definition capability.  This means the television can display high definition images which are increasingly broadcast on digital tv and widely available on Bluray discs.  The speed at which the picture is refreshed can vary depending on the specification of the television.  The faster the refresh rate, the higher the quality of the image.  Although LCD TVs can be cheap there can be wide gaps in image quality and it is important to research the television’s all-round performance before making a purchase.

The other choices available for a new television are plasma and rear projection.  Rear projection televisions have been all-but superseded by plasma quality and LCD affordability, but are sometimes still chosen for business, rather than domestic purposes.  Plasma televisions consume more power than LCD televisions and are more costly due to their construction of thousands of miniscule gas or plasma chambers. The picture quality of plasma televisions is superior to LCD, but the televisions do not last as long without maintenance of the plasma content.

The future may well be Smart TVs.

More recently there have been so called “Smart” televisions being released, which provide all of the benefits of a standard LCD television but with internet capabilities. With a Smart TV you can browse the web, watch on demand programming, stream from sites or access social media sites; which is why they are also sometimes referred to as Hybrid TVs, being a middle point between the standard television and a computer. While still in its infancy, Smart televisions are set to become a major player in the world of home entertainment. With more and more becoming available for such products and Google even releasing Google TV, a platform based on the Android operating system and the Linux version of Chrome, you can see how these devices may well take off in the near future.

Your first opportunity to see a newly-released film is to go to the cinema.  Although this can be expensive, particularly if you buy the inevitably over-price buy food and drink, the film is usually more memorable than watching it at home.  The environment and atmosphere are conducive to your immersion in the plot, with few distractions. Even ignoring the inevitable first-week pirate copy that will be released, the numbers of people going to see new releases at the cinema is dropping, and revenues are dwindling.

Now, I for one like going to see a film at the cinema – but only if I have had my interest captured by the release for some time. I won’t go just for something to do, as the cost prohibits that, and although the floors may be sticky and the food expensive, I find it to be an overall enjoyable experience. I feel that one of the problems with the state of cinema is the absolute inundation of film after film, almost every week it seems. There’s always something new out to watch, and things don’t seem to be that exciting any more. It’s just generic comedy A followed by mega-action-fest B, and I find it hard to become invested in the hype or the preparation of their release, so just let them slide. People I have talked to have a similar tale to tell, but whether this is prevalent amongst other cinema-goers – who knows?

Although enjoyable, is it worth it?

Once upon a time it took up to two years for cinematic films to make their way onto video or DVD for home-viewing.  The first release was once for rental only, but things have changed.  A cinematic release is now available for rental or purchase as little as six weeks after the first showings of the film. Films can still be rented on DVD or Bluray disc for a lower price than purchase, and there are now several services which will post the discs to your home, saving the need for a trip to the DVD rental store.  Films are increasingly less expensive to purchase for those who wish to watch films more than once.

There are now ways to watch films at home without ever touching a disc or using transport to get to a cinema, shop or rental store.  It is possible to legitimately download or stream films on the internet, although illegal downloading is more widely available and often very poor quality.

Most digital television services, including cable and satellite providers, offer a service where you can choose the film you want to watch and view it at your convenience.  This service is often free for older films or included in a package with movie channels.  More recent releases are available at a fixed price which is added to the monthly bill when the film is activated on the TV or box, and when you can watch an almost-new film for a fraction of the cost whilst in the comfort of your own home; why would you trek all the way to the local cinema just to see it on a slightly larger screen?