DV Filmmaking

Frame Rate and Video Standards

Another item to keep in mind is frame rate: the number of images that appear on screen each second. Film and video simulate motion by displaying a series of still images, one after another. Research has shown that the human brain can process a limited number of images at a time, and that if a person views more than 15 images per second, the brain interprets the series of images as a single, moving image. This phenomenon is called persistence of vision. Without this, movies wouldn’t work. They wouldn’t seem lifelike to us.

Muybridge and the Frame-by-Frame Image

At the end of the 19th century, photographer Eadweard Muybridge used still cameras to record a series of motion studies. The collections of still images recorded in quick succession provided detailed frame-by-frame studies of people and animals in various stages of motion that had never before been captured. Muybridge’s subjects include, among others, a running horse pulling a carriage, a blacksmith striking an anvil, and a nude woman pouring a bucketful of water onto another nude woman.

These sequentially photographed still images function much like individual frames of film or video, and can be animated by playing them back in succession. Playing back a greater number of images at a higher frame rate produces smoother motion. Playing back fewer images at a slower frame rate yields more choppy results.

Frame rates are measured in frames per second, or fps. Higher frame rates create smoother, ...