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BEST SLOW MOTION CAMERAS OF 2021!

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We have passed another year in slow motion land and while camera releases were more plenty than expected considering the chip shortage and teh COVID disruption, it’s time to take a look back through the year’s camera releases, and see which delivered on the price/performance scale when it comes to slow motion frame rates.  Phones are stagnationg while high end cameras are getting more frame rate options in higher resolution. Our Best Slow Motion Cameras Of 2021 have been selected and ordered by recommendation! → Continue Reading Full Post ←

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BEST SLOW MOTION CAMERAS OF 2020!

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BEST SLOW MOTION CAMERAS OF 2020

As the end of 2020 nears, it’s time to take a look back through the year’s camera releases amid the COVID 19 chaos, and see which delivered on the price/performance bracket with slow motion frame rates as the primary goal.  Phone slow motion took a back seat this year as the interest of the feature in phones was subdued or even eliminated. Our Best Slow Motion Cameras Of 2020 have been selected and ordered by recommendation!

We saw some surprises including a mostly affordable 4k slow motion solution and the adoption of 4k 120fps on many cameras which makes us think 240fps at UHD should be something to think about in the coming years as a regular option once 8k video is commonplace on consumer recording devices and TVs. The increase in resolution should theoretically allow for a lot of 4k frame rates to be offered as 8k delivers 4x the pixel count of 4k for any given frame rate. Keep on reading for our 2020 picks!

BEST SLOW MOTION CAMERAS of 2020:

Without further ado here are what we believe are the best value slow motion cameras in their respective categories for the year 2020:

Best Slow Motion Phone Category:

3rd Place) Sony Xperia 5 II:

The Sony Xperia 5 II is all about capturing the best video possible on a smartphone and in HDR. The kick here is that the phone is capable of 4k 120fps in full HDR which is pretty much class-leading.

The footage below will give you a taste of what the phone can do. In good light, it will let you capture excellent quality 4k 120p footage with the possibility to grade as it records a gradable flat profile.  In low light, it will be a pretty unremarkable image with grain and artifacts as could be expected from the light requirements when shooting at high speed.

Sony Xperia 5 II: 4K 120fps video footage by CNET Highlights:

Sony Xperia 5 II Slow Motion Specs:

  • 120fps 4k
  • 60fps 1080p

This is one of the first phones to offer 120fps in 4k which will probably become a standard spec in 2021 for flagships. However absent is the slow motion at 1080p which considering the 4k oomph, it should have been capable of 480fps at 1080p or similar. It is a shame that the spec was completely avoided considering HDR in 120fps 4k requires 240fps full pixel readout before merging.  In theory, 240fps non-HDR is possible on this phone but not available for unspecified reasons. Phones are becoming more powerful by the day and this is one that has our attention. The just under $1k price tag is not ideal but some of the best phones are going to cost you.

2nd Place) OnePlus 8T:

One Plus continues to offer compelling slow motion features on their phones with 480fps 1080p and up to 480fps at 720p.  It gives you a quad 48MP camera module which is literally insane considering the phone sells for under $750USD and has 120hz refresh rate. Feature-wise it has probably everything under the sun and then some and will not disappoint in the performance realm.

Fireworks in Slow motion – OnePlus 8T 480fps in dark by sternking: → Continue Reading Full Post ←

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BEST SLOW MOTION CAMERAS OF 2019!

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As 2019 comes to a close its that time to take a look back through the year’s camera releases and see which delivered the goods at an affordable price in slow motion.  Phone slow motion continues to be a strong category, so strong in fact that we made a Best Slow Motion Phones of 2019 list that you can see here.

Stagnation in many camera segments aside from phones is still ongoing, the semi-professional and pro markets stay at 120fps and 240fps with the occasional 320fps camera that delivers just a tad better quality but at a price.  For professional slow motion, there were announcements but not a shipping product yet, however previously released cameras like the Chronos 1.4c and edgertronic still own the affordable quality market. Read on for our best of 2019 results!

BEST SLOW MOTION CAMERAS of 2019:

Without further ado here are what we believe are the best value slow motion cameras in their respective categories for the year 2019:

Best Slow Motion Phone Category:

We had 5 finalists for slow motion phone of 2019 and while the Mate 30 Pro below got the top marks, the iPhone 11 and OnePlus 7 series had great showings, go to the dedicated article for the rest of the phone options.

 Huawei Mate 30 Pro:

Coming out of left field from a company that has been in the news as being in trouble with the US government, the Huawei Mate 30 Pro which is not shipping in the US officially but can be found from online import sellers, is the slow motion phone champ of 2019.

Huawei Mate 30 Pro Slow Motion Specs Dissected:

  • 120fps 1080p Continuous
  • 240fps 1080p Continuous
  • 960fps 1080p for 1 full second (960 frames in total)
  • 1920fps 720p for 1/2 second  (960 frames in total)
  • 7680fps 720p interpolated 4x (lasts for 32 seconds on a 30p timeline.)
  • All super slow motion modes at 960p and above last 32 seconds of playback at 30fps regular speed.
  • The entire buffer for the slow motion feature is 2GB and gets filled by data then dumped and encoded on the fly by the Kirin 990 chip.

This is the first phone that truly records 1920fps slow motion in 720p mode for 1/2 a second or 960 frames and then does excellent interpolation to a whopping 7,680fps 720p to create mind-bending images.   It is especially good for people, animals, and hard non-deformable objects. It will of curse fail as any algorithm with fluids, powders, and heavily detailed objects and will create a soft mushy in-between frame in those cases.  If you do not choose interpolation mode then you can get real slow motion for up to 32 seconds of playback on a 30p timeline which is excellent for a phone.

If you decide to buy it, the phone has a few issues to keep in mind. Due to US government restrictions, it will not ship with a  full version of Android with the Google Apps and not have access to the Playstore.  However several workarounds have been worked out in forums to make this phone usable. The other is that it is a Chinese phone which may need you to get help from someone who understands/reads Chinese to make the setup and get to work in English after.    We do not recommend this phone as your main handset as the support of updates will probably be negated in the US but if you are in China, this is a great flagship phone.  If you are outside of China, make sure you can live with the limitations in the software.

960fps，1920fps and 7680fps test – Huawei Mate 30 Pro incredible Slow Motion by Slow Experiment:

As you can see from the sample above and these other samples at HSC, the quality is quite good and the time is usable easily as a sports and experimentation high speed mode.  It will of course not replace a dedicated slow motion camera for quality work but it is still an amazing development to get real 1920fps 720p and 960fps 1080p even with some artifacts in a portable device.

Huawei may be in hot water with the US government for some time but they have consistently delivered amazing hardware that is probably the cutting edge worldwide.  We are excited about the future of phone slow motion and considering the giant leap that happened here, it is not unrealistic to think that really good 1080p 2,000fps or similar could be very close.  At least for a small-time recording but it will really be magical.

Huawei has made an incredible slow motion phone on the Mate 30 Pro and if they read this, send a handset our way to test and offer samples of reference.  As of now, their new handset is the one to beat. -HSC

Mid Range Professional Cameras:

This year the semi-pro camera market had some very good surprises when it comes to cameras that can shoot RAW files at very high quality and also allow for windowed slow motion modes.

Two of our picks are from Blackmagic design which is a known name in the affordable quality camera market. They have been able to deliver RAW and compressed RAW with BRAW format for very little investment compared to many other brands.  The quality delivered by these cameras are really cinema-quality so the trade-offs when stepping down are more to do with changing a camera system for producers rather than giving up the footage grading ability or low light performance.

Third Place: URSA MINI PRO 4.6K G2

The URSA Mini Pro G2 had a firmware update mid-year that allowed for 300fps in a windowed 2k pixel mode that has great quality and can be stabilized for excellent 1080p production quality.  For under $6k for body only the price is not that high for a camera that can really bring your production values up.   It gets a third place because the cost of owning the camera goes up with accessories like media, lenses, batteries, monitoring, and storage for editing. A good kit can easily get in the 15k range. The BRAW format is excellent but not for everyone.  ProRes is also a possibility and probably what many producers will shoot in when need to deliver in a rush.

High Speed Frame Rates on the URSA Mini G2:

Blackmagic RAW 8:1

4.6K Full – Up to 120 fps
UHD Windowed – Up to 150 fps
HD Windowed – Up to 300 fps

With 4k UHD at 150fps it makes for a killer feature rarely available on other cameras and the 300fps in HD or 2k allows for that extra oomph within your creative shoot.

300fps UMP G2 test 190629 by Reel Eagle Studios: → Continue Reading Full Post ←

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Best Slow Motion Phones of 2019!

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Best Slow Motion Phones of 2019

This year we have decided to have a special post to highlight the advancements in smartphone camera systems that allow the recording of super slow motion video. We have seen after all huge advancement this year especially by Asian companies making their best efforts to exploit the camera module’s strengths without crippling them to sell a newer model. The Chinese have decided to create a camera war between phone builders that one-up each other every few months.

We value image quality just as high as frame rate and when phones claim to be 1080p in high frame rate modes we usually find that the real case if 720p or similar upscaled to full HD 1080 with artifacts and jagged edges that can make you dizzy. But not all phones are created equal and that is where this list of the best of 2019 comes in. If by any chance an even stronger contender comes in before the end of the year we might revise this list but it would be a fluke.

Best Slow Motion Phones of 2019 guide below, remember buying through our links helps us continue our mission without adding any cost to your order. Thank you for your support!

#5) Sony Xperia 1 and or Xperia 5

Video Features: 2160p@24/30fps HDR,

1080p@60fps,

1080p@30fps (5-axis gyro-EIS),

1080p@960fps for 0.1 seconds  3.2 second playback on 30p timeline

720p @ 960fps for 0.2 seconds 6.4 second playback on 30p timeline

Cinema Pro by Cinealta – with professional settings

Sony was really on the cusp of delivering the best slow motion mode across a lot of camera segments including phones with their Motion Eye ™ Technology which leverages the power of a fast sensor with a stacked design and memory module to allow for pretty remarkable frame rates and or still sequences.

When it comes to phones, however, the Xperia 1 and Xperia 5 offer the same exact performance and recording time as the previous Xperia XZ2 and XZ3 which is a very low 0.1 seconds 1080p at 960fps and or 0.2 seconds at 720p 960fps.  That equates to just 3.2 seconds at 1080p on a 30fps timeline or 6.4 seconds on 720p. Hardly usable. However, the quality is not that bad and does allow you to get a lot of good shots if you don’t mind the limited rec time.

Of the Xperia 1 and Xperia 5, the  5 has about the same slow motion performance for substantially less money.

Sony Xperia 1 :  Unlocked Smartphone 6.5″ 4K HDR OLED CinemaWide Display, 128GB – Black – (US Warranty)  from the $999 initial price.

Sony Xperia 5:  Unlocked Smartphone  → Continue Reading Full Post ←

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Slow Motion Fractions From the Web June 2019

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Slow Motion Fractions

To better encapsulate the slow motion happenings of the web we are starting a new post type called Fraction/s as in “Fractions of a Second” that shows anything and everything related to slow motion that has happened recently.  This is based on the fact that high speed imaging hardware releases have been stabilizing and slowing down compared to previous years.  This way we can better cover anything small or large related to this craft.

Thanks to our readers who have submitted a lot of this information which sometimes escapes us. There is a lot of interest in slow motion related information but it is easy to get buried in the mountain of daily information. We hope that we cover many of these occurrences so you get to see them.

Slow Motion Fractions June 2019:

New One Plus 7 Pro Video Sample:

OnePlus 7 Pro Slow motion 480 fps by TechBeLike:

We can clearly see the same resolution loss as in the OnePlus 6 but with slightly better compression which is ok but still far from ideal. If OnePlus could clean this image and make it 1080p many slow motion fans would find it near incredible as it records 480fps for 3.75 seconds. This is already good enough to analyze your golf swing for example but hardly broadcast ready.

How to activate slow motion camera mode on Galaxy A30 and Galaxy A40:

This Article by Sammobile shows you how to activate a slow motion mode on these devices after a software upgrade.

https://www.sammobile.com/2019/06/10/galaxy-a30-galaxy-a40-activate-slow-motion-camera-mode

Top 15 Slow Motion Video and Camera Apps for Android 2019:

This article by jihosoft lists 15 apps and methods to get slow motion on your android devices. Note that if your hardware does not support it you will not get real slow motion frames.

Top 15 Slow Motion Video and Camera Apps for Android 2019

 

All 40 early bird units of the Chronos 2.1 HD camera have been sold out. Congratulations to krontech.ca on their early success.  If you need a 2.1 HD 1080p 1000fps camera from them you can still get one of the regular cameras from the next 200 unit batch after the early bird units have been delivered.  Go to their website for more info: krontech.ca

10 Sick Whips in Slow Motion from the Crankworx Innsbruck 2019 Whip-Off:

“Riders were absolutely sending it at this year’s Crankworx Innsbruck Whip-Off presented by Spank . Check out 10 of the sickest whips (and tricks) in slow motion.”

Help Someone by Buying his Chronos Slow Motion Camera:

This post at the Chronos Camera forum offers a near brand new camera for $2500 USD due to the terrible news of the owner’s wife having cancer diagnosed.  If you need a camera you could help someone while getting cool gear for a discounted price.

Post here: http://forum.krontech.ca/index.php?topic=472.0

More cool videos from The Slow Mo Guys:

Sony Venice gets more frame rate options at 6k resolution!

Cine Gear 2019: Sony VENICE Firmware Updates with HFR and more

 

Optimized slow motion for the DJI OSMO Action:

New Osmo Action firmware released by DJI – v01.03.00.10

 

Xiaomi Mi 9T to have 960fps slow motion mode:

https://www.gizmochina.com/2019/06/15/xiaomi-mi-9t-malaysia-launch-20-june/

 

Creating Beautiful Slow Motion in Adobe Premiere Pro

 

There you have it,  thanks for reading our post. Be sure to send anything you deem worthy our way related to slow-mo stuff – HSC

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BEST SLOW MOTION CAMERAS OF 2018!

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BEST SLOW MOTION CAMERAS 2018

As 2018 comes to a close it is time to look back through the year’s camera releases and see which delivered quality at an affordable price in slow motion.  Phone slow motion options above 480fps were a big surprise this year and the frame rate quality improved in other cameras up to 240fps.

There has been a stagnation in the mid to professional camera range at the 240fps with no big improvements afterward. The best quality and value once again came from the Chronos 1.4c from Krontech and the edgertronic cameras which offer professional quality results at a very reasonable price. Read on for our best of 2018 results!

BEST SLOW MOTION CAMERAS of 2018:

Without further ado here are what we believe are the best value slow motion cameras in their respective categories for the year 2018:

Best Slow Motion Phones:OnePlus 6, 6T, Samsung Galaxy S9 and Note 9, Sony Xperia XZ2 and XZ3 series!

The best slow motion phones of 2018 are in our view the OnePlus 6 & OnePlus 6T which offer the same Slow Motion quality and features at 480fps 720p with a recording time of 3.75 seconds which translate to a full minute of playback at a 30p frame rate timeline. This is unmatched by any phone and while the quality is still not ideal, it is, however, the undisputed king of usable slow motion.

Other phones in the running like the Galaxy S9 and Note 9 offer 960fps recording for up to 0.2 and  0.4 seconds which is a very short time frame to catch the action. Sure they offer twice the frame rate as the OnePlus 6 at 720p HD as well but the time restriction just gets it to second place. The Samsung phones do have better 240fps continuous recording which is something to take into consideration.

The Xperia Sony Phones XZ2 and XZ3 are 960fps phones that record at 1080p resolution which is a first for any phone. Problem is they record at just a very tiny sliver of time. The 0.1-second recording is so small a window that the phones are just next to useless for serious slow motion use.  Furthermore,  the phones at 720p only double that time recording to 0.2 seconds which is 6.4 seconds of slow motion at 30p playback.

OnePlus 6 vs Samsung Galaxy S9+ super slow-mo by Fun4sure:

The big surprise in the phone space was the iPhone is no longer a class-leading slow motion phone, same goes for the Google pixel which capped performance at up to 240fps only.  Both of the big tech companies nearly forgot about slow motion this year while our phone leaders OnePlus, Sony and Samsung used it as one of the top features to tout the feature set.

As a Side Note, OnePlus just released a new variant of the OnePlus 6T called the 6T McLaren Edition which also offers the exact same camera performance in the regular 6 and 6T. The big change comes in faster charging and a 10GB RAM memory configuration which will probably be unnoticeable compared to an 8GB 6T in real use. The extra price tag is mostly for the look and feel so we recommend the 6T and regular 6 OnePlus variants as better options for value. All of these phones have the exact same slow motion specs.

Winner: OnePlus 6T and OnePlus 6!

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Mid Range Professional Cameras: Panasonic GH5s, Sony a7 III, and Sony PXW-Z90V!

3rd Place: We were excited by the announcement of the Panasonic GH5s earlier in the year as the rumors showed 240fps 1080p continuous recording.  Sure the spec was included in the camera but the results were an aliased and moire prone image that made it unusable for professional use at 240fps. The camera does offer excellent 1080p at 120fps and slightly reduced resolution at up to 190fps.  The 240fps mode is usable but you will not want to shoot anything for a client with it as the quality drop is severe.  The Panasonic GH5 of 2017 is actually a higher quality 180fps image than the GH5s which seems to be based on the sensor itself being able to out resolve and scale the image down with more detail retention. We still think that unless low light is your prime focus, the Panasonic GH5 is still the better choice for frame rates in the Panasonic portable Mid-Range Professional cameras.

Panasonic Lumix GH5S + DJI Ronin-S | 240fps Slow-Motion Footage by Tom’s Tech Time:
 → Continue Reading Full Post ←