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Bit of a back story. I was told by a friend about 7 years ago that you can achieve a higher recording frame rate from a camera by plugging it directly into your computer and streaming it into something like Final Cut.

I've now just bought a Canon 1300d with the max shutter speed being 4000 for pictures and I'm wondering is there any way I can do this? When using the live view mode on the EOS utility it caps the shutter speed at 200 for some reason(if anybody can explain that it would be great).

So can anybody tell me if this is possible by using the cameras APIs directly or anything? I understand there would obviously be limits in areas like the cable transfer speed and what not but even a slightly higher framerate than 50 for videos would be a cool achievement.

Leon Harvey
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  • The question is about video and unfortunately off topic. –  Dec 02 '16 at 23:51
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    I depends on whether the desired end result is video footage or individual frame grabs from that video... – Michael C Dec 03 '16 at 13:55
  • Are you asking how to take still images with a fast shutter in order to stop motion? In that case, look for CHDK. Are you asking how to take high frame rate video in order to play back in slow motion? In that case see the inexpensive Casio Exilim cameras. They'll take up to 1000 fps video. – Jerry101 Dec 04 '16 at 08:31
  • @MichaelClark Super slow motion is a property of video. Frame rate is as well. Mentioning Canon doesn't change the fact that it explicitly contains the phrase "for videos" as the intended "achievement". –  Dec 04 '16 at 16:45
  • @benrudgers Frame rate is a property of both still imaging and video capture. There are many legitimate uses of video in which the end result desired is a single frame at a precise instant. And where, pray tell, did I mention Canon anywhere in my above comment? – Michael C Dec 04 '16 at 19:27

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I'm not sure how to do this with direct video output.

However, if you are simply trying to achieve a higher framerate than is possible on your camera, you can try various time interpolation techniques to "fill in" the in-between frames.

For example, in Premiere Pro CC, there are two useful time interpolation methods that can slow your footage way down without being choppy: optical flow and frame blending.

Frame blending simply fills in-between frames by blending the keyframes.

Optical flow is a more advanced method that identifies object movement between frames, and calculates what the in-between frames should look like.

Here is a great visual example of these interpolation techniques compared side by side: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_wfO4fvH8M

amacrobert
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  • I've played with that stuff before but I'm looking for a more low level solution. Twixtor and the like would just be for post production. – Leon Harvey Dec 02 '16 at 22:31
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Just because you can take a photo with an exposure time of 1/4000 second does not mean that the photo was taken in only 1/4000 second.

For still imaging

1/4000 second does not equate to 4000 fps. It doesn't even equate to the image being taken in 1/4000 second. What it means is that the narrow slit between the first and second shutter curtain is just wide enough that each individual pixel on the sensor is only exposed to light for 1/4000 second as the slit takes roughly 1/250-1/500 second to travel across the entire sensor.

You're still limited by the speed of the shutter mechanism as to how long it takes to expose one frame as well as how long it takes to reset the mechanisms before another frame can be taken. Even without mirror movement in Live View this is the case.

For frame grabs from video

Although the mechanical shutter is no longer a concern, you're still limited to the maximum video frame rate of the camera. This is very likely a hardware limitation due to the maximum speed at which the sensor can be read out. The reason you are limited to 60 (59.94) fps is likely because that is the most frames per second (within the "standard" scale) that can be read out from that sensor. The reason you are limited to 1/200 second exposure time is that is likely the shortest time for which the sensor can be electronically switched on and off.

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Michael C
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