- 1,494
I saw 2Fast2Furious last night and once again i was disappointed. People in this thread seem to be saying that it's only a movie and that it isn't MEANT to be real/technical. Well i beg to differ. a movie entirely devoted to cars should be _exactly_ that.
2f2f cut down on a great deal of technicalities, in fact i can only remember a few lines here and there. in my opnion that is a good thing since many people who like cars aren't too interested in the very technical aspects. The driving is another matter however.
Jumps/crashes/fantastic props etc they are all to be expected in a movie and i welcome them very much. However i have yet to satisfy the part of me that goes to a movie wanting to see a damn good car chase/race. the cars they use are capable of incredible things, speed/acceleration/cornering abilities yet none of them were used. For those that don't know what i mean, let me explain:
Think of your average car chase/race in a film... There are two main components, acceleration and corners. Let's focus on acceleration first (as in the case of a 1/4 mile race).
To show a car accelerating quickly, they show the driver changing gear, show the foot pedals, show the engine being revved (usually its a shot of the engine being revved in first gear or in idle to show the revmeter rising and falling quickly) then they change gears again, repeat the process, the faster the car gets the more intense the expression on the drivers face, change gears again, how many times can you upshift on a car with 5/6 gears. You are never allowed to hear a full rev range before yet another gear is changed.
All agreed? Now here's a better way to do it:
Have one high quality microphone in the car, which will always records a perfect engine tone with no crackling or distortion.
Have several cameras mounted around the car, one on the wheels, one in the front grill pointing at the car/driver, one at the drivers feet to show the shifts, gearstick/dashboard/frontviewcams etc all in place. Then when you show a car driving fast change the cameras as many times as you want but NEVER interupt the microphone so you have one unbroken sound of a car accelerating from rest to a highly illegal top speed and can enjoy it in all its glory.
Now the issue of cornering in films...
Currently films show a car approaching a corner, several in car shots, more outside shots. then the wheels are shown to slip, you see the actors face (just to confirm (falsely) that he is in fact driving), then some more tyres screaching, then what 'appears' to be the car pulling out of the corner but could just as well be the car coming out of the most minor of slides, or even none at all.
A better way to do that? simple. have ONE camera, positioned at a good place on the corner, and show one unbroken clip of the car approaching, drifting, and pulling out of the corner. Granted it takes more impressive driving to do that, and you need better cars (though they are using them already) but would leave all the enthusiasts happy and i doubt the non-enthusiasts would tell any difference but we don't know since there are so very few films that do it this way.
For anyone thinking i am barking up the wrong tree, think about the film 'bullit', with steve macqueen. it is widely acknowledged that it has the best car chase of any film, has anyone asked why? it is because it employs (at least one of) the methods i mentioned above. long unbroken shots of cars being driven fast and driven well. you see and hear good cars being driven hard, and thats what everyone wants to see.
with the current methods they could show a car chase between a vitz and a matiz and make it look 'fast'. which can't be right. you may as well use those cars if thats what you want.
As for the rest of the movie, i preferred the actors in the first movie, esp michelle rodriguez (drool)
and vin diesel. plus it had a more believable storyline, rather than some drug baron hiring fast cars to transport his cash... heh heh. It also felt more 'underground' since most was filmed at night. But the cars were certainly much better in the second one. skyline (drool) and the 2 old-skool american muscle cars (drool)
Recently bmw comissioned known film directors to make short movies (15 minutes or so long) about their cars and although being given a close to unlimited budget, they still employed the 'pseudo-fast' techniques i described above and are consequently poor in my opinion. When i have access to the cars + cameras i will endeavour to make a movie clip of my own because i am tired of seeing poor car chases in films. It has long been a dream of mine to record a decent car chase. Until then i (and everyone else who shares my views) will just have to wait.
2f2f cut down on a great deal of technicalities, in fact i can only remember a few lines here and there. in my opnion that is a good thing since many people who like cars aren't too interested in the very technical aspects. The driving is another matter however.
Jumps/crashes/fantastic props etc they are all to be expected in a movie and i welcome them very much. However i have yet to satisfy the part of me that goes to a movie wanting to see a damn good car chase/race. the cars they use are capable of incredible things, speed/acceleration/cornering abilities yet none of them were used. For those that don't know what i mean, let me explain:
Think of your average car chase/race in a film... There are two main components, acceleration and corners. Let's focus on acceleration first (as in the case of a 1/4 mile race).
To show a car accelerating quickly, they show the driver changing gear, show the foot pedals, show the engine being revved (usually its a shot of the engine being revved in first gear or in idle to show the revmeter rising and falling quickly) then they change gears again, repeat the process, the faster the car gets the more intense the expression on the drivers face, change gears again, how many times can you upshift on a car with 5/6 gears. You are never allowed to hear a full rev range before yet another gear is changed.
All agreed? Now here's a better way to do it:
Have one high quality microphone in the car, which will always records a perfect engine tone with no crackling or distortion.
Have several cameras mounted around the car, one on the wheels, one in the front grill pointing at the car/driver, one at the drivers feet to show the shifts, gearstick/dashboard/frontviewcams etc all in place. Then when you show a car driving fast change the cameras as many times as you want but NEVER interupt the microphone so you have one unbroken sound of a car accelerating from rest to a highly illegal top speed and can enjoy it in all its glory.
Now the issue of cornering in films...
Currently films show a car approaching a corner, several in car shots, more outside shots. then the wheels are shown to slip, you see the actors face (just to confirm (falsely) that he is in fact driving), then some more tyres screaching, then what 'appears' to be the car pulling out of the corner but could just as well be the car coming out of the most minor of slides, or even none at all.
A better way to do that? simple. have ONE camera, positioned at a good place on the corner, and show one unbroken clip of the car approaching, drifting, and pulling out of the corner. Granted it takes more impressive driving to do that, and you need better cars (though they are using them already) but would leave all the enthusiasts happy and i doubt the non-enthusiasts would tell any difference but we don't know since there are so very few films that do it this way.
For anyone thinking i am barking up the wrong tree, think about the film 'bullit', with steve macqueen. it is widely acknowledged that it has the best car chase of any film, has anyone asked why? it is because it employs (at least one of) the methods i mentioned above. long unbroken shots of cars being driven fast and driven well. you see and hear good cars being driven hard, and thats what everyone wants to see.
with the current methods they could show a car chase between a vitz and a matiz and make it look 'fast'. which can't be right. you may as well use those cars if thats what you want.
As for the rest of the movie, i preferred the actors in the first movie, esp michelle rodriguez (drool)
and vin diesel. plus it had a more believable storyline, rather than some drug baron hiring fast cars to transport his cash... heh heh. It also felt more 'underground' since most was filmed at night. But the cars were certainly much better in the second one. skyline (drool) and the 2 old-skool american muscle cars (drool) Recently bmw comissioned known film directors to make short movies (15 minutes or so long) about their cars and although being given a close to unlimited budget, they still employed the 'pseudo-fast' techniques i described above and are consequently poor in my opinion. When i have access to the cars + cameras i will endeavour to make a movie clip of my own because i am tired of seeing poor car chases in films. It has long been a dream of mine to record a decent car chase. Until then i (and everyone else who shares my views) will just have to wait.
