The RED Epic is a high quality cinema camera featuring an 8K sensor capable of capturing 1 to 300 frames per second at full resolution. Movies such as Gone Girl, Transformers: Age of Extinction, The Hobbit Series and The Great Gatsby have been shot with RED cameras. This tutorial is for the cinematographer looking to elevate production value and experiment with impressive variable speed capabilities.

Step 1: High Speed Capture

The American standard speed for cinematic pictures is 24fps (frames per second). Achieving sharp images in slo-motion requires a faster captured frame rate than the playback frame rate. This is called varispeed. When picture is captured at 96fps and played back at 24fps, you are viewing the footage at quarter speed. The degree of slow-down varies depending on application. A 2-4 slowdown is considered standard for replays or artistic effects, and often means a capture rate near 60-90 fps. This speed can also give the appearance of smoother panning and steadier shoulder-mounted footage, since high-frequency movements appear damped. Capture rates near and above 300 fps are an opportunity to take the viewer to places their eyes have never been. Water splashes, flying insects, sporting moments, explosions and other split-second events can become visually accessible and even other-worldly.

Step 2: RED Varispeed

When shooting in 4K, the RED is capable of capturing frames at a speed up to 120fps. Access the "FPS" option in the main menu and dial in the desired frame-rate. Once you do so, the FPS text turns yellow and the audio meters are replaced with “Varispeed”

Step 3: Shutter Speed

Shutter speed affects how much motion blur is in each frame of your video. If you want your motion blur to look normal, you should take your frame rate and double it. If your shutter speed is not double the amount of your frame rate your footage will have a blurry "ghostly" effect and will be unusable.

Step 4: Lighting

Implement a lighting set up similar to the above photos and diagram to light your slo-mo shot. Lighting is objective in most instances but must be executed properly for slow motion video. Increasing the shutter speed for slo-mo means reducing the amount of light that is let in through the camera sensor. This means you must have a very well-lit subject. One can try to fix this through increasing ISO or opening up the aperture, however these options will add a lot of noise to your image, ultimately lowering it's quality by making it grainy.