The Matrix

'The Matrix' (1999, dir. Larry and Andy Wachowski) was where the term 'Bullet time' was really made famous and where the way the concept was significantly developed.
'The Matrix' is a 1999 science fiction-action film starring Keanu Reeves, Lawrence Fishburne, Carrie-anne Moss, Joe Pantoliano and Hugo Weaving. It was released on March 31, 1999 in the USA and was the first installment in a very succesfull trilogy. It was Distrubted by Warner Bros and made a Gross Revenue 0f $463,517,383 from a Budget of $65million.

Plot Summary:

Thomas A. Anderson is a man living to lives, by day a boring computer techie and by night a computer hacker known as Neo. Neo had always questioned his own reality however the truth was far beyond his imagination. He then learns that he is being tracked by the police and is then contacted by a legendary hacker known a Morpheus, eho then awakens him to the real world.

Visual Effects

The Visual Effect Supervisor of 'the Matrix' was John Gaeta, who started the Research and testing for the film in 1996, while also working on the film 'What Dreams may come'(1998) which won an Oscar for it's visual effects. He Also won a BAFTA and an Academy Award for his work on the first Matrix film, along with various Visual effect Awards for the other films in the trilogy.
In 2000, after inital success of the original 'Matrix' film, Gaeta was asked to become the senior Visual effect Suppervisor on the remaining films in the trilogy, which were to all be filmed in a new multi-million, custom built, effects complex called ESC. The centerpieces to these films were to be terms coined by Gaeta, 'Virtual Cinematography' and Virtual effect'.These are basically umbrella terms for cinematographic techniques performed in a computer graphics enviroment.
In fully synthetic scenes of the Matrix sequels, all aspects including; principal actors, elaborate performances, dynamic events and scenery were all computer generated through a process of "image based" rendering technigues. This process is usually anologous with virtual reality and not film making.

More History

There have been many times in history where the concept of bullet time has been used.

In the late 1960's the concept was used frequently in cel animation. For examle in the title sequence of 'Speed Racer', the character is seen jumping out his car, it then pauses and the view point pans round in a 90 degree arc around the subject.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YTq7AJm_GI

The first music video to use the concept was 'Army of me' Bjork which was directed by Michel Gondry. It occurs 37secs into the music video and shows the girl driving the truck from dead on, the point of view changes profile shot via 90 degree arc around the subject.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeAZ9DQZFz8

Michel Gondry also used the concept the music video 'like a rolling stone' Rolling stones, here he has taken pictures from different POV's of the same subject frozen in time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCz8-1RPJF4

Eadweard Muybridge

He was an English Photographer who used multiple cameras to capture motion. In 1872 he was hired by Leland Stanford, the governor of California, to prove the assertion of "unsupported transit". This was whether all four of a horses legs left the ground at the same time, whilst galloping. Muybridge was able to prove that they did all leave the ground with a single negative, however not as previously thought. They did not leave the ground out stretched as in the paintings, but whilst tucked under the body of the horse.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8X0sHS0g8A

Muybridge was able to capture this negative through the use of multiple stills cameras, which were lined up along the edge of the a race track. Each camera was then actuated by a taut string that was stretched across the race track and attached to the shutter. This was so when the horse went past it would tug on the string and the film would be exposed.

After Eadweard went on to take photos at the University of Pennsylvania. These pictures generally involved the study of people and true human form. Here he used a bank of cameras which usually surrounded a subject/s so that he could study them different POV's.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjVaWaHCBxI

Eadweard also invented the Zooproxiscope, which projected images from a rotating glass disk in quick succession this gave the impression of motion.

http://www.kingston.gov.uk/browse/leisure/museum/museum_exhibitions/muybridge/machinery_and_equipment/zoopraxiscope.htm

What is it???

Bullet time is the registerd trade mark of warner bros.(Matrix's distrubitor) and refers to the digitally enhanced stimulation of variable speed photography used in films, adverts and even video games. Basically it is a type of slow motion or time lapse technique. However it allows the you to film imperceptible and un-filmable events, such as bullets. It also allows the point of view of the viewer to move around a scene at normal speed while the objects in the scene are slowed down.

Bullet time was originally achieved photographially by surrounding the subject with cameras. these would then take a pictures simulataneously or sequentially depending on the desired effect. the frames would then be arranged and displayed in sequence to create a orbiting viewpoint.
For many years, it has been possible to use computer vision techniques to create and render scenes with novel viewpoints sufficient enough for bullet time type effects. More recently, this has been formalised into what is none as free viewpoint television (FTV) which is bassically the live action version of bullet time.
Bullet time within the Matrix was pre-designed using CGI, which was then used as a guide to set up cameras on a track using laser targeting behind a green screen creating a complex curve through space. The cameras were then triggered at very close intervals from different viewpoints to create extreme slow motion. the frames were also scanned by a interpolation software to create even more frames to slow it down further and increase fluidity. They could also drop frames to speed up the action.

Getting Started

I have no clue how to go about reseaching this project, so... i'm just going to type 'Bullet Time' into google and find out what exactly it is.

One of the links that came up was wikipedia, which gave me a description of what bullet-time is and where the term comes from. It also gave me a historical background and a list of where the concept has been applied in film.

http://http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_slice_photography

So i'm going to use this as a base to start my Research.