The Slanted Lens Explores Why Pulling Stills From Video is a Zero-Sum Game

In game theory, a zero-sum game is one in which one side’s gain is exactly balanced out by the other side’s loss. Regarding photography, the term works well to describe one problem with the ever-more-popular art of motion image photography, or pulling stills from very high-definition video. And in the video above, The Slanted Lens makes this point very well by testing the concept in a photo shoot using Canon’s 1D C.

Whether or not motion image photography is the future is up for debate. Both the Canon 1D C and the much more expensive 5K Red Epic have already been used to test the concept in videos we’ve shared in the past.

And although the results of those tests have turned out fairly positive, The Slanted Lens takes this opportunity to point out one of the main issues with the practice: most video requires motion blur, and a lot of photography eschews it.

The video is well worth a look if you want to see a visual representation of the problem. In essence, as the stills get sharper, the video gets shakier and more unnatural looking. And while motion blur has its place in photography, and ‘shakiness’ its place in video, the trade-off makes a “best of both worlds” scenario unlikely.

(via Nine Volt)