Peter Jackson's introduction of high frame-rates (HFR) in Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey caused him an unexpected headache: many filmgoers hated the new tech. Those folks found that the hyper-realistic screenings ruined the magic, while others like myself enjoyed the eyestrain-free 3D experience and felt it should be given a chance, despite some issues. Because of all that, Jackson decided to tone down the too-sharp images for the HFR version of The Desolation of Smaug to make it more filmic and please critics and fans alike. With that in mind, I went to an HFR screening as an unabashed 3D buff, hoping to be absorbed by the story and not distracted by the tech. Unfortunately, it didn't quite happen that way.
Why did nay-sayers dislike HFR on Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey? First off, many felt that the higher frame speed looked too real, revealing production flaws and ruining the suspension of disbelief. Worse, purists compared HFR to a cheap TV effect and called it vastly inferior to time-tested 24 fps. Though Jackson claimed to be unfazed by all the criticism, he did take it into account for Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. What audiences actually disliked about the first film, he felt, was not the HFR but the extra sharpness that resulted from filming digitally in 5K with Red's Epic cameras instead of film. To remedy that, he told Variety that actor-friendly "Pro-Mist" lens filters were used during filming to apply a slight blur and remove any harshness during certain shots. In addition, each scene was carefully color corrected to "take the (video-like) HD quality away" and he deemed the final results to be "reasonably successful."
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