Bullet-Time Photography Super slow motion would be relied on heavily in the stylization of the action scenes in "The Matrix," but certain moments in the script called for something special. These scenes required dynamic camera movement around slow-motion events that approached 12,000 frames per second. The Wachowskis called it "bullet-time photography."
This "Flow-Mo" process allows filmmakers almost unlimited flexibility in controlling the speed and movement of on-screen elements.
They first blocked out the action that was going to be rendered and filmed the scene using conventional cameras. Then they scanned the images into a computer and, using a laser-guided tracking system, "mapped out" the movements of the camera that would capture the final scene. A series of sophisticated still cameras was placed along the mapped path, each of which would shoot a single still photo. Then the photos were scanned into the computer, which created a strip of still images, similar to animation cels. The computer generated "in-between" drawings of the images ‚ much as animators draw frames to move their characters smoothly from one pose to another ‚ and the completed series of images could be passed before the viewers' eyes as quickly or slowly as the filmmakers wanted without losing clarity. Obviously, this painstaking technique takes time and precision, but it renders moving objects and people in a completely new way.
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