Slowing down everyday activities to make one second last for one hour

Mar 18, 2023 by John Aldred Leave a Comment

YouTube video

The Slow Mo Guys are back again, slowing down time. This time, it’s part 2 of something the boys did in 2021. Shooting at 90,000 frames per second and playing back at 25fps, they’re able to slow down time to 1/3,600th of its regular speed. This means that one second of real-time is able to be slowed down to precisely one hour. This presents a very unique view of the world around us and the events that happen in it.

Obviously, this concept proved popular last time they did it, so they’ve done it again. Slowing incredibly fast events down by 3600 times makes it very easy to see exactly what’s happening. Sure, 90,000fps isn’t quite fast enough to capture things like electricity arcing from a Tesla coil, but it’s still pretty fast and shows some everyday events in a whole new light.

Shooting with the Phantom TMX 7510, Gav and Dan are able to get 90,000 frames per second at around 720p HD resolution. Sure, it’s not exactly 4K, but it still provides plenty of detail to let you see what’s going on when quick events are slowed down so much. Even with the relatively low resolution, you can see individual angle grinder sparks travelling at insane speeds, appearing to almost stand still in the air from one frame to the next.

At 90,000 frames per second and played back at 25fps, time is slowed down to 1/3600th of normal speed. So, 1 second of shooting time becomes an hour. One second of slow-motion playback is 0.006944 seconds in the real world. This means that with a 180° shutter angle, each frame has an exposure time of only 0.000139 seconds.

It’s nice to see Gav and Dan tackling subjects that are relatively tame compared to their usual activities. Nothing was being blown up or shot at in this one. It’s just everyday life activities slowed down to crazy speeds. Well, I say everyday life activities… Ok, perhaps not the taking a football in the face thing, although for Dan, that does seem to be an almost daily activity when he’s around Gav.

But who doesn’t love seeing Dan being hit in the face with a football?

About John Aldred

John Aldred is a photographer with over 20 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter - and occasional beta tester - of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.

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Dave Williams is an accomplished travel photographer, writer, and best-selling author from the UK. He is also a photography educator and published Aurora expert. Dave has traveled extensively in recent years, capturing stunning images from around the world in a modified van. His work has been featured in various publications and he has worked with notable brands such as Skoda, EE, Boeing, Huawei, Microsoft, BMW, Conde Nast, Electronic Arts, Discovery, BBC, The Guardian, ESPN, NBC, and many others.