Quick AI tutorial: How to create super slo-mo clips from 24fps files using Runway's AI editor

Background: Why create slo-mo clips?
When you are editing, it is sometimes the case that you want to take standard speed video clips and slow them down. This creates a dramatic effect and can extend the clip so you get more use out of it. A clip that is 5 seconds long can be turned into a 20 second long clip by reducing it’s speed by 25%, for example.

Traditionally how are slo-mo clips created?
Traditionally, when you do this, you will get an undesirable effect where a clip’s motion suddenly becomes very choppy. This is because the natural eye experiences the 24 frames per second as continuous motion. However, when you extend those 24 frames over more time our eyes suddenly pick up the individual frames, and the eye experiences them as a series of distinct images being flashed in succession. To avoid this, cameras will often have options to record in higher frame rates (60 fps, 120 fps, etc.), which allows for files to be experienced in slow motion without any choppiness. As you take a higher frame rate file and slow it down, there are enough frames to avoid reducing it below the rate at which our eye stops experiencing continuous motion.

How does AI create slo-mo clips?
Today, however, there are artificial intelligence tools that solve this problem by creating frames in between the 24 frames every second, essentially upscaling the clips to higher frame rate files. The software can make pretty accurate guesses to what the new frame should look like based on the frames around it. This allows any clip shot in 24fps to be converted into higher frame rate files, allowing for super slow motion.

Watch the video at the top of the page to see how Elemmir does it using Runway’s AI tool.