Animation progress - 30 seconds!

After setting the correct time for the animation in 3ds Max, which is:

Animation length: 30 seconds

Framerate: 30 fps

I found out that 30 seconds... isn't as much time as I originally thought. The first 'scene', where the ships take off, ended up taking about 12 seconds, which nearly half the time I have. This is obviously too long, so I've sped things up so it only lasts about 4 seconds. This makes it look too quick for me, but I think anyone else would find the scene too slow and boring.

The planned sequence of events in the animation is;

1. Ships take off
2. Camera cuts to outside main Rebel ship as the squad zooms towards the camera
3. X-wing breaks down, causing the other two to slow down/stop.
4. One or both of the ships that are still working return to the base.

How this actually works out could easily change as I continue working on the animation though.