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I know we’re not supposed to talk about action cams, but this action cam is not! Why is no one talking about the Mission 1 Pro ILS? This thing looks so good. Have I bought into the YouTube shill hype? I just sold another camera and a couple of lenses to get it. Is anyone else going to pull the trigger on one?

Thinking of it as a Super-16 FILM camera represents an incredible opportunity when combined with the high-resolution sensor - zooming in post. My experiments with emulating S16 film showed that even a moderate amount of blur applied in post hides a huge amount of detail in the image. This means you can crop into the source image significantly and the blur will hide it. For example: If you were to put a 12mm lens on it, then you'd get a ~35mm FOV at 6K, which you then blur. If you were to put a 12mm lens on it, then crop 2x you'd get a ~70mm FOV at 3K, which you then blur and the blur hides the zoom in post. If you were to put a 12mm lens on it, then crop 3x you'd get a ~100mm FOV at 2K, which you then blur and the blur hides the zoom in post. Depending on how much blur you applied (if you were going for a vintage 16mm look or a more modern 16mm stock emulation) I suspect you could zoom up to 4-6x in post before the digital nasties started being visible through the emulation. I don't know what kind of digital zoom the camera offers, but if it allows it then you could frame in-camera and not be throwing away bitrate when you crop in post. This gives two advantages: 1) It turns any prime into a zoom, perhaps even a 4-5x zoom - much more than the 2-3x fast zooms like 18-35 etc 2) if you crop in post then you can apply additional stabilisation, making it feel a lot larger than the tiny camera it is I suspect that mostly this advice will fall on deaf ears, as people are drastically afraid of softening their images, like they'll be punished in the afterlife for it. When I saw Goodfellas in the cinema on 35mm film projection, it looked like somewhere between 720p and SD - and that was a 35mm feature film!! The amount of blur to accurately reproduce even a semi-ballpark 16mm film emulation is beyond most modern thinking, but if you can wrap your head around the concept then the ILS can become a drastically useful camera.

For me, 6K is ideal - I don't lose detail when reframing and even with some denoising, a lot of the fine detail sticks around. Really, for anything from 4K through 8K, it's fine for me. 4K just means I have to be more careful with my frame and 8K means using a bit more disk space (which I have plenty of for now, hope hard drive prices come down someday, though). But yeah, the frame rates are fantastic. They're one of the big reasons that Camera Conspiracies loves his M1P ILS so much.

I think we had some discussion about it! I'm very pro-Mission 1 ILS. I've bought a couple of Backbone-modded cams over the years (well, the first one I bought as a conversion kit for an existing previous-gen GoPro, which I promptly screwed up and then sent to them to help me fix nice guys!). The thing that's kept me from using either one is that monitoring is bad on them. The HDMI output on the older GoPro lags. We're not talking 3 frames... more like 1/4-1/2 second. And the monitor output on the Insta360 One RS... isn't. There's no wired display option for it and the wireless display to the phone is also laggy, even in an area with no wifi interference. Neither was made for pulling focus. And holding a wee little action camera right up to the eye to focus on its little screen (very little on the One RS) stinks - and tools to punch in, while available, are clearly an afterthought and are clunky. So they're most usable for something where you focus once and then just roll - which doesn't fit a lot of my use cases for a smaller sensor. Though they were great for the eclipse that came through the US a few years ago. Anyway. The M1P ILS seems to fix that problem. The screen is as big as you'll find on an action camera. Wired monitoring is possible and (from what I've seen) low-latency. Dynamoc range is, by action camera standards, good. The only reason I didn't buy one when I got the "in stock" notice from B&H was that... well, I just got a Pyxis 12K because the current sale is crazy. That and it's GoPro - they'll be on sale for at least $100 off within a year. That's how I got my M1P non-ILs.

For anyone looking to do something similar a suitable harvesting product is this Allied Vision industrial camera that uses the same Kodak CCD. They are also long since defunct of course but are available on eBay. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/284133056331 I think the price seemingly on the high side is probably reflective of people looking to do a DIY Digital Bolex too but when you consider that a used D16 is not easy to come by and is well north of £5K then for someone determined enough this route is something of a relative bargain. Pi 5 and its eco-system have now matured sufficiently to be able to handle the Allied Vision software in the intervening years so it’s definitely viable as a DIY project. Not trivial of course but viable.

Funny you should write this, I just got a A7v last week. My reasons are a bit different, we were awarded a project once again where we shot the bulk last round on Sony cameras, and will be using some of the B-roll for the new shoots. I just wanted all the new parts I'm shooting on Slog 3 cine as well. It feels a lot more refined than the A74 I had a while back!

The recreation of the Digital Bolex that David Bross (of the Digilog camera app) has been working on is now functioning. He's got help from Joe Rubinstein from the original Digital Bolex company. It sounds like he'll have two of them to be used by filmmakers to test it out. https://www.cined.com/david-bross-digital-bolex-rebuild-reaches-working-prototype-kodak-ccd-raspberry-pi-5-free-loaner-units-planned/

Of these only the Allied Vision Prosilica GT 3300 has the KAI-08050 sensor that the DB used. The Faux Bolex project was designed using Basler brand machine vision Gig-E cameras and uses Basler libraries but if someone is savvy with programming they should be able to change the code to make it work with other brands. Don't look at line scan cameras, look at area scan cameras. The FB project uses Gig-E for connection, (not USB or CameraLink.) The Basler model with the same exact sensor as the Digital Bolex is avA2300-25gc. The monochrome model would be avA2300-25gm. Other sensors also use the TrueSense colour filter and have global shutters so this might not be the only suitable camera. Basler cameras model numbers are easy to figure out. The av means their Aviator series, the A is area scan, the 2300 is the approximate horizontal pixel size, the 25 is max frame rate, the g means Gig-E connection, the c is colour (and m is monochrome.) If anyone makes one, please share your progress with us here. https://github.com/lafauxbolex

Thanks! I didn’t see the other discussions. I haven’t been here in a while, as I’ve been busy installing solar panels on my roof and taking care of some other upkeep. This camera seems very quirky, which is a bonus for me. I’m looking forward to learning how to use it and figuring out what it’s good at. I’ve never had the ability to shoot at some of those frame rates, and 8K isn’t really my thing, but I’ll give it a try. It reminds me of the BMPCC OG days. Just so you know, I sold my GX800 (amazingly, a bigger and heavier camera) along with some kit lenses. I’ll probably let go of my Leica 15mm f/1.7 as well, since it won’t be of much use to me with this camera. I have a few plans for this thing, especially using some of my vintage glass, which could be a lot of fun. I’ll definitely report back once I’ve had a chance to play around with it.

The Digital Bolex uses a Kodak KAI-04050 sensor. The sensor is available in colour and monochrome models. (BTW, the colour ones use a TrueSense filter, not a Bayer filter. ) So presumably there would be better resolution with the monochrome ones than the ones with the TrueSense filter. Here's the spec sheet. https://www.imperx.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/KAI-04050-D.pdf I played around with footage from my colour Digital Bolex, using a monochrome plug in that allows you to assign a grey level to any colour tone with a lot of customization. It looked really nice. But probably shooting black and white with a dedicated monochrome camera might be better somehow. There are a few example videos online shot with the monochrome version. The story is that so many people had been requesting custom builds using the monochrome sensor that they decided to just come out with a monochrome model.

I am currently taking a good hard look at the V… Not the A7RV that I had, but the more recent V for vanilla, as in none-R, the 33mp one. As a pure stills camera. In a direct comparison between the A7RV I had and the S1Rii that I currently have, bodies only, nothing in it. The Sony has more megapixels which gives more latitude to punch in allowing shorter focal length lenses plus even better (more accurate) AF and is smaller & lighter with battery life and the S1Rii counters with…well with what actually…?? ’Something’ I can’t quite put my finger on… It’s only slightly behind in the above factors and the only thing I can come up with that I prefer over the Sony is, “I prefer using it”. But…and this is the big one and the above confirms it even more, there are quite a few bodies that do what I need them to do, but very few lenses. As things stand, I’m not going to jump immediately, but my primary tool for next year is going to be based on a specific lens, or at least something very much like it and that lens is the Sony 50-150 f2. I can’t quite get past it. It is the perfect outdoor lens for my line of work. Yes I wish it was smaller and lighter but that is it’s only compromise. The cost isn’t because for business use, it’s not that big a deal. But, it’s E Mount only so native on Sony or adapted on Nikon. The more recent A7V beats the A7RV for me as it’s; better in low-light, even faster and more accurate AF and I prefer 33mp when I don’t need to crop so aggressively. There is nothing else from Sony that would work for me as a body. Nikon, I had the ZF and with primes and smaller zooms it’s fine, but with the 50-150 adapted, it would be trash to use, especially as there is no battery grip and I prefer the A7V/S1Rii style fully artic screen. Ditto ZR. And there are reports of banding in certain lighting conditions. If it had a mech shutter and the type of rear LCD I prefer, I’d be all over it. Z8? Could get away with no battery grip and it’s an option… Z9? Prefer it over the Z8 and could be an option… But with both of the latter, there have been reports of this specific lens, the 50-150, not working quite as well as it does natively… And then the final piece of this particular puzzle is the fact that is not a fact but could become a fact, that from within the L Mount alliance, someone pops out a rival lens to the 50-150… No signs but a patent went in a few years ago apparently for a longer focal length to the Sigma 28-45mm f1.8 which was I believe for a 45-90 or very similar. That would do it for me as keep me in the L Mount alliance for all my needs because with the S1Rii I could just about punch in for my needs. So you have 6 months L Mount Alliance to come up with something and it MUST be internal zooming and MUST be f2 or faster and ideally, basically the existing 28-45mm f1.8 in longer focal length such as 45-90 and then we’re good. Because if not, I will almost certainly be chopping in one of my S1Rii’s for either a Sony or a Nikon plus 2 lenses. For video though, all the other (4) bodies and lenses will remain LUMIX/Sigma because as things stand. A. They are unbeatable for my needs. B. The cost to change would be hideous and if that change was sideways at best, what would be the point? The simplest answer to all this is make that fucking lens Sigma. You have 6 months to get it on the market. 7 months at a real push because if there is no sign of it within 4-5 max, I will be jumping ship for all my stills photo needs.

Agree and if they ever come out with a longer option such as a 70mm or even am 85mm and manage to keep it f2/2.5, they would make for a great little set. 20/40/70 would be really superb! They make less sense if you are already invested in the f1.8’s which are hardly large and pretty light.