Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K

[drm 143]

46 minutes ago, leslie said:

so i kinda dont get the whole 6k thing

The sensor in most digital cameras don't capture all of the colors at each pixel (not including Foveon). The cameras use a Bayer pattern, like the attached image, to record the color information. So, a typical 4K image doesn't have the color information for a "real" 4K image. They use a bunch of fancy math to estimate the colors in places where they don't have a reading. It is estimated that you need an image about 1.4 times larger than your final resolution in order to have proper colors. So, with a 6K image, you down sample that to a 4K image and you should get a sharper image and better colors. There are not many TVs on which you can display your 6K images at their normal resolution, but the extra resolution is useful.

[leslie 336]

9 hours ago, Skip77 said:

The post you just made is trolling.  

I made no comments directed at you.

You guys don't like AMERICANS and that's all this is.  You all ran off @webrunner5 because of his views and you attack me for saying the same-things camera related comments that other people post about. 

 

You might want to create a few more new click - bait titles for your You Tube channel instead of bothering with me. 

i liked webrunner, i will miss him...  and no doubt  he had a lot of experience that he tried to or could have imparted to the forum. Having said that he was about as tactful as a sledgehammer and it was his way or the highway. Personally i don't think that cuts it in this day and age. Sometimes a line has to be drawn in the sand a point to which someone will go to but no further.  A camera forum is not a battlefield, and its not life or death either. if you cant distinguish between the two your probably missing the whole point of having a camera in the first place.  

mercer is american i believe I dont have hate for him 😉 in fact of the entire forum, he seems to be living the dream. We regularly get posts or updates on his progress what can you show us ?

[Kisaha 1,575]

5 hours ago, leslie said:

 i had a chance to wander into jb hifi a couple of days ago, they have 1 8k tv they can sell you, everything else is 4k. so i kinda dont get the whole 6k thing, tv's will be 4k or 8k from what i can see from the retail shop so what is 6k supposed to do ? Sure it gives you the option of reframing in post if you have to. or downscale to to 4k or upscale 8k perhaps. Is this a half camera thats  meant to do every thing ? i actually haven't really followed the 6k thing at all. Maybe i'm in denial, perhaps i dont want to know. I cant see how i have lost money by getting the p4k i think it does an excellent job for the price i payed. What the 6k would give me i'm just not sure of

Do not overthink about it.

How can you loose financially when the P4K is half the money, and costs so little anyway? And already use it for sometime, which again costs something on the bigger scheme of things.

6K is a special case but we will have 8K cameras on reasonable prices as soon as October (Z cam), so if you want to save money for something, start saving for the next Pocket 8K next year!

Some people will get the P6K, I really doubt it will reach the P4K phenomenon. Not even the 8K - when it comes. 4K will be good for a lot of years, and do not forget that P6K has on average X2.4 more data to handle (if I remember right), so better and bigger and faster - and more expensive - camera media, a very powerful editing suite, and a lot a lot of hard drives.

Also, there is a mismatch with resolutions and codecs on the 6K, do not know why and if and when that will change.

Battery life seems to be even shorter on the 6K, a bit bigger and a bit heavier (700 something to 900 something is a significant increase) camera.

The EF can be perfect for some when thinking S35 all their lives, but this is a X1.6 camera, while the P4K an X1.9, the difference is a lot smaller than a proper X1.4-X1.5 S35 sensor and a X2.0 normal m43 one.

Also, amazing Lucadapter turns it into X1.1 but you can't take it off easily to use EF-S lenses, and I know a lot of people having EF-S from their C100 days, so it is not such a straightforward option as an m43 adapter, which can be anything from X0.64 to X0.75 to vND dumb adapter to a simple X2.0.

What I am saying is that it isn't as simple as "6K is better than 4K, I am getting the 6K", there are a lot of variables to consider. 

Usually a bigger sensor is the best, but the EF mount is kind of limiting in this age, and the P4K's sensor is already a monster in low light, speedboosted you gain another stop, so one of the huge difference of the past isn't a factor anymore.

I am trying to make my case on my mind, I can afford the P6K and I am building a new PC soon, but do I really have to go to 6K? That means I will have to shoot 6K for braw? I will also love to use m43 zooms for run and gun, have you seen how small and light those are?

My biggest issue is the 1080 deliveries and live events I shoot from time to time. This is the most dissapointing factor for me of these cameras. 95% of what I do I deliver in 1080p, even if I take it down to 80% this year, I still need great 1080p cameras. Imagine an 150minutes event that I use 3-4 cameras usually.

[thephoenix 5]

 

[dslnc 22]

3 hours ago, Kisaha said:

 

My biggest issue is the 1080 deliveries and live events I shoot from time to time. This is the most dissapointing factor for me of these cameras. 95% of what I do I deliver in 1080p, even if I take it down to 80% this year, I still need great 1080p cameras. Imagine an 150minutes event that I use 3-4 cameras usually.

With the p4k 1080p in prores is great. Both oversampling and crop

[drm 143]

4 hours ago, Kisaha said:

My biggest issue is the 1080 deliveries and live events I shoot from time to time. This is the most dissapointing factor for me of these cameras. 95% of what I do I deliver in 1080p, even if I take it down to 80% this year, I still need great 1080p cameras. Imagine an 150minutes event that I use 3-4 cameras usually.

Kisaha, I do this all the time. It really isn't that big of a deal. Virtually all of my events are at least 3 cam events. I set the time codes on each camera and syncing later is a breeze. You will invest in more storage and soon not think much about it. I have in excess of 100TB of storage, plus online storage (S3, etc.)

As for which cam for a live event like that, I believe that I would personally bring the P4K - mostly without a speed booster. There are some really good zooms for M4/3, like the Panasonic 35-100 f/2.8 or the Olympus 40-150 f/2.8. That would give you good low light performance in a portable package. Although, in an event like that, I would really lean toward something like an A7iii for the really good low light performance and much superior focusing ability.

But, yes. The editing will take longer with the 6K footage and the storage requirements are at least double. On my machines, I have noticed little difference in playback in Resolve between the P4K and the P6K footage. All of our machines are at least 4Ghz, quad-core processors, with SSDs, so they aren't beasts, but are decent spec'd machines.

[TurboRat 64]

1 hour ago, drm said:

Kisaha, I do this all the time. It really isn't that big of a deal. Virtually all of my events are at least 3 cam events. I set the time codes on each camera and syncing later is a breeze. You will invest in more storage and soon not think much about it. I have in excess of 100TB of storage, plus online storage (S3, etc.)

As for which cam for a live event like that, I believe that I would personally bring the P4K - mostly without a speed booster. There are some really good zooms for M4/3, like the Panasonic 35-100 f/2.8 or the Olympus 40-150 f/2.8. That would give you good low light performance in a portable package. Although, in an event like that, I would really lean toward something like an A7iii for the really good low light performance and much superior focusing ability.

But, yes. The editing with take longer with the 6K footage and the storage requirements are at least double. On my machines, I have noticed no difference in playback in Resolve between the P4K and the P6K footage. All of our machines are at least 4Ghz, quad-core processors, with SSDs, so they aren't beasts, but are decent spec'd machines.

How much do you pay for your online storage? S3 I assume is AWS?

[thebrothersthre3 787]

11 hours ago, leslie said:

 

maybe the sensors are from the same family  ? so to speak  which would make the colour and matching easier.

if they had gone with mft we could throw a speed booster on it quite easily. i have to wonder what kind of beast that would be 😃 Seeing as bm only make cameras you have to think they would make it easy to fit the largest amount of lenses available compliant with the sensor in mind as who knows what the purchaser would want to stick on the front of it. Personally i would have liked for bmd to provide a roadmap before they announced the p4k. Something like we gonna do a 4k first then 6k and perhaps a full frame later.  I might have been still saving my money for a 6k if that had been the case. but i don't resent buying the p4k. you cant just hold your breath  till the next great thing arrives, well i cant anyway lol.

i had a chance to wander into jb hifi a couple of days ago, they have 1 8k tv they can sell you, everything else is 4k. so i kinda dont get the whole 6k thing, tv's will be 4k or 8k from what i can see from the retail shop so what is 6k supposed to do ? Sure it gives you the option of reframing in post if you have to. or downscale to to 4k or upscale 8k perhaps. Is this a half camera thats  meant to do every thing ? i actually haven't really followed the 6k thing at all. Maybe i'm in denial, perhaps i dont want to know. I cant see how i have lost money by getting the p4k i think it does an excellent job for the price i payed. What the 6k would give me i'm just not sure of

6k is closer to 8k, would probably look pretty darn good on an 8k TV.

I am not sure how good 4k would look on an 8k TV. I have a 4k PC monitor but its not large enough to even tell the difference between HD and 4k. 

That said the Pocket 4k is certainly not a waste of money, I mean its only 1k in the first place. You can always sell it and get most of your money back. 

[drm 143]

1 hour ago, TurboRat said:

How much do you pay for your online storage? S3 I assume is AWS?

Amazon is a bit expensive, so we try to minimize what is there and how long it stays. If you use the long term storage on S3, 50TB works out to somewhere around $200 per month, depending upon usage. The deep storage is cheaper, the other options can be way more expensive (5x-6x+). Be careful what you put in regular storage, as the price can add up quickly.

If you can get by with 6TB, Microsoft OneDrive was offering 6TB for $10 /mo, which is a pretty good deal. We use raid 6 network attached storage units with 8TB external drives as backups. We try to buy 2 or 3 drives per project and build it in to the cost of the project. I like using 6 disk network attached storage in a Raid 6 array. This gives 4 drives of usable storage, so using 12TB NAS drives gives you about 48TB of storage. This 48TB of storage costs around $3000. These drives *do* fail, so budget for replacing a drive per year in a big array.

[nathlas 22]

21 hours ago, dslnc said:

Is it just me or would a P6K with Sony E-mount be much more interesting than the current EF version?

In case you are interesed on a gear combination like that I believe that Sony will try a camera like BM's with an E mount of course.

 

That's what I got from one of Sony ceo interviews .

 

[A_Urquhart 153]

On 8/18/2019 at 1:09 PM, drm said:

The sensor in most digital cameras don't capture all of the colors at each pixel (not including Foveon). The cameras use a Bayer pattern, like the attached image, to record the color information. So, a typical 4K image doesn't have the color information for a "real" 4K image. They use a bunch of fancy math to estimate the colors in places where they don't have a reading. It is estimated that you need an image about 1.4 times larger than your final resolution in order to have proper colors. So, with a 6K image, you down sample that to a 4K image and you should get a sharper image and better colors. There are not many TVs on which you can display your 6K images at their normal resolution, but the extra resolution is useful.

But how much does it REALLY matter?

Why is it that the world's best DP's are happy shooting on a camera with a 3.2K image sensor that has to be UP SCALED when recording 4k like is the case with the Alexa Mini, and yet people on forums think a 4K sensor is not good enough?

 

 

[TurboRat 64]

22 hours ago, drm said:

Amazon is a bit expensive, so we try to minimize what is there and how long it stays. If you use the long term storage on S3, 50TB works out to somewhere around $200 per month, depending upon usage. The deep storage is cheaper, the other options can be way more expensive (5x-6x+). Be careful what you put in regular storage, as the price can add up quickly.

If you can get by with 6TB, Microsoft OneDrive was offering 6TB for $10 /mo, which is a pretty good deal. We use raid 6 network attached storage units with 8TB external drives as backups. We try to buy 2 or 3 drives per project and build it in to the cost of the project. I like using 6 disk network attached storage in a Raid 6 array. This gives 4 drives of usable storage, so using 12TB NAS drives gives you about 48TB of storage. This 48TB of storage costs around $3000. These drives *do* fail, so budget for replacing a drive per year in a big array.

Thanks for the info! I tried OneDrive before but the upload speeds were horrible. Been looking at Synology but it's still out of my current budget.

[thebrothersthre3 787]

1 hour ago, A_Urquhart said:

But how much does it REALLY matter?

Why is it that the world's best DP's are happy shooting on a camera with a 3.2K image sensor that has to be UP SCALED when recording 4k like is the case with the Alexa Mini, and yet people on forums think a 4K sensor is not good enough?

 

 

Cinema projectors are only 2k so it doesn't matter if you are making hollywood films. If gigantic 8k or 16k digital screens become the norm for home viewing that really changes things. 

[drm 143]

2 hours ago, A_Urquhart said:

But how much does it REALLY matter?

Why is it that the world's best DP's are happy shooting on a camera with a 3.2K image sensor that has to be UP SCALED when recording 4k like is the case with the Alexa Mini, and yet people on forums think a 4K sensor is not good enough?

 

 

I agree. It doesn't "REALLY matter". We are to the point where we have plenty of resolution, although better colors and better dynamic range would be nice to have. It is very amusing to me that we are going for crazy high resolutions, then blurring the background via aperture choices, and doing things like adding pro-mist filters to soften the image.

I have a friend that is a well known DP who has put pantyhose and other things over the lenses to soften the look. Super high resolution is a nightmare for some things. There are some things that simply look better if they are soft without all the details (e.g. aging actors & actresses, etc.) Airbrushing a photo is one thing, but airbrushing a video is a whole different planet of costs.

[Turboguard 183]

I'm back with a question about the use of Sony F970 in the new tilta handle. Will these work well with the BMPCC4K?

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1468019-REG/watson_b_4238_np_f970_lithium_ion_battery_pack.html/specs

They're so much cheaper than the original Sony's but I like Watson and own a lot of their batteries.

[drm 143]

2 hours ago, Turboguard said:

I'm back with a question about the use of Sony F970 in the new tilta handle. Will these work well with the BMPCC4K?

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1468019-REG/watson_b_4238_np_f970_lithium_ion_battery_pack.html/specs

They're so much cheaper than the original Sony's but I like Watson and own a lot of their batteries.

I use the Powerextra brand from Amazon. They are close to the same capacity, but are around $35 for 2. I have over 20 of them and have only had one die in the past year or so. I use them in lights, monitors, and on the P4Ks (and now the P6K).

[Turboguard 183]

16 hours ago, drm said:

I use the Powerextra brand from Amazon. They are close to the same capacity, but are around $35 for 2. I have over 20 of them and have only had one die in the past year or so. I use them in lights, monitors, and on the P4Ks (and now the P6K).

Yeah I remember you saying that, and forgot to thank you for your tips!

 

Does anyone here use the metabones support for the tilta camera? I see two different options on the website and one does say "PL type", which is not what I use but Nikon mount. So should I assume the other tiltaing support bracket is the correct? I have a Speedbooster ultra.

https://tilta.com/shop/lens-adapter-support-bracket/

[JordanWright 241]

1 hour ago, Turboguard said:

Yeah I remember you saying that, and forgot to thank you for your tips!

 

Does anyone here use the metabones support for the tilta camera? I see two different options on the website and one does say "PL type", which is not what I use but Nikon mount. So should I assume the other tiltaing support bracket is the correct? I have a Speedbooster ultra.

https://tilta.com/shop/lens-adapter-support-bracket/

That one looks like the one I use for my Canon .64

[Yannick Willox 15]

OK, so I finally have the Pocket 4K !

I also have a Zoom F8, which outputs timecode on a BNC. I have some cable/converters into 3.5 mm stereo jack, but I cannot get my p4k to sync up. 

Does anyone know if a direct connection is possible ? It would be great to record "playback" video shots on pr-edited audio tracks. I want to start playback of the audio clips on my Zoom, which would output the correct timecode, and all my shots would be in sync.

[Novim 61]

MOZA AirCross 2 (1Kg weight, 3.2Kg payload, the battery up to 12 hours, follow focus, two versions: Standard version with $429, and Professional kit with $499 which has three more items than standard version: Arca-Swiss Quick release Plate, Phone Holder, and iFocus-M, etc), and at 50" it seems BMPCC 4K is supported: