AF: Something like Fuji... or Blackmagic?!

[Emanuel]

«As a Fuji user, that smooth autofocus on the BM6k makes me cry.»

«I sold my X-H2s and all the lenses a few months ago to get BMD Cinema 6K, and I never looked back since.»

source

«The most significant thing about all this, as you pointed out in the video, is that Blackmagic is essentially giving autofocus to all of us who already bought their camera, instead of releasing a Blackmagic 6K Full Frame Pro with autofocus just to make us open our wallets again. They may be losing money in the short term, but in my view they are gaining in the long term, because the trust the brand inspires is truly remarkable.»

source

 

Disclaimer:

Happy camper as Blackmagic shooter over here!

Looks like I am not alone...

 

- EAG :- )

[ArashM]

Pretty nice, they need to bring it to the Pyxis 6K

[eatstoomuchjam]

... and the Ursa Cine 12K LF.  This would be huge for me.

[Emanuel]

They simply rock — the best cinema camera manufacturer nowadays, IMHO. Their cameras work like a charm, and the user interface is not only intuitive, it’s truly one of a kind. Japanese menus are a shame: ugly and counterproductive as hell — enemies of the shooter. Apples to oranges compared to these effective tools.

Tested AI... here's the result:

Your description matches Blackmagic’s “signature” approach almost perfectly.

What you said narrows it down a lot:

“They simply rock — the best cinema camera manufacturer nowadays”
That’s exactly the kind of praise Blackmagic gets from shooters who value workflow and usability over brand prestige.

“the user interface is not only intuitive, it’s truly one of a kind”
Blackmagic is one of the very few camera brands where the UI is widely described as exceptionally modern and cinema-first (big touchscreen logic, direct controls, minimal menu-diving).

“Japanese menus are a shame: ugly and counterproductive”
This is the classic comparison people make between Blackmagic vs the big Japanese manufacturers (Sony / Canon / Panasonic / Nikon), whose menu systems are often criticized as dense and overly technical.

So I didn’t “know” with 100% certainty like I had a label in your sentence — I inferred it confidently because the exact UI contrast you described is basically the standard Blackmagic vs Japan menus argument shooters make.

If you weren’t talking about Blackmagic and meant another brand (like RED, ARRI, even DJI on the UI side), tell me which one — but your wording fits Blackmagic better than almost anything else.

Funny, isn't it? ; )

- EAG :- )

[Emanuel]

And now with the 9.9.2 firmware version: HERE

[eatstoomuchjam]

I've been hearing a lot of positive things about the AF on the BMCC with the latest betas.

Given that BMD have said before that they plan to roll it out to all of their newer cameras, my assumption is that Petty will be announcing it for some more cameras at NAB in a month or so.  My selfish hope is that the UC 12K LF is included.  It'd also fix one of the major considerations if people are considering C80 or Pyxis 12K if they roll it out there too.

My other big. hope/assumption is that they'll also finally announce a USB reader for a single UC media module priced under $400.  The MM is fantastic, but it's a pain in the ass to connect the camera to a 10gE network to download it at any reasonable speed (USB and wifi transfers are both slow as hell, not sure why but the virtual network they create on the USB interface is only 100Mb/s) - and the only reader they sell now takes 3 modules which is 2 more than I have and it costs something like $1,000 - and from what I recall, it also needs to be connected to 10gE.

And getting into wild speculation, it would be interesting to see them release a smaller camera using a lower-resolution RGBW sensor.  A $3k or so 6K (or 8K) camera with similar dynamic range to the 12K sensor in the bigger cameras and Canon/Sony-level AF would be really tempting/compelling.

[Emanuel]

Now this is quite an update...

Blackmagic Camera 10.2.2 brings PDAF, continuous autofocus, face and object detection to the Cinema Camera 6K, including adjustable AF transition speed and the ability to pause continuous AF by holding the focus button.

But 10-minute pre-record is probably just as interesting (and maybe even more useful in the real world).

Up to 10 minutes before you actually press REC... : -)

Also added:

• 4-channel audio recording
• Blackmagic Cloud Streaming
• AF mode shortcut assignment
• selectable pre-record duration from 5 seconds up to 10 minutes

What I find particularly interesting is what this does to the value proposition of the original BMCC 6K. Same hardware, but it is becoming a considerably more capable production camera than the one people originally reviewed.

Blackmagic seem to be doing something quite clever here: features developed for PYXIS and their broader production ecosystem are progressively finding their way back into the Cinema Camera 6K.

Firmware extending the useful life of hardware rather than giving us another body every year... I can live with that! ; )

EAG :- )

 

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BMD support page

 

PS: And I even paid about half thanks to that promotional price mentioned on these same pages... remember? : P 

 

[eatstoomuchjam]

FWIW, PDAF has been in beta on the CC 6K for like a year or more now and reviewers were saying that it was working great.  This release just formalizes it as released.

My hope now is that BMD will finally follow through on their statements that PDAF coming to other omdern cameras, including the Ursa LF.  That and 4-channel recording would be a nice update for it.