2K BlackMagic Pocket Cinema Camera, active m43, $995

lmackreath

@feonn I would agree....not good at all! What are the chances that the handful of Pockets that have been released to reviewers could have this issue? This to me I doubt is a one off case...and the worry is now we are going to have shipments of these cameras all being made with the same noise issue out of the box!

lmackreath

The cheesycam footage is the closest I have seen to some well shot and stable footage out of the camera so far.

However...I still feel very underwhelmed by the quality of the picture. Maybe this is down to the lenses chosen, but if you are paying around £1000 for glass like the Lumix 35-100 you would expect good results?

It seems the "Aukland in my pocket" gave us the highest quality footage I have seen out of this cam so far..now was that more down to the quality of the Canon glass used rather than the cam itself?

feonn

@ahbleza It seems Bloom's camera has a bit of the strange sound noise.

jleo

From the folks at Cheesycam, BMPCC. Lumix MFT lenses, and Rokinon 8mm, Atomos Ninja: original MOV file

http://cheesycam.com/blackmagic-pocket-cinema-camera-rode-videomic-pro-captured-on-atomos-ninja-2/

Flaaandeeers

Some footage from Cheesyguy (recorded into Atomos Ninja and not SD card):

ahbleza

Looks like Philip Bloom just got his BMPCC, and he has posted footage.

http://philipbloom.net/2013/08/19/coming-soon/

Here's the link to his footage:

https://philipbloom.wetransfer.com/downloads/ebff4627e2ad5492d32379162d9890f420130819204706/edcc1d13feb4373dc06f6f9bca2959f420130819204706/a878af

For users of this forum, I am currently uploading it to Vimeo. It looks good on a 27" display.

lmackreath

And the footage keeps rolling in!

I assume this guy was either using the 14-42 that doesnt have the IS swtich on ....or it did and he failed to use it :p

jakepowell

@vicharris if only, its an advert for the chair ;) (sorry off topic)

vicharris

Get a different chair or make the DB actor stand!!!! :)

jakepowell

@peaceonearth ahah been there ... try shooting a tweed like grey fabric upholstered chair ... @vicharris i think you may be right. but until someone does one or we do we just wont know... i think prores is the only thing available at this time?

vicharris

I still think most of it is crop factor stuff guys. Let's see a BMPCC at let's say 12mm then compare that with what, 16mm on the BMCC? I have not seen one test like this. Also all we see is tests on prores.

peaceonearth

@jakepowell it was no review of your work but of the limitations of the BMCC.

peaceonearth

@vicharris ;-)

true - but I have painful memories to testimonials shot with a 5DM2 with acting people wearing suits and I don't want to go back there. PersonalIy I accept your point of view for RS issue but not for color moiré in grey fabric I see upcoming.

jakepowell

@peaceonearth its prores file not raw i should imagine raw is better. but yes i agree it has been pushed far and yes it does show moire in the waves , also check the palm trees in the bmcc shot for more funky stuff. i'll try harder. im not the most experienced in this by any means. and despite my engagement in this i agree with @vicharris either of these and gh2/2/3 or whatever are fine tools to get the proper thing done which is to get out there and tell stories visually (however seeing as this is a bmpcc thread i would say that argument it reserved for another place)

vicharris

I'm going to go ahead and say it now, if your viewers are looking at all these faults we keep pointing out, you're not doing your job as a visual story teller. Period. I for one am done nit picking footage. :)

peaceonearth

@jakepowell

with due respect to your grading work for me it is a good sample for limitations how far you can push the BMD RAW files. In theory quite a lot and for some shots it may work - but in the BMCC landscape shot you see the color moire issue clearly even in the small waves of the sea area. As you push colors to more saturation and added contrast color moiré is pushed too :-/

lmackreath

@nomad Thanks for all your work with the BMPCC and colour charts etc. I was wondering if you have time if you could shoot some more basic footage with the Pocket to let us some see some more real work comparisons between the quality of the pocket and BMCC?

nomad

I can confirm most of this from my tests too. The Pocket is surprisingly close in quality. Given it's size and weight, I can imagine that the decision is guided more by the intention of rigging it up (which defeats this advantage) vs. shooting unobtrusive or even clandestine.

The latter will need small lenses for sure, I'm gonna append to my lens C-mount tests over the next few days, today it's the wide end.

BTW, I couldn't find massive advantages in grading of the whole frame between shooting RAW or ProRes on the BMCC with my color chart tests. Of course there will be advantages with chroma keying or color based qualifiers in post.

jakepowell

ok just my two cents. the pocket cam is softer than the bmcc , not by much but it is noticeable. the grain and texture of it (noise if you want to call it that but im not really speaking of it in a negative way) is a touch finer on the bmcc i think, i prefer its texture. the colours are similar but not identical from what i can tell bmcc seems to have a touch more greens or yellows , pocket a touch more magenta or purple even. nothing to stress over either way as grading is a dream even for someone not so experienced in that like me but i have a slight preference for the bmcc's way of doing it. dr seems identical. the bmcc seems more moire prone actually but i have a hunch that may be aided by the crop factor but still interesting.... chroma noise on the building is visible on both but less so on bmpcc as @vicharris said i think this may be aided by the crop factor also . nonetheless bmcc seems a touch crisper and cleaner and finer in character and requires less sharpening in post. conclusion... pretty impressed its close and down to personal taste mostly . we will see how 1080p native sensor stacks up against 2.5k versions well regarded raw i think the differences may be more pronounced there but i could be wrong... if anyone has a bunch of s16 lenses from days gone by this camera is a no brainer as far as i see....

here is my attempt at getting both to match , graded in davinci resolve , the pocket was given more sharpening. other that that just contrast adjustments and playing with levels a bit to come up with a matching image in each . apologies if you hate the skin tones im going to do another focusing just on them next because i'm not happy with them really. please note for highest quality download original.

lmackreath

@Wilbo Yeah I didnt really say anything bad about the videos as any footage out there is useful for us to see..but yes it wasn't shot in the best conditions and handled or graded imho.

Wilbo

Good find @lmackreath

Wow, both played really choppy for me too. Something wrong with the upload maybe?

Assuming the first video actually played back smoothly before the user exported a compressed version for Vimeo, it doesn't look too bad. I would have graded it little more though, but it's a good look at dynamic range.

The second video looks pretty ruined by Twixter used on 24p (or 30p) footage. I think even without the Twixtor, it looks pretty bad and video-like, and not even good video either (of course the terrible lighting or no lighting contributes to the look too).

-w