Saturday, 13 April 2013

Keeping up with the Joneses

I'm not one for product blogs, but sometimes amazing things need attention lavished upon them; and Blackmagic's Pocket Cinema Camera is one of those amazing things.

A 1080P HD cinema camera (it captures RAW Wide Dynamic range) with the form factor of a crappy pocket camera. Hang it off the back of a micro 4/3rd lens and throw it on some rigging and you've got a pretty amazing piece of kit.

Blackmagic has already introduced some stiff competition for the 5K Red Epic, with their 2.5K Cinema Camera and new 4K Production Camera, both resembling medium format digital backs. They're dirt cheap too, especially given the other uber-professional competition is keeping prices for 4K/5K gear closer to the £100,000 price point (to clarify, Red and Blackmagic are uber-professional, it's their price points that put them in competition with consumer and prosumer tat).

So, I can pick up a professional grade HD camera, couple it with a LANC remote, pop it on a Freefly MOVI gimbal and hang it off the bottom of a R/C quadcopter or clamp it to the roof of a car without without stretching the credit card (edit: to clarify, I don't have such a credit card with a $20,000 limit, I should probably remove the MOVI from the list, given the full price of it is $14,500, not the $2,500 deposit I believed at first it cost)? That's pretty awesome (edit: it's still pretty awesome).

I'm foreseeing lost sleep on the horizon.

Just as well I have a 4K Red One. That's helps me sleep at night.