Here are my random thoughts on the dp6 as we shoot with it. I'm going to update this post "blog style" over the next few days if anyone is curious what I think. (We have long shooting days, so I don't have much time at night to write.)
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*Back story*

I've been pestering SmallHD about when the DP6 will come out, as I have a couple intensive projects I'm working on that could really benefit from a camera mounted monitor. They finally agreed to ship my unit early if I gave some feedback on the beta firmware.

At some point I plan to write a thorough review with photos, but for now this is just an overview of my initial reactions. For those who haven't read my rambles before, I did post production for 15 years before moving to New Zealand to start a simpler life. I don't know if i succeeded at "simple", but I've been building up an indy production truck with an arsenal of light, grip, dolly, crane, jib, sound and camera gear - basically a one-truck-stop for doing low budget films. Because NZ is so small, I get a chance to work with some seriously amazing directors and DPs who all do indy projects between the big ones.

I've started work on a feature film with Adam Clark (DP on "Boy", "Eagle vs Shark"). He normally shoots on film, but the director (and budget) convinced him to give shooting on digital slr's a try. While the technique of lighting, exposure and framing isn't very different from what he normally does, he found the shooting position for SLRs very uncomfortable. He's used to being up and over the camera more than behind and below. After an early test shoot, he began asking me for a better monitoring solution to help with both position as well as focus. My DP1x was tied up, so that brings us to the dp6 / dpslr.

I've been a pretty big fan of the dp1. It has its flaws, but it does its job nicely as a tool, and has been a valuable addition to the kit. After shooting with the dp6 for a few days, I'm more than impressed. The size, the build, the functions of the dp6 have changed how we rig and how we shoot... for the better. I can't make a full assessment until the firmware is finalized, but there is a lot to love here.


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*The size.*

5.6" has turned out to be a really nice "sweet spot". Its large enough that you can achieve critical focus without cramming your face into the camera, but its large enough for an over the shoulder director to see whats up. If you've ever played back footage on a dslr, the natural distance from the monitor seems to be around a foot from the screen. With a 5.6" monitor, the distance increases to around 18 inches/ 2 feet. The change is profound. When playing back a take, the dp and director can be shoulder to shoulder and easily view the scene in detail, while this leaves enough of a gap for the actors/crew to have a bit of a peek too.
Probably more importantly, 5.6" is a fantastic size for mounting on a rig. Its big enough to see, but not so big to block your view. Big ups on size.
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*The Build*

The dp6 is milled out of a solid block of Aluminum. All the inputs connectors are protected from impact/damage by the nature of them being recessed into the unit. This is a combination of very practical and extremely tidy. The unit has a very low profile visually, and looks like it belongs on a serious rig.

This is totally irrelevant from a filmmaker's perspective, but if you've ever owned a piece of precision machining, there is something mesmerizing about it. Gun owners probably can identify with this the most readily, since whether you admit it or not, you've run your fingers down the line on the barrel and had a "ohhh yeah" sensation. I've had it with guns, laptops, the original gameboy... and now a monitor. But it isn't just me. On the set last night, one of the actors asked if he could touch the dp6. I was a bit taken aback, but I was like "go for it". Because of the location of the scroll wheel, there is a natural "shooting position" for the monitor where you can hold it and work the wheel at the same time. Even though the camera was mounted on a tripod, he assumed the position, spun the wheel a few times, brushed his finger across the edge and said "nice!". The makeup artist saw and said "i want to too!" and before long, most of the crew had taken a grope. I don't think "it feels nice in your hand" or "it looks damned sexy" have much of a place on a set (unless you are filming porn?) but the dp6 just looks and feels... "right".

Where the build *does* matter, is in things like the monitor threads and the battery mounts. And they are milled... I want to say "like a gun", although I'll probably change that later. The back of the unit has a gentle "rounded slope" on the edges. The battery mounts, made of plastic, fit perfectly to that contour. I mean, like "lego perfect". When you use the thumb screws to attach the battery mount, it just looks like its milled right to the monitor.

The thread holes are all finished out (i think the word is "chamfered"?) so that its very easy to start screws into them.

If i haven't gushed enough about the build quality, let me know and I'll gush some more.

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*Design*

In some ways this is closely tied in to the build. You know when editing how a rough cut feels really polished compared to the assembly cut, but then the fine cut makes you wonder how you ever felt the rough cut was watchable? The dp6 is a very polished edit.

My biggest concerns for a monitor are the image, the size/profile, ease of rigging, ease of powering and ease of operation, probably in that order. I realize that "profile" is in a funny position here, but a monitor with a giant flange or a bunch of clutter and controls around around the front can be quite distracting when shooting. The monitor is important, but you need to be able to see your surroundings as well to anticipate and react to changes. I put the interface as last because its almost always a "set and forget" thing. I wasn't thrilled about the buttons on the back of the dp1, but was happy they didn't take up space in the front.

The dp6 has a clickable finger wheel with two other buttons in the top right corner. This means you can easily control all the menu options with one hand. You can even reach up and adjust anything while hand holding the camera. While this is neat, I couldn't see my stance on controls changing... until I started playing with some of the extra monitor features. I don't know yet what features will be included in the final firmware, but I could see switching things like peaking on and off. I'll wait to comment on those until they are "finished", but I'm giving a big thumbs up to the control wheel. It keeps the flange thin, keeps clutter off the front, but also makes the menu system friendly and fast. A ton of thought went into this one feature, and I think it shows.

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*Image*

I've got to run get ready for today's shoot. I'll post again as soon as I can.

If you have any questions, ask and I'll try to address them. I started with my post positive reactions, but I'm fairly objective, so ask away and I'll give a candid response.

Cheers,
-a
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Rain delayed more update. see post below. cheers!

Trying to keep the "rig" as simple and efficient as possible for commercial productions has brought my attention to the smallHD dp6.

How are you powering the camera, monitor, etc. in the field?

Are you feeding the monitor HDMI or SDI?

Do you feed other (video assist) monitors as well during production?

Thanks for the post Andrew. Great detail of information in the field.

Heya Bob,

I've really only had the dp6 for this one shoot so far. We are on a 7d, so the monitor is fed via hdmi and the camera uses its stock batteries. I used the smallHD battery that clips onto the back of the monitor. With the battery mounted I was able to hot shoe mount the monitor very securely. Used it in that configuration for the handheld and tripod work.

The DP6 has a d-tap cable available. On a bigger rig with dtap batteries, i'd probably go with that option for simplicity. Since I'm a freelance "grip solution", then I have to have every option possible open. I also picked up the canon battery mount, which allows you to run the dp6 off one or two e6 canon batteries. I only plan to use that if the dp6 batteries run out. On the shoot sunday I got a little over 6 hours out of the dp battery, which blew me away. Part of that is that the dp6 has an on/off switch, so i flicked it off during longer breaks. I'd estimate I got around 4.5 hours of actual run time. .

Whether or not to feed another monitor depends on the director, of course. On this shoot the director is happy to stand near enough to the camera to see, or jump in for playback. I have a battery powered HDMI splitter ready to go in case we need a video village, but it hasn't been called yet. SmallHD talked about a passive hdmi splitter that was small enough to mount on the camera. That would make a killer assist, feeding the full camera output to both an on board monitor and a remote one, but they didn't have one ready when they shipped my order.


Hopefully that helps. I was planning to take lots of photos yesterday but it rained all day and we were mostly shooting exteriors, so I opted to leave the dp6 in the truck. I don't know how weather resistant the dp6 is, but I'd guess not enough to withstand the heavy side spray that we have under our umbrellas. The project didn't pay enough for me to test that particular limit. hehe.

cheers!

Thanks for all the detailed information Andrew. I'm off for a shoot on the West Coast and hope to hear more when I return about your production and the Dp6.

Best,

BTW, it sounds like you went from the soup into the fire moving from Post production into field production.

VERY interested :). Please keep us updated!

Great thread! Thanks a bunch for the info Andrew.

I'm a big fan of SmallHD and really like my DP1. I agree with you on the build quality - my DP1 has taken two sphincter clenching falls to the floor and just keeps on working. The things are built like tanks.

Look forward to hearing more.

Hmm. I had assumed I could keep editing the first post and slowly add to the review in one place. I guess the ability to edit expires after a day or so. Bummer.

Anyways, on with the review...

*focus!*

The big question on my mind about this size monitor was "how is it for focus?". People have lots of different opinions about what is too big, too small, and what they consider "critical" features in a monitor. Since i use the monitor both for myself and as a tool for a variety of DPs/cameramen, my biggest priorities lean towards framing and focus. Color and exposure are important, but these are things you set once before a scene. During a shot, its all framing and focus, and those need to be damned good to be useful.

The dp6 has 1,024,000 pixels. In comparison, the standard "high def monitor" at 800x480 is 384,000 (or the intentionally misleading 2400x480 where red green and blue pixels are listed separately). The 7d screen is 640x480, which is 307,200 (but sadly canon advertising sometimes uses the rgb deception and lists the screen as 902k. Using the same "trick", the resolution of the dp6 would be 3,072,00 pixels.)

Resolution isn't everything, but its a whole lot. I know that some people swear by lower res screens with peaking on, but when looking at a really high rez monitor, you can just *see* what is in focus the same way you'd look at a photograph and judge what is and isnt sharp. With the dp6, the "looking at a photograph" thing is appropriate, since the screen is around 320 pixels per inch. I have a few anecdotes of setting up my dp1 as a director's monitor and the dp migrating over to using it as their primary screen. I also have a few stories of cameramen with various monitors wanting to engage in a "pissing match" by side by side comparing their kit and mine. When it comes to clarity and focus, the dp1 has trounced every other monitor i've put it against... except for the dp6.

When Adam first asked me for a monitor, he was squinting into the back of the 7d. As soon as I hooked up the dp6, his first reaction was a surprised "oh! Now I can see what is in focus!". After using it all day for a second day I asked him if he had a quote for my review. He thought for a second and said "Its infinitely better than the <colorful adjective> screen on the 7d". He then laughed and said "ok... a real quote..." He thought for a second and said something to the effect of "Yesterday on the dolly [without the dp6] we had to pull focus by the marks. Today we were able to pull focus from the monitor. I'd prefer to have a professional focus puller who can work the lens by feel without a monitor or marks, but if we don't have one of them around, the dp6 makes pulling focus by sight possible."

Using different monitors to focus, i've always referred to the "fishing distance". With basically any monitor you can crank the lens in each direction and see when something goes way out of focus. If you split the difference, the subject is basically in focus. The clearer the screen, the less fishing distance you have. Its pretty clear when watching a lot of 35 adapter/dslr footage who has a low rez screen, as you see the subject go out of focus in both directions before landing. With the dp6, I often am looking at what is *in* focus, rather than using what is out of focus as an indicator. The fishing distance on the dp6 in my experience all falls within the "in focus" on a lower rez monitor. Where on the 7d screen I can fish until "the face is in focus", on the dp6 i can see when "the face" is in focus without any fishing. Any fishing i'd do then would be focusing details (eyes vs glasses, etc) that all fell within the "in focus" range of the 7d screen.

I realize that my "review" doesn't follow normal review guidelines/direct comparisons. I don't review stuff for a living and I'm just trying to share my opinions in a manner that I would find interesting/useful when searching for feedback on a product I cant actually go and touch pre-sale.

When I first bought my dp1 I compared it to marshall, ikan and sony offerings at the time... even the red monitor. Out of all the DPs, camera ops and techs that I was on set with not one ever preferred their own monitor over the dp1. In fact, many went on to buy dp1s (kirk pflaum only 3 days after seeing mine. heh). I know that in the last year or two that everybody has released new monitors with new sizes and new features. Unfortunately I don't know of anyone that has bought one of the new monitors and there are no shops on this island that would stock the screens for a comparison. I offer my personal experiences as what they are. If somebody wants to send me their monitor for a side by side, I'll be happy to be objective and to put the comparison under the noses of a variety of DPs as possible. I was so happy with the dp1 that when the dp6 was announced there was no shopping around for me.

NZ is tiny. The whole country has the population of Dallas. And 3/4 of those people live on the north island. The south island is something like the size of california and has around a million people in total. Christchurch is the "big city" and clocks in somewhere around 370,000 people. As a result, its rare to meet people that truly "Specialize". We often have to be somewhat versatile and flexible, at least here on the indy side. Its rare to meet a dp that doesn't also edit, or a lighting assist that doesn't also something like graphics. On this shoot with Adam, our sound guy, Hadlee, is also a freelance turnkey producer. While he is targeting audio as his main gig, he does shooting as well. When I first pulled out my monitor case he asked what i was doing and I mentioned i was going to rig up my "smallHD". He was like "oh right". Then i pulled out the dp6 and he started saying "No! No! Is that the dpslr??? NO!". It turns out that he owns a dp1x (I didn't know) and he has been building up a shoulder mount rig. The dp1 is just too big for it and he had been eyeing up the dp6 as a better replacement. However, it seemed that he wanted to justify what he already had. At first he was like "the smaller screen is really too small for focus" and "the bigger image area of the dp1x is an advantage" (i'm paraphrasing). After half a night of shooting, he walked over to the dp6, shook his head as if in defeat and said "I'm going to have to get one.". Then yesterday when helping me pack up he said "I MUST have this." hehe.

Those are the only quotes and anecdotes I have about the dp6 and focus. For my own opinion? The dp6 is worth every penny just to focus. The screen is very clear and contrasty and the pixels are so dense that you would struggle to see them if you tried. You can see what is in focus simply by looking at the image and seeing what is in focus. People that have used a dp1 know what I'm talking about. People that downplay resolution I have to question whether they've actually had face time with a smallhd. In my experience with a myriad of different video/film professionals - many who have money invested into other brands - have all conceded that the dp1 is so clear you can focus without any assistance. In my opinion the dp6 leaves the dp1 behind. Its brighter, clearer, with darker blacks. The only reason I see to ever buy a dp1 would be for a video village with people sitting even farther back... and at that point I'm not sure you'd even need HD. Hmm. I tentatively take that back...I'll have to test out the dp1 and dp6 on the advantajib. The extra size there might be valuable.

Regarding sharpness...

SmallHD started from the ground up with the dp6, so even though there are functions that are the same name, they act differently. The "sharpness" function jumps to mind.

Most of the people around here shooting dslr are turning down the sharpness all the way, the contrast down a few notches and saturation down one. That combo seems to look the most natural/filmic. When monitoring an unsharpened image, you lose some of the visual cues that tell you what is in and out of focus. Thats where "sharpening" comes into play in a monitor. Its a close cousin to "peaking" and "edge detection". In fact, the dp6's sharpening seems to behave much closer to peaking than a traditional sharpen. Where in-monitor peaking often adjusts the whole image's brightness, the sharpness usually leaves the image alone but changes the contrast around abrupt changes in color/luma (as would happen if something detailed were in focus.) With the dp6, if you crank up the sharpening, it does make it even easier to focus. I can't remember where it is dialed to, but mine is up a modest amount on mine. The down side is that an in-monitor sharpening will have an effect on non-detailed areas too as it tries to fish out contrast. The result is a subtle (or not so subtle, if you crank it all the way up) "plastic" look to gradated areas... like skin tones.

This brings me to an interesting (at least to me) head about what a monitor *should* do. There are people that expect a monitor to be a faithful representation of the image, in color, contrast, sharpness, luminance, exposure, etc. Then there are people who expect a monitor to provide guides and cues for focus, exposure, color, etc. These normally can coexist as explicit features that can be enabled/disabled as needed. The two functions that get cloudy are "contrast" and "sharpness". Its uncommon with experienced DPs, but some less experienced shooters want their field monitor to look like what their home TV will look like after an S curve gamma. Plus, they want the sharpness of the monitor turned up so they can "see the details" even though a true reference monitor would not look that way. Thats not saying this is wrong, but in being given the opportunity to test out beta firmware, it has put me in the shoes of the monitor designer a bit and made me question how *I* would prioritize default settings were it my decision.

Sharpening... At 0, the smallhd looks very true to my eyes. The image looks very natural/true, and while you can easily focus there, it does get easier with sharpening turned up... so i turned mine up. This, in turn adds a subtle change to other parts of the image (for most people they haven't seen it until i turn the sharpening off then on again. "oh... that"). Knowing this is the cause and it isnt on camera, its an artifact I can ignore for the advantage of increased focus clarity. So... what do you make the default? If you turn it off, then the "pixel peepers" (i hate that term. whats a good one? videophiles?) will be happy but shooters might find it "softer" than another monitor with an aggressive sharpening applied. What then if you turn it up. The monitor will be artificially sharp (intentionally), but focus is why most of us buy these things, thats good... but the "videophiles" (i dont like that term either. how about "video techs") might complain about the sharpening applied to the gradations leaving "artifacts" in the gradations.

This brings in what i believe will come to be my favorite feature of the dp6. The custom settings. If at any time (not in a menu already) you spin your finger wheel, you get a list of custom presets. If you scroll down to one of them and click, all the settings of the monitor change to that setting in an instant. This means you could have a "true image" setting and a "extra sharp" setting and a setting with full frame overscan adjusted... but i'm getting ahead of myself there. In a nutshell, the custom settings will allow you to use things like contrast and sharpening as a "toggle feature".

I just got a new firmware emailed from smallhd. This should probably be its own entry, but the dp6 ships with a little usb stick and you can now update firmware just by copying the firmware to the stick, popping it into the usb slot on the dp6 and installing. No more trips back to the factory for software updates. This opens up the possibility of new features being added as they are perfected. It also means that monitors can be shipped with "incomplete" firmware, so you can see it as a plus or minus depending on your personality. I'm going with "plus" because i needed a monitor weeks ago, not months from now.

Holler with any questions... or complaints if i'm going on too many tangents. heh.

cheers!
-a

Love the detailed post Andrew. I go on tangents myself at times so no worries there. Pics would be great though ;)

Pictures to come... I used the soundie's camera to take some shots of the dp6 in action, so i hope to get those off him tomorrow.

When I showed off my dp1, i was impressed that 3 days later someone i showed it to ordered their own. This week broke that record. I met with Sasha, a russian expat who shot government films on 35mm film back in the 70s/80s. He has spent the last 17 years in NZ and is building up gear to do his own film/video projects. I showed him my dp6 earlier this week and he seemed impressed. Today he informed me that his own dp6 had shipped. It turns out he was so impressed with the dp6 he ordered his own 3 HOURS after seeing mine. Hehe.


So i installed the new firmware this morning and a lot of things changed.

One of the things I planned to complain about was a standby button located next to the "back" button on the monitor controls. When I would reach to exit out of a menu i'd put the monitor to sleep. This reminded me of accidently poking the on/off button on the dp1 and I was ready to rail on it pretty heavily. I had already sent some negative feedback to smallhd regarding this "feature".

And... its gone! Now the same button toggles the focus assist on and off, which is great. Yay firmware updates and a company that listens!

To update the firmware, i copied it from an email to the thumb drive included with the dp6. I then powered the dp6 on while holding the scroll wheel down for a few seconds. It started doing something and the phone rang. I grabbed the phone and came back over to the monitor and the firmware was updated, with the dp6 prompting me to reboot. Hard to imagine a simpler process.

So a few things have changed now that the firmware has advanced a bit. There are still some bugs in it, but it is majorly better than the version I came from. I'm digging the firmware thing.

The "plastic" look I was describing is gone. I think somehow I had peaking enabled (the old menu was still in-progress). When i enable peaking I can recreate what I saw before, but its only there when peaking is on.

I had assumed that peaking and "focus assist" were the same, but they are not. Peaking leaves your colors mostly the same and just does edge enhancements to make focusing easier. Focus assist kinda does the same thing but it also darkens the whole monitor and only the "in focus" stuff jumps out. I'll have to spend time with both features, but my initial reaction is that I prefer the peaking. On the other hand, the standby button now toggles the focus assist on and off, which is very fast and easy, so i could see popping it on when a specific need arises... possibly even during a shot. Very interesting...

I gotta get to set, so i'll cut my ramble short. The new firmware has made me rethink the monitor a bit, but so far all for the better. I'm gripping a music video tonight, so there'll be some new faces to respond to the dp6. So far all the responses have been overwhelmingly positive.

Cheers!

Got an email from smallHD about the latest firmware. The button that does the "focus assist on/off" is actually a user definable shortcut! If you hold it down for 3 seconds, it brings up a list of functions that it can perform. Choose one and that button becomes an instant shortcut for that function.

Its been a crazy week, and next week looks even crazier. Sorry about the lack of photos.

•screen protector•

On digital still cameras I usually put one of those sticky screen protectors on the screen. It messes up the picture a little, but saves from annoying scratches. With still cams, the camera is generally doing the focusing though. For shooting video, its been a conundrum. I put a screen condom on my 7d when i first got it out of "still camera habit", but when I won the 550d/T2i I just left it bare. Fortunately, I haven't had any big gashes yet.

The dp6 comes with an optional acrylic screen protector. At first I thought this was just a fancy screen condom (they sell those too), but its actually a kind of screen armor. There is a sheet of maybe 1/8" thick acrylic with a flange around it. The whole assembly snaps on very snugly to indents milled into the monitor case. Once snapped on, It'll take a bit of effort to get it back off. Since the rest of the case is basically bombproof, this adds a significant amount of protection for the screen (the weak link). Now... My dp1 has no scratches on its screen, nor has it been broken, but my mate Kirk had his dp1 in a gear bag as he travelled through africa and something pressed against the screen while it took a hit and the screen cracked. I personally would never put a monitor in a gear bag like that, but I'd feel pretty confident that it could survive with this screen protector in place. I put it on immediately when I received the monitor (so i wouldn't have smudges on the screen itself) and to be honest don't remember it having any effect on the image quality at all. It does make the screen a bit more reflective though. I don't plan to remove mine at any point. It just seems a good idea to provide impact protection for the lcd. If the protector gets gouged, you can pop on a replacement in seconds. Thumbs up for this design.


*backlight / blacks*

The only monitor i've done a side by side with the dp6 is the dp1x... and I suppose the built in screen of the 7d/550d/ex3. Compared to the dp1, the dp6 is significantly brighter, but somehow the blacks are darker too. I don't want to talk out of my posterior, so I want to do more careful side by side comparisons, but my first reaction is that the blacks on the dp6 look closer to those on a macbook than on most field monitors. That might be an overstatement, but that was my initial reaction.

•sun shade•

the dp6 sun shade is the same as the one for the dp1. Its 4 posts that snap into the corners of the monitor and hold open a neoprene "tunnel" to look through. Its quite clever, really, and folds up nicely into a small space that weighs almost nothing. The biggest differences on the dp6 is that the holes in the corner of the monitor are a little bit bigger and thus easier to install/remove the shade, and thanks to the acrylic protector I'm not as afraid of accidently snapping one of the bars into the screen and causing a mark. It works pretty well as a sun shade... but in heavy sun the reflection of your face can be an issue.

*image*

The color, contrast and image of the monitor are still being tweaked for the final release, so its kinda pointless for me to comment on them. Even with the early firmware, the image looks quite good. I'm hoping they can pull off "stunning". Its certainly there with clarity and focus, but color and contrast can be a monitor's downfall. I look forward to how it plays out.

•false color•

I heard some rumors and saw some tweets about the dp6 having false color. I'm not under any kind of NDA, other than that of courtesy given they trusted me with an advance unit. My early firmware had a flavor of false color, but it wasn't ready for the field so it was removed from this latest firmware. I don't know anything about what is involved with programming something like this, but Dale did mention to me that he really wanted false color to be a feature if at all possible. If you don't know anything about SmallHD, its video geeks that wished for a better monitoring solution, then decided to try and build it themselves. This means that there is a lot more personal pride invested in their company than in many, and that they are driven to make "the ultimate monitor" partly because they want to *have* the perfect monitor. This explains the obsession with build quality and industrial design. The addition of the USB port was so they could keep trying to tweak and improve their existing monitors without the cost of having people send them back to the factory. Its entirely possible that the CPU that drives the dp6 cannot pull off a good false color. Its also possible that it can. The beta was fairly close, but had some bugs. Dale won't say anything about it because if he implies it will happen but then it can't, he's vilified. I feel pretty confident in saying that because Dale himself wants it, he will not give up until it is proven impossible. (Thats not to say it *is* possible, mind you)

•batteries•

I personally dig the smallhd batteries. They had some duds early on, but they made good rushing replacements to anyone with a problem. This new batch is a distinct improvement over the old ones. They have a new paint job, which is more matte and looks very nice. They have a normal looking charging port instead of that funky high voltage mini-usb. And they have an on/off switch on the battery, which should come as a relief to anyone who ever ran down the old ones by leaving them plugged in. (i've done it a few times.) The batteries on the dp1 snapped into two clips. On the dp6 it slides into a fitted "slot". As I mentioned above, I got probably 4.5 hours use out of a battery over 6 hours turning the monitor off during longer breaks. There is a d-tap and a canon e6 battery mount available for the dp6 as well, so a lot of the complaints about a lack of battery options are reduced. I personally will use the smallhd batteries except when shooting long all day concerts on the jib, then i just wire in a tekkeon.

For $80 including a charger, you are hard pressed to find a cheaper solution. The battery charger looks like a laptop power supply, but the LED on it indicates the charge status of the battery it is charging. The batteries are lithium ion and charge faster than they discharge so if you have one on a charger, you'll never run out.

My gripe with the batteries is that the smallHD neoprene? case is not designed for the battery mount to go inside. You can squeeze it in there (I do) but its a bit of a stretch. (the sleeve is out of something like wetsuit fabric, so its spongey and stretchy) If you buy the smallhd batteries and mounting bracket, you aren't likely to be taking them off the monitor much, so its kinda an annoyance to have to cram the monitor with the battery plate/battery into a case not designed for it. That might be a bit nitpicky, but it is one of the few things that i've found disappointing, so it seemed worth mentioning. Just be aware if you buy the battery and plan to leave it mounted, the sleeve will look lumpy.

I'm kinda tired, so i'll leave it there for now. If you have any questions, holler. If you are gonna be around christchurch and want to check it out, or do a monitor comparison, drop me a line.

cheers!

Heya.

A 7.1 earthquake hit near our house. I spent most of the day cleaning up the stuff in our house that was destroyed. A lot of neighbors had part of their house destroyed.

I have some pictures of the dp6 on set, but repairing the house is a bit of a priority at the moment.

cheers,
-a

We were are all at dinner last night when we saw the news. Let us know if you need anything. Our prayers are with you and your neighbors.

-reed

Andrew,
Hope you and your loved ones are okay. Sorry to hear about the damage to your neighborhood and area. Take care.

Hey thanks for all the thoughts and prayers, ya'll. A group of us from our church in the city went door knocking to make sure everybody in the church's neighborhood was ok. (We live out in the country, so we were able to check all our neighbors by making 5 phone calls).

Its pretty scary. A lot of chimneys have collapsed through roofs and there are splits in walls you could put a ex3 through. On the other hand, since the quake hit at 4:30am, most people were in bed and are ok. Its a stark contrast to the 200,000 people who died in haiti in a similar quake. The loss of property is pretty profound though. I've had 3 shoots scheduled for this week cancelled due to the fact that the locations we were going to film in are now piles of rubble.

Anyways, you guys are probably hitting this thread in anticipation of photos, not for earthquake info, so here are a few. dp6A.jpg is some 3000 pixels wide so you can zoom in 100% and get a good idea of the clarity of the screen. (as clear as a handheld photo of an lcd can be.) The rest I scaled to 1200x800. There is no adjustment to the photos other than scaling and saving.

Dvinfo scaled my photos down the last time i uploaded big ones, so i'm linking rather than embedding. If anyone has a problem seeing them i'll try embedding.

http://www.lakeflyproductions.com/dp6/dp6A.jpg
Large photo of the dp6 screen. This is a handheld photo of a light, so some fringing is the result of the camera taking the photo, not the screen or the camera feeding it. I've scaled the 5d's image on the dp6 up to mostly fill the screen, but have left a tiny bit of the "dead grey" area at the top and bottom of the screen. I like to see a bit of extra head and foot to get an early warning for booms, etc. You can adjust the scale/overscan however you like so what you see here is how I chose to set it. At 100% you can see a bit of moire pattern on the screen. This is an artifact of the camera taking the photo of the screen, not the screen itself.

http://www.lakeflyproductions.com/dp6/dp6B.jpg
DP6 mounted on canon 5DmkII. I did several direct comparisons of the dp6 compared to the camera screen+ zfinder. I liked the stability the zfinder gave you pressed against your face, but there just isnt a lot of information on the camera lcd. Most of what I noticed with the zfinder is how visible the pixels were. I'd really like to see a zfinder/loupe for the dp6.

http://www.lakeflyproductions.com/dp6/dp6C.jpg
The menu system. the "no card" and "1920x1080" are generated by the camera. You can adjust the opacity of the menu overlay on the dp6. One thing to note is after the finger wheel scrolls across the menus at the top, it then scrolls across the ones at the bottom. It wasn't obvious to me at first, but I appreciated having larger menu fonts vs trying to cram everything across the top.

http://www.lakeflyproductions.com/dp6/dp6D.jpg
shoe mounted on the cineslider (with a crappy 501 head). The dp6 is very light, even with battery, so i found shoe mounting to cover most scenarios.

http://www.lakeflyproductions.com/dp6/dp6E.jpg
Side view of the dp6 on 5d. My shoe mount is a giotto mini ball head using the "shoe bolt" and one knuckle nut from my noga arm "shoe mount bundle", then using a second knuckle nut from the redrock arm to thread against the head to lock it down. Its a bit of a frankenstein, but its very secure and light/compact. Its pretty close to "perfect" from a size/stability standpoint. If you have a better solution, especially one that doesn't include buying the noga bundle and throwing away the giant-ass tube thing, please holler!

http://www.lakeflyproductions.com/dp6/dp6F.jpg
Shot of the back of the dp6, showing the battery mounted on its bracket.You can just make out the indentation for the scroll wheel at the top left of the monitor as pictured here. The battery connects to the dp6 via a wee jumper cable. I had a discussion with another grip who hated the jumper cable. My point was that if you use a battery contact to connect power to the monitor, then any other power solutions have to connect to that proprietary contact. I personally dig having a standard 12v connection, as this makes it simple to switch to a tekkeon or even cigarette lighter as needed.

Obviously these photos are all me mucking around during downtime on a shoot. I have some more "action photos" i'll try to upload as soon as possible. holler with any questions or photo requests.

When we are filming with a monitor, I drop the hdmi cable across the other side of the lens and come around to the port on the camera. I normally don't leave a big loop out to the side. I was just mucking around and got lazy.

Cheers!
-a

This looks like a really sweet monitor Andrew!
Hope the cleanup goes well over there for you & everyone affected.
Bryce

Man. something like 200 aftershocks so far, many in the high 5s. The aftershocks are actually doing more damage than the initial quake, especially on brick buildings. Some buildings that weathered the main quake are being ripped apart by the aftershocks. Ugh. My 3 year old son keeps saying "can daddy make the earthquakes go away and not come back?... PLEASE" after every big one. It helps to imagine our house is a boat. Doing that makes the motion of our home make more sense.


I shot a TV commercial yesterday during a 5.6 aftershock. It was a two-man-army deal, where Campbell, the producer/director called me in to bring all the gear. After lighting, I shot on my 7d and Cam ran audio with my dr-680 and schoeps 641.

Campbell was obsessed with the dp6. He kept carrying it around even when it wasn't on or connected. At one point when playing back a clip I asked if he was happy with the shot and he admitted that he had zoned out and wasn't paying attention to the shot, but instead was just looking at how crisp the image was on the dp6. hehe. I asked him for a quote for this review and he said "are you kidding? I love this thing". Its not the most helpful quote, but there it is.

We got the typical "you are shooting on THAT?" dslr reaction, but somehow rigging up the dp6 changed people's mind. The most vocal guy (there is always a really vocal guy who is incredulous that he's never heard of a dslr shooting video) went from "what is all this?" to telling his wife quietly "they have some really nice gear" after seeing playback on the dp6. I hadn't really thought the monitor would change the "professional appearance" the same way a matte box does, but in this case, it did.

*focus assist*
I have to admit that what I pictured when I read about the dp6's "focus assist" was that it would be peaking on top of a normal image. The dp6 does that (its called peaking. heh). But focus assist is something different. Its kinda hard to describe... its like peaking in that it accentuates the parts of the image with a sharp change in color/luminance (thats what our eyes/brain use to identify when something is in focus) but it also darkens the rest of the screen. What you end up with is a dark "ghost" of the image with white lines where things are in focus. It works, and if you flick it on you can easily rack focus with certainty.

The problem is... I don't really care for it. I suppose it could be an issue of not being used to it, but it obscures enough of the image that I can't imagine leaving it on while normally shooting. It would make sense for specific racks vs. marking the lens, but I'll be curious if I ever reach for it. With the shortcut button you can turn it on/off with a click, so its possible to even using mid-shot for focus check. I'll be curious if anyone out there loves it. I love having more options, so its cool its there, even if I never reach for it.

One artifact of peaking/assist/etc. being in-monitor vs in-camera is that the camera overlays have peaking/focus assist applied to them. So the record "light" and any status displays will have contrasted edges if you have one of the assists applied. Again, its not a big deal, but a little bit disconcerting if you aren't expecting it.

Thinking about what I haven't discussed yet, i realized i haven't plugged anything into the composite or component ports. I've just been using the hdmi to date. I'll connect something to the other inputs and see how they fare.

Holler with any questions.

Cheers!
-a

Thanks for posting so much information when everything must be in a state of turmoil. I am definitely going to try and track down a DP6 at IBC this weekend.

I have toured a little in your area on trips to NZ in the past and it's pretty hard imagine what it must be like now. I tend to think of N Island as the more active geologically with it's volcanos and geysers but then I thought back to the very large range of mountains we struggled over in a wheezing camper van and realised I had forgotten more of my O level geology than I thought. My thoughts are with you and all my kiwi mates.

So the smallHD's are earthquake proof as well hey? Awesome! ;-)

Was wondering when you get a chance if you can post a pic of how much screen realestate you get / loose in record mode using the 7D? I've got a 550D and a Marshall and one thing that annoyed me was how much of the screen area I loose when it goes into record mode.

I've been thinking of going the 7D / small HD road, especially if it means I get 100% coverage of the LCD screen.

Cheers

P

Thanks for the well wishing. I've just been around to neighbors delivering some water.

Hey Paul,

The 7d is a different beast, as it stays in 1080 while in record mode. (awesome for focus).

I also have a 550d, so I can hook it up to see how it fares in the lower rez mode. (I had assumed it was the same as the 5d, but hadn't tested it)...

The answer to real estate is that the dp6 has a powerful custom overscan function. This means you can adjust the size and aspect ratio to anything you like. The horizontal and vertical position and scale are independently adjustable, which lets you do all sorts of clever things.

The 7D output stays in 1080, but part of the screen is comprised of the grey "out of bounds" areas from the camera. To compensate, I made one of the custom presets be a "shooting mode" where only the useful information from the camera fills the full screen. You wouldn't "gain" resolution, but you could totally scale it so that the letterboxed portion of your camera's output fills the screen edge to edge and uses every single pixel. The scaler in the dp6 is quite nice, and i don't notice any quality difference in changing the aspect ratio or scale. The dp6 has different presets for various aspect ratios, but the real power is just adjusting the image to exactly how you want it.

If you take advantage of the custom presets, then you could, for example, have preset 1 be "full frame" and custom 2 be set up to show the whole 4:3 frame/menu and quickly flick between them with a roll and poke of the scroll wheel.

There is an "auto scale" function, but i'm not sure its working fully yet, and even still, what you ultimately want is to blow up to full frame a subset of the image the 550d outputs. Thats totally doable with the overscan function.

Hope that answers your question.

Cheers!
-a

Regarding earthquake proofness, officially my dp1 and dp6 have survived some 250 earthquakes now. During the big one, my dp1 fell (in a bag) from a shelf to the floor with no damage whatsoever. As long as you protect the screen, the aluminum frame is pretty darn rugged.

Thanks for posting this review. I want a DP6!

Yea I echo that sentiment...Thanks so much for posting all this info.

SmallHD made a good decision letting you review this pre-production unit, because I was all set to get a Marshall. This thread alone has very likely changed my mind...and you never know, maybe others too.

Regards,

G.

Have you tried the component ports?

Hey Guys,

Sorry I've been kinda slack in posting here. Christchurch is a bit of a mess. My big projects have been put on hold indefinitely so i've been taking a bunch of commando gigs where i'm basically the entire crew. It kinda wipes me out and on sets like that I'm way too busy to be able to think much about the gear. "Film sets" are fantastic places to reflect on stuff, since there is tons of down time, which is how this thread started.

I updated to the latest firmware and several of the changes were exactly what I hoped for (and at least one was directly per my suggestion, which was cool.) A lot of companies do firmware updates so they can fix bugs... smallhd is clearly using it to evolve their monitor, which is rather refreshing. If any owner has an idea for an improvement, they'll consider it. It may not be a good idea, but I can vouch for the fact that they are listening.

The new firmware colors are much more accurate. I still haven't done a proper test, but so far nobody has said anything negative about the colors, which is great.

A third person in christchurch ordered their own dp6 today after touching mine. On the one hand I think thats cool, since I want to see smallHD succeed and keep creating products I lust after... on the other hand, I'm going to miss the elite-ness of being the only kid on the block with a dp6. hehe.

Sorry, Alex. I haven't plugged in component inputs yet. I'll try to get to that today.

I was on a shoot today with two young filmmakers. Both have 7Ds and were both seriously looking at the dp6 for their "rigs" (i hate "rigs" btw). It was interesting to see them both try out the focus assist mode on the dp6. (Its where the screen goes dark and the in focus stuff is shown as a white line around pixels in focus). The first guy was like me and had trouble getting used to it and preferred to just see the peaking on a normal image. The second guy loved it. He was whipping around the room and nailing focus on different objects. I tried repeating what he did and my brain must be wired differently because I couldn't do it. It was like he had a feel for how far to pull focus and the screen was just visual confirmation. I wish that instinct was an accessory I could order. hehe. Anyways, it was cool seeing the focus assist feature in the hands of someone that really jived with it.

I gotta crash. I have a late call time tomorrow so i'm hoping to have a critical stab at the dp6 with component. Holler if you have any questions. Gnight!

couple of action shots with Adam Clark:

http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=19464&stc=1&d=1284298525

http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=19463&stc=1&d=1284298525

Cheers!
-a

Alex,

Sorry for being so slow with the component test. I wanted to compare the hdmi with component, but my only camera with both is my hv20 and I haven't been able to find it. I've been digging around everywhere with no luck. My wife went on a spring cleaning today (yes, its going into spring here) and found the camera wedged between the dresser and the wall. The dresser normally isnt "one hv20" away from the wall, so it must have marched there during the quake and the bag went down the back.

All a very complicated excuse for not doing something, I know... I've got to run to a VO session, but hope to poke cables into the hv20 this afternoon.

Cheers!

Glad you found your camera! Lol!

Heya Alex,

After finding the component cable for the hv20 i looked back and forth a few dozen times between the component and hdmi footage. Since the hv20 won't output both at the same time, i'd have to unplug the hdmi cable, then change the menu in the dp6... so my comparison wasn't totally direct, given how there was a delay of 2-3 seconds between looking at the different images.

Honestly, I couldn't see any noticeable difference between the two inputs. The color, contrast and clarity looked identical to me. As I went back and forth, I'd keep forgetting which input I was on and have to look at the hv20 to see if the hdmi cable was plugged in or not. (plugging it in bypasses the component out). Its possible the component input is a tiny bit more saturated...

I took photos of the screen in each mode, but i was just hand holding the camera as I shot the screen, and my photo of the hdmi input is a bit out of focus, so the component input looks much much sharper in my photos. (in other words, my photos were useless in comparing the two modes).

I'm quite pleased with the component mode. I thought the analog vs. digital would be markedly different, but they really aren't. I wouldn't hesitate to use the component input for focus. I tried out the focus assist and it seemed to work just as well on component as hdmi.

Not very scientific, but thats my reaction. If there is a specific test you'd like me to perform, holler.

cheer!
-a

I'm still testing it to see what all is in there, but it appears there is a lot to love about the newest firmware.

The big one is that there is now a "dslr record" custom profile that senses when cameras like the 5d or 550d/T2i jump between standby 1080 and the 480 mode. The new profile automatically scales each up to fill the full horizontal width of the monitor, so while you are shooting you don't have to touch the monitor at all as you go between standby and record modes.

Of course, on a 7d the output remains 1080, which is infinitely better for focus.

The colors in 1.1 have been tweaked. They look great in most settings, but there have been a few select scenarios where some (not all) of the colors weren't quite right. I have to keep reminding myself that this is not a reference or grading monitor. Its easy to get confused with the $5k (low rez) reference monitors thanks to the killer build quality. However, the dp6 is definitely designed and built from the ground up to compensate for the shortcomings of on-camera monitors. The one thing that is usually 100% on built in monitors is color, and everything else (resolution, size, overscan, placement) is painfully lacking. The dp6 nails resolution, size, overscan (even if you do wacky stuff like shoot with anamorphic lenses), and you can mount the thing damn near anywhere. If you are doing critical color work, you can always double check with the camera lcd... but I'm convinced that the dp6 provides you the right options to use it as a powerful tool and set it up in such a way that you can reliably trust it as your primary monitor in the field. YMMV, but thats my opinion.

Cheers,
-a

Heya Alex,

After finding the component cable for the hv20 i looked back and forth a few dozen times between the component and hdmi footage. Since the hv20 won't output both at the same time, i'd have to unplug the hdmi cable, then change the menu in the dp6... so my comparison wasn't totally direct, given how there was a delay of 2-3 seconds between looking at the different images.

Honestly, I couldn't see any noticeable difference between the two inputs. The color, contrast and clarity looked identical to me. As I went back and forth, I'd keep forgetting which input I was on and have to look at the hv20 to see if the hdmi cable was plugged in or not. (plugging it in bypasses the component out). Its possible the component input is a tiny bit more saturated...

I took photos of the screen in each mode, but i was just hand holding the camera as I shot the screen, and my photo of the hdmi input is a bit out of focus, so the component input looks much much sharper in my photos. (in other words, my photos were useless in comparing the two modes).

I'm quite pleased with the component mode. I thought the analog vs. digital would be markedly different, but they really aren't. I wouldn't hesitate to use the component input for focus. I tried out the focus assist and it seemed to work just as well on component as hdmi.

Not very scientific, but thats my reaction. If there is a specific test you'd like me to perform, holler.

cheer!
-a

Lol! Thanks for testing out the components. i was curious about the focus assist

I've had a chance to spend some time with the latest firmware (1.1) and to work the dp6 in a number of different real world environments with various DPs and shooters, and myself behind the camera in a few occasions.

The biggest and probably most controversial thing i want to say is...

Canon got lucky.

That has to be it. I realize I've left the realm of fact and am speculating wildly, but the hit and miss with the canon dslr for video is SO extreme that it feels like a total and complete accident that any of the canon cameras can produce what they do. Their R&D department must include 100,000 monkeys with typewriters and for every amazing revelation like a good data rate, or switchable pal/ntsc fps, monkey poo gets flung at things like AGC audio and dropping to 480p on the output while recording.

I've read all the big stories and theories and conspiracies about video on dslr and all that resonates from owning and using these cameras is that it seems to me that within canon there are engineers that care passionately about making their cameras rock... and there are management types that are doing everything they can to make it suck... and unlike most battles that end up with a homogeneous compromise of overall lameness, the 5d, 7d and 550d(t2i) are random collections of awesome and suck mixed together. The "big players" were quick to dismiss them because of the suck, where a lot of us focus on the awesome. You *can* get results from dslr that are amazing, and many of us have embraced it and flexed to the requirements to work around the things that suck, but that doesn't discount the fact that the features that suck? They suck.

There is a whole cottage industry of people making devices to make dslrs (and other video camers) suck less. SmallHD is a boutique startup within a cottage industry. (or... a cottage startup in a boutique industry?) At times its hard to remember that because they put so much "finish" into their product and image. Two years ago SmallHD was some video geeks trying to shoot videos and like many of us asked "why isnt there a decent field monitor at a decent price?". Then, they went out and tried doing it themselves. Unhappy with their first attempt, they scrapped it, put some money behind it and set out to "do it right".

I have no vested interest in smallhd. I'm not an employee or shareholder, i'm just a customer. In the end it doesn't matter to me whether they succeed or fail (well... except for support on the monitors I own). But I do love a good "rise to success" story and I do love their monitors. We've all been asking for large sensors and swappable inexpensive lenses since the 1970s. Canon gets my love for accidently giving me a lot of that (while swearing that it is NOT what the market wants... whatever). As soon as HD hit, I've been asking for a field monitor to let me see HD. The big names and even the big "indy" players all passed out 800x480 (and even LOWER rez!) monitors and said "here ya go!" with very little differentiation between them aside from logo and price. SmallHD's DP1 (albeit after a LONG wait) shook things up hard. A true HD monitor with an industrial design that showed somebody had spent ages putting thought into the thing. The dp6 easily tops the dp1, and is a pretty amazing "second product".

I had an irritating experience with one of the other monitor makers in one of my earlier grip jobs. The monitor was only 2 weeks old and had only been run off the a/c adapter because the owner (my friend) didn't have any sony batteries to match the mount. I had some, so after he rigged his monitor to his steadicam, i made sure the monitor was off and popped on my battery. Immediately, smoke poured out the monitor, so i ripped the battery off and it was uncomfortably hot. When it cooled down i stuck it onto my camera (in retrospect a dumb idea) and the battery worked fine. The monitor, however, never turned on again.

Now... yeah, whatever, we all have those stories, and while annoying, thats kinda the price we pay for being "boutique" consumers. Where things got infuriating is that the company (after having him pay shipping, which is a huge sum of money from nz to the states) the monitor returned unfixed with a note that it "tested ok". It still wouldn't turn on - battery or wall current. He complained and got a new RMA number and had to pay to ship the monitor a second time. This time it came back with a note stating it was "damaged. Not a warranty issue." He complained again and ultimately got a reluctant RMA number with the disclaimer (paraphrased) "the state of the monitor has already been determined. If you really wish to do so, you can ship it again at your cost and we will verify our findings."

So that was it. My friend had already paid around 1/3 the cost of the monitor shipping it to not get fixed. (or even to have a paid repair offered to him before being shipped back). When I talked to my friend a year after the smoking monitor event, i expected him to have a working monitor. Instead, he had a broken monitor, some corporate emails and several hundred dollars in shipping. I don't mention the company name because its been over 3 years, everything has changed and it seems unfair to hold a public grudge. If it had happened to me personally you can bet i'd be spewing their name around, but carrying somebody else's torch just seems petty. I wouldn't ever buy their brand again, but thats different.

Kiwis get bent over on electronics. At one point when i was looking at a new macbook it was going to be cheaper to fly to los angeles, buy a macbook and hang out with friends for a week than it was to buy it over the counter here. We often are last to get new models of electronics and despite the nz$ being worth around 72 us cents (been as high as 89, as low as 64), its not uncommon for things to be 2-3 times more expensive here after currency conversion.

It makes me very sensitive about buying gear. I don't want to pay 3x more for gear just to have a local person to yell at. However, i am extremely gunshy about getting caught in a corporate support spiral. I either want to buy from the biggest stores/biggest names...

or the smallest.

I know that sounds odd, but just like any other boutique, if you go small enough, then customer service is placed in a very high position. I first discovered this with cool lights. I mean, its just "off the shelf components slapped together!" and yet how the components are chosen, how they are put together and how they are sold makes all the difference in the world. You couldn't pry my cool lights led600s out of my dead hands and its just a wall of leds, right?. Richard clearly thought hard about what was good/bad about other lights, and set out to make his own that was better and still affordable. That alone is worth something. If his lights have a problem, he makes good. Period. His reputation is his entire marketing strategy and he can't afford to have bad stories. And when it comes down to it, he busts his ass. I had a problem where a bulb reseller shipped me the wrong brand bulb for my hmi 575 (cool lights didn't sell a 575 bulb at the time). Richard had recommended a few places to buy bulbs and the place that shipped me the wrong one was one of those. I had a big shoot and a 575 that flickered due to the wrong bulb. Although it wasn't his error, Richard drove around hong kong, located the correct bulb, bought it and shipped it to me. I paid actual shipping cost and his wholesale price for the bulb. Had i lived in the states, 5 minutes from a bulb shop I doubt he would have done that, but knowing I was out of good options, he bent over for me. A bigger or smaller sized company likely would/could not have done that.

SmallHD fits into a very similar model as cool lights in my mind. They live off of their support. That means they would NEVER return to me a dead monitor once, say nothing of twice. They couldn't afford to. And yet, their product is not second rate. In fact, its got way more engineering and thought put into it than anything else in the price range (even a higher price range). As cool lights has grown Richard doesn't have to bend over as far... although he still certainly bends. As SmallHD grows I expect they'll get to a point where support emails don't immediately direct to the owner of the company... but maybe not. For now you have geeks putting their heart, soul, personal savings and basically every minute of the week into making a monitor that rocks. The evolution from dp1 to dp6 shows to me just how hard they are working. The dp6 has a few things that aren't quite there. but its damned close... and with the firmware updates, it has been getting better and better.

Its not often that gear inspires this many words out of me. (i'm verbose, but this is getting absurd. hehe) I figure if i painted my whole stream of consciousness about the dp6, then it would be almost like going on a shoot with it and me... and having me yacking incessantly the whole time. heh.

I do appreciate the encouragement people have given me to keep on waxing poetic. In another forum i'd have been called "ghey" and told to shut up by now. :,P

I've probably said more than enough, but I would like to finish up with this: If you are teetering on a decision of which "hd" monitor to buy, I think you should try to see a dp6 in person, especially side by side with the other monitor you are considering if possible. Ultimately who cares what I think, or even what the people I work with think? All that matters is if it works for you. I do happen to believe you'll dig the heck out of the dp6 though. Its hard to put down.

If you can't see a dp6 in person and have questions/tests you'd like me to perform, holler. I'm happy to help out so long as I don't have to drive around hong kong. ha!

Cheers!
-a

Just curious, does it have the ability to pass thru a signal if I wanted to use this at the top of my DSLR + utilize my steadicam pilot's monitor? In actuality, I'd probably never do so, but just wanted to know if it was possible.

Yes - either via SDI or with the use of SmallHD's inexpensive and awesome HDMI splitter :)

The DP6-SLR does not support signal pass through. We did create a very small self powered HDMI splitter that can attach to one of the DP6's four 1/4 20 mount locations. See the short video at
HDMI Loop-through Splitter (http://www.smallhd.com/Store/5-6-inch-HD-Monitor-Accessories/HDMI-Loop-through-Splitter)

The DP6-SDI provides SDI loop through, if your camera supports SDI.

Hope that clarifies things a bit.

-reed

Got mine today and tested it out with my HPX-170 via SDI. REALLY great monitor and all the features are totally pro and then some. Having minor trouble calibrating to match bars coming from HPX; getting everything dialed exactly in except black pluge bars. Probably operator error, but I typically know how to calibrate monitors, just need to play with it more to nail it. Will test it out via HDMI on my 7D later.

Fantastic for focus, and I no longer see a need to have a client monitor actually; at least for the work I do. This monitor will really shine on that point!

Only, super-minor gripe is I wish the neoprene sleeve would fit when the battery plate is left on; too tight, it can be jammed on but I think most of us would mount the plate and prefer to leave it on. Once again, a minor request that they make a slightly bigger sleeve.

I did all the research on all competing products and know I made the right choice!

I see some reports from Paul Joy that there is a yellow tint that makes the colour inaccurate. I do my white balance by eye balling so this would be an issue. The DP6 certainly looks very sexy to me over the marshal but the colour is indeed an issue.

Could you do a comparison? Thks.

Yes it's a weird one. I'm getting very yellow greens and a yellow tint in general but the guys at smallHD assure me that they are not seeing the same results. I've even tried a second DP6 to see if I had a faulty unit. Certainly the other reviews that are popping up on the net don't mention this problem so it's a bit of a mystery why I'm seeing these results when they are not.

Here's my initial impressions post: SmallHD DP6 first impressions | Paul Joy (http://www.pauljoy.com/2010/09/smallhd-dp6-first-impressions/)

And some fun while I have two of them: Dual SmallHD DP6 monitoring | Paul Joy (http://www.pauljoy.com/2010/10/dual-smallhd-dp6/)

I'm hoping it's something easily sorted as the DP6 is fantastic in every other way, small, light, tough and very functional.

Hey if anyone else has experienced this, or if any of the people that have experienced it, find the solution/resolution please give your feedback. I really want to hear how this plays out, because I am ready to drop my coins on a monitor and want to make the right choice.

I really like the DP6 and want to go that way, but I need to hear the results of this "yellow tinge" issue before I purchase. So as of right now I am having a hard time deciding between the DP6 and Marshall V-LCD70XP.

Regards,

G.

No issues here. The color is very good, and definitely nothing weird like green or yellow "tinge"

Seems to be an isolated issue, IF it's an issue at all. Definitely not a reason to avoid this monitor.

Hey if anyone else has experienced this, or if any of the people that have experienced it, find the solution/resolution please give your feedback. I really want to hear how this plays out, because I am ready to drop my coins on a monitor and want to make the right choice.

I really like the DP6 and want to go that way, but I need to hear the results of this "yellow tinge" issue before I purchase. So as of right now I am having a hard time deciding between the DP6 and Marshall V-LCD70XP.

Regards,

G.

Hey Greg, I'm in the same position as you but the sexy DP-6 is really hard to resist..!!

Indeed it is.

Regards,

G.

I thought i'd been pretty thorough on my ramblings, but stuff might get lost in the ramble.

Each firmware update has been bringing the colors closer in line to what i'd expect them to be, but there is still some room for improvement. However, i didn't put much weight into it because its not a grading monitor and because color is the one thing that built-in screens usually do really well. If i'm going to adjust color balance by feel, i'll do it from the on-camera screen where the rez is cruddy but the color is fantastic.

I haven't seen a "yellow tinge" in particular, but I have noticed some skin tones are rendered a little funky in certain scenarios. I'd love for it to get tweaked in a future firmware, but I didn't buy the dp6 for its color rendition, so i've been happy to wait and see what the firmware holds.

My 2c anyways. Cheers!

v1.2 is on the way, and will address all these minor concerns.

Jon, your pluge issue will be resolved with 1.2 (our error, not yours)
Paul, well you know.... we're working on it

1.2 brings some useful new tools as well as some fixes to the table. So stay tuned, and maybe some of these guys can chime back in once they've had a run at it.

Thanks!

I experienced that with my DP6 as well. I noticed a big difference between the LCD on my 5D and the DP6. However, it wasn't always noticeable.

Maybe when the monitor warms up, it goes away?

All I can say is that the guys at smallHD are awesome and they take VERY good care of their customers. I've been more than satisfied with their customer service as well as their products.

Well I bit the proverbial bullet today. I guess I will see for myself the deal with this color stuff.

I have to say that a big part of my decision to go SmallHD was everyone raving about how well they take care of their customers. I hope you all are right.

Regards,

G.

I am lucky enough to work close to the SmallHD shop in Apex NC so I dropped by to pick up my monitor today. Just so you know the folks at SmallHD are as nice in person as everyone says they are over email. I brought in a camera (Ex1r) and they hooked everything up and walked me through all the features. When I left I knew I had bought the right kit.

When you hold this thing in your hand you know its NOT a toy. Its the real thing. The screen is RAZOR sharp. Determining focus using the DP6 is a piece of cake. The clip-on screen protectors are an absolute MUST. Don't buy it without them.

We will be using it this weekend as we shoot some test footage for an indie movie. I have high expectations for the little monitor.

I'll keep ya posted.

trying to decide whether to buy the non-sdi one or wait for the sdi version. It7s $400 cheaper to buy it wothout sdi. Question is whether I am going to get the sharpness I need out of the EX1 through component as I don't have hdmi. I need the monitor primarily for focus so will the component be enough? And what do we know about how much the sdi upgrade for the non-sdi units will cost? $400? :)

Damian,

Actually, component and SDI will look identical. If that's your main concern, you shouldn't have a problem using the component ports - that's what they're there for!

Just ordered mine today. This review was the last bit of info I needed to make my decision. Thanks for sharing Andrew!

can anyone comment on the rough turnaround time from purchase to delivery? it says they're backordered.

Well I am not sure what the website is saying now (I didn't look) but when I ordered mine (NON SDI version) it said "ships within 5 business days". I ordered on a Weds or Thurs (can't remember which) and had it in my hands the following Thurs. Granted I did pay for next day air shipping.

Hope that helps.

Regards,

G.