Bmpcc sold at 50% discount, is it still worth buying?

[Noa Put]

There have been many times I wanted to get the bmpcc but was held back by the frustration several users reported about the usability of the camera or because of some image issues, back then the white orb and black spot issue was not solved.

There is something about the image of the bmpcc that I find very appealing, IF it was shot and colorr corrected in the right way and it does fit in my controlled way of shooting when I go out and shoot for fun, I never walk around with my camera's while shooting handheld, I always carefully choose my frames on a tripod (or gorillapod if I want to travel light) or introduce movement only if there is a slider or steadicam involved. I"m am a bit of a motion control freak actually :)

I think you are right John, it has been itching long enough and the current low 520 euro price is a too good of a deal, no matter what replacement might be announced at NAB. I"ll go slow on cards to start with, one 64gb card will do, just to get my feet wet with using RAW but I"ll get 2 extra cheap aftermarket batteries and a viewfinder loupe as I understand those are really necessary. I know the loupe doesn't exactly make it a pocket camera anymore but I will be using my 12mm f2.0 on it so the camera and lens will still be a small and light combo.

If I don't like it I can still sell it with a small loss. Thx all for thinking a bit with me :)

[Noa Put]

Wtf, I was just ordering the camera but when I reached the part where I needed to pay with paypal the 50% discount was not being deducted so I contacted the store, they told me this action stopped last week friday and now it was back again at full price, they forgot to update their website. Duh...

Maybe it's a sign that I should not get the camera :) Not paying the full price, that's for sure, ah well, ordering the panasonic lx100 now...

[Rob Cantwell]

ahhh too bad!!
I did a month long trip to the North West Pacific area a few years back and dragged along two lenses a 1 Series Canon and a laptop all in the one bag, weighed a ton! , got great images ok, but it was a hassle.
I'm going again this year, I finally made my decision, all i'm bringing is the little Sony RX100 III, I reckon it'll fit into any pocket I have.

Enjoy the LX100

;-)

[Noa Put]

Well I"ll be..., I was about to order the lx100 from the same store where I saw that discounted bmpcc and I went over to the bmpcc page just to see if they had changed the discount text but they only partially did, there first was a reference on the discounted price you had to pay and that was removed but the title of the page still said in big letters: "50% off!" right after the camera name. So I was again confused if it was 50% off or not since I informed them about it already half a day ago and I send a second mail to the store.

I got an immediate response back where they apologized again because they missed the title discount reference and they where going to correct it right away but then they made an exception for me and offered the camera at the discounted price if I still wanted it so I just placed the order :)

[John McCully]

Ha ha, that's so funny. Noa, the trials and tribulations you have experienced in purchasing the BMPCC are a taste of what's to come.

I do look forward to seeing your end results.

[Noa Put]

Yeah, probably tomorrow Black magic design will unveil a pocket cam version 2 and offer the old version for 100 dollar, ha! I was getting fed up with shooting on camera's that made my life too easy, it's time to feel some frustration again, let's hope the pocketcam doesn't disappoint in that area. :)

[Tim Polster]

Hope you like it Noa. We all need more tech-frustration in our lives! ;(

[Jim Andrada]

Hey Noa - good deal!

The Z-finder works wonderfully here in Tucson but maybe in Europe you won't need it. I use the camera without it on the Nebula and I can see enough to aim in the generally right direction. I agree 100% that it's a puzzling sort of thing - small and capable of producing an excellent picture, but sometimes frustrating to use.

I'm thinking of making a wire frame "sports finder" for it.

[Noa Put]

The most amazing part was they had the camera in stock, in stock! You heard that right, ordered yesterday, delivered today, BMD has come a long way... :) I think this action was stock the store has bhought during the time BMD sold the camera at 50%, they probably have keeping it aside to get some attention to the store by offering it now, just before NAB.

I will start with the very basics, 1 sdxc card and 2 batteries and see from there on what I need, will post as soon as I have something presentable, even if it's a failure :)

[Chris Barcellos]

Noa:

If you haven't worked with raw, this is a cheap way to get into it. I bought the original BM Cinema Camera for that purpose, and bought the BM Pocket when it was on sale to compliment that camera. To be honest, I haven't shot it much since I got it, due to various reason not related to any of these discussions.

Initially, I adapted to lenses I had for the Cinema Camera, using available lens adapters. I bought one EF to MFT adapter and from there, I can mount all my old manual Nikon glass via Nikon to EF to MFT combination. In additions, I can use my EF mount Tokina 11-16 mm as semi wide to normal lens and my Taron EF mount 17 to 50 for narrower angles. Using those bigger zooms defeats the purpose of of shooting a small cinema, but I haven't pulled the trigger on new MFT glass,

To go real light, I bought some inexpensive c-mount video glass, which adapts well to the camera also. (12.5mm, 25mm. and 35mm). I also outfitted my camera with stuff I designed and built with my 3D printer, to make the camera alot like a 16mm or super 8 of the first 2/3's of the last century. I have started testing footage that way.

There is no doubt that this camera is intended as a cinema camera, which would mean that you shouldn't expect finished imagery out of the box. With the limited settings on board, it is clear the camera footage is intended to go to post processing, whether or not you shoot in film mode, or video mode. The images out of the camera aren't that sharp looking because the wide latitude creates a low contrast image. High contrast increases apparent sharpness. In addition, sharpness, which is added by most camera to output in the camera footage, is not added to Blackmagic footage, from what I can tell. That means that in post, you add sharpeness as well an other attributes, as needed.

I fear that most of the footage posted from this camera is not really ran through extensive post treatment.

So if post treatment is not your idea of the fun you want to have with this camera, then its probably not the way you want to go.

[Noa Put]

For my weddings I wouldn't dream of using the bmpcc, I need something that gives me a right image from the start and gives me a fast workflow in post, I also need something that easily allows me to use it a full day without having to use tons of batteries and cards. The excitement storm the black magic camera's caused when they where introduced seems to have settled down a lot which probably has to do with how difficult they appear to be in use, in the field and in post.

The image the BMD camera's can produce have always intrigued me and I do look forward to experiment with it. I actually need a camera that forces me to slow down, when I shoot weddings it's always run and gun and I feel that I have that same rush when I go out and shoot for fun, I move fast, shoot fast and when I get home I need to see my shots to know how it really was on location :), I rarely take the time to just look around and really enjoy what's around me, that enjoyment always comes while I"m editing and by watching the finished film.

To me it looks like the pocket cam will be a real challenge to shoot and edit in raw and I do expect a lot of frustrations but I also feel the reward will be big if I manage to pull it off.

[Noa Put]

Received the pocketcam today, still waiting for a sandisc extreme pro card and 2 extra batteries but managed to shoot a bit of raw with a fast kingston card which seemed to handle raw as well.

It certainly is going to be a learning experience, from shooting to (especially) editing, my pc is too underpowered to handle Davinci and it looks very complicated but did get some very good results colorcorrecting in photoshop's camera raw and then sending the .dng's directly into edius for a conversion to hqx avi, it only is a brutally slow process. Handling the camera in bright sunlight was a bit of a joke, almost couldn't see anything on the screen and the battery life in percentage looks like a timer counting down in seconds, will need a loupe asap. I used a olympus 9-18mm on it, looks like a good all round combo for scenery shots with wide dof.

The dynamic range and how much you can push the image is almost ridiculous :)

[Noa Put]

Behold! My first rawclip attempt online, shot straight into the sun and NO black hole :)

This time I started directly in lightroom because adobe raw in photoshop seemed to have a clip limitation, I still don't have a idea what I"m doing but it does look very promising. Very exited to use this camera for my personal projects.

But that lcd screen is almost next to worthless without a loupe + the fact that if you use it on a gorillapod and place it low to the ground you have to lay down on the ground to frame your shot, this is definitely a camera to shoot on a tripod at eye height with.

password: raw

Private Video on Vimeo

[James Manford]

Originally Posted by Noa Put

The dynamic range and how much you can push the image is almost ridiculous :)

I can only imagine! but isn't that the best part!? The post production is basically limited by your imagination :)

[Rob Katz]

noa-

congrats on the new bmpcc and the raw post!

having a new tool under the roof is always a moment for excitement so glad you are enjoying.

i have been reading this thread with great interest because i, like noa, think some of the images i have seen from blackmagic cameras are lovely.

i am excluding all the pixel peeping, dynamic range gab-fest, patterned noise concerns, devouring of batteries, ergo weirdness and every other negative that has been tossed at the bm camera line.

i really like the image that comes from blackmagic cameras.

i look forward to more posts and perhaps some wonderful vids.

be well.

rob
smalltalk productions/nyc