BTM_Pix

A word of caution about the Atomos/Zoom partnership when it comes to the Connect module for the Ninja V is that it doesn’t work. I got the Connect in a bundle with the AtomX Cast so it wasn’t a massive financial hit but it’s annoying nonetheless as I was looking to it to provide sync of my Zoom recorders when recording ProRes RAW. Needless to say no firmware update has been forthcoming. Which brings me to the second note of caution about their alliance which is that the new Atomos branded UltraSync Blue does not work with my Zoom H3VR due to the same Bluetooth incompatibility with their new chipset whereas the original TimecodeSystems ones do. My F2BT and F3 with the BTA-1 module work perfectly with it but it’s a no-go for the H3VR and, again, needless to say no new firmware has been forthcoming to resolve it. It was interesting to see earlier in the week that FujiFilm are releasing a firmware update to allow the XH2 and XH2S to join the Nikon Z8/Z9 in being able to receive timecode from the UltraSync Blue and hopefully Panasonic and Sony might join in to give the option to use their generally underutilised Bluetooth ports (for video at least) for something useful too.

Don't forget that a few weeks ago even Fuji X was added to the list of lenses that can be AF adapted to Z mount too. The interesting thing about this F to MFT for me is that Viltrox obviously have the driving of the F mount lenses worked out (they also do a version of this one to let you put F on E mount) and they also have L mount cameras covered as they do EF to L mount AF adapter. So, as they have both ends of the puzzle, then it strikes me that they should be able to make an F to L mount version of this. Which would be an instant buy from me.

They have a whole website of it here : https://www.rollei.com/ Its all just the usual array of rebadged OEM accessories and tripods and camera coolers as well as adapters and lenses from Viltrox and ..... Whoah.... Hang on.... What the actual fuck is this ?!??! When did Nikon to MFT adapters with autofocus become a thing ? Has anyone got one of these ?

As a manager, its probably worth assessing how safe any brand would ultimately be in the hands of a corporation with this behaviour in its recent past anyway.

To be fair, even Olympus themselves weren't interested in keeping Olympus cameras going anymore. Better to have been bought and transitioned this way by a company that was - at least in the current term - interested in producing them rather than it being bought strictly for the name and it then be used just as a brand stamp on a succession of low end OEM stuff. There are numerous examples of this in different industries but one example from photography is Rollei where that brand has gone from meaning this : To meaning this : With Olympus, we will now at least be spared that indignity and so it can be remembered for the cameras up to this point rather than being subsequently associated with a raft of shitty products.

Why is the notion of a transition period stupid exactly? A transition period enables the new company to hit the ground running not only with existing brand awareness but also with existing branded inventory which in the case of Olympus would have been extensive. It also enables the selling company to have limited exposure to its brand name being subsequently damaged by the new company's use of it on terrible or even dangerous products. This is particularly relevant in this case as Olympus is not a single division company and only sold the imaging division. "“Following the transfer of the Imaging business, Olympus will concentrate on Medical and Scientific Solutions, in our ongoing efforts to become a global medtech company which offers products and services to make people's lives healthier, safer and more fulfilling.” Yasuo Takeuchi, President and CEO of Olympus Corporation This deal to buy the imaging division of Olympus would have been far less attractive without a period in which they could sell existing inventory and a limited number of additional runs with the existing branding. This would be exactly the same if someone bought the lens part of Arri, whereby the buying company would want a period to establish themselves whilst selling the existing branded products but Arri wouldn't want the hit to the rest of their brand value if that company then started selling $30 800mm telephoto lenses for iPhones made out of a coke can and some bits of clear plastic. Its obvious that OM Systems couldn't use the name forever but that a transition period would be required to allow them to re-brand and re-tool when newer iterations were to be released such as here with the TG-6 and TG-7. So whilst I don't think it is 100% certain that there was a definitive three year transition period in place, I don't find it fanciful enough to be considered stupid either.

The final deal went through in January 2021 so it could be something to do with a 3 year grace period to still use the Olympus name on products or some such. They'll still be getting called Olympus by everyone over the age of 40 though as no one has got the time for another round of marathon/snickers.

Happened across one of his reviews when looking for a new MacBook a while ago. I was concerned when watching it that the MacBook I was interested in was producing excessive noise when it was under load but it just turned out that the annoying whining noise was his voice. Yeah, the deliberate falsification of the thumbnail in his colour comparison video and his attempt to justify it on here wasn't exactly the high watermark of credibility.

Its CCD as well by the way. Someone is currently selling an entire kit on eBay including two of the lens modules, the M mount, EVF flash etc for £1500. I'm absolutely not tempted in the slightest of course. Absolutely no way. Definitely.

Yeah, we were all cautiously optimistic about the ZX1 on here when it was announced. Interest cooled when it a) took so long to come out and b) it ended up launching at $6K . When you look at the Flickr group there are some interesting images but the weird/telling thing is that every single one of them is by the same photographer ! Makes you wonder how many they actually sold in the end. https://www.flickr.com/groups/14759325@N21/pool/with/52332163939

True story, I was in a camera shop in Berlin with @Andrew Reid early last year and they had a ZX1 in a display case and I motioned towards it and the guy behind the counter laughed and refused to let me have a look on the basis that it was a "piece of shit". Obviously didn't want to jeopardise future sales of non pieces of shit 🙂 Ricoh did something along those lines a good few years ago with their GXR system where you slid in lenses which had entirely different sensors behind them, each one tuned to the lens. They also had the option to slide in one that turned it into an m mount. To complete the modularity it also had a slide in tiltable EVF. I think its seriously missing from the mainstream manufacturers. If Sony took that Ricoh idea up then people with a dilemma between an A7Rx and A7Sx would just buy the singular body and slide the sensor in that they needed for that particular task. But of course they want you to have that dilemma so you buy both.

I have the Mark 5 version which has an f1.8-2.4 lens with a shorter zoom range, equivalent to a 24-70mm. Its getting on for six years old now (these are actually from the first day I picked it up) but its still a better pocketable option for casual shots like this for me personally over my iPhone even if I just based it on the handling and nothing else. I don't profess that these have any particular merit but I take the quality of what it can produce for what it is and if wherever I'm going is important enough for me to want to get better results then I'll take a real camera anyway so the handling still trumps the iPhone. Having said that, I am so jaded these days that I can't muster the interest to take any images for casual use so I end up taking nothing out at all anymore. Which is why I'm actually really curious about this iPhone 15 Pro Max and very keen to hear the views of those who've actually bought it and to what extent it has made them drop other cameras and in what range of circumstances.

Its like everything else in that its breakable depending on circumstances. I've broken far tougher cameras than the Pocket, including multiple Nikon D4 and D3 bodies which were built for very heavy duty wear and tear but not for bouncing off concrete. So it happens and all you can do is mitigate it. The clamp is the obvious step but also the cable in that if you use a right angled one then you can reduce the outside span of cable that it can then get snagged on. Another mitigation is to use a right angle adapter and plug the monitor cable into that so if something happens then you are likely to damage the end that goes to the monitor instead of the camera port and can then replace the adapter. Its interesting that people wring their hands about the camera port yet the input port on something like the Ninja V is equally vulnerable irrespective of it being full size HDMI. SDI is the answer but I can assure you that they can get sheared off as well in the wrong circumstances. At this particular moment, though, I'd be far more concerned about trying to get hold of media to use in the OG Pocket than its HDMI port.

Samsung did it many years ago with their compact cameras. Its interesting looking back on it now whether they were partly using this as a way of gauging which way consumer photography would go. And if it was, the results told them that the better way to travel was to close the camera division 🙂 Zeiss did have a more recent attempt at doing the same wth the ZX1 but it absolutely tanked and was quietly discontinued. Its all in there for them to enable it and of course bluetooth would make it easy for the voice comms element of it. I used to use both the EyeFi and the Toshiba FlashAir cards to auto background transfer images to my phone for semi-immediate posting to social media and if its only for jpegs then bluetooth is perfectly fine for that too. As with the Samsung and the Zeiss though, neither of those products are still available so when it comes to bridging real cameras to the modern world then maybe they want us old farts to stay in our lane !

For all the same reasons that @MrSMW outlined in his post above, it would have to be radically different. And for the same reasons listed in your post, it isn’t so it hasn’t. When you combine the both then it’s arguable it never will for me personally but that doesn’t mean it won’t for millions of other people. As I said in the post, it is clearly a leap forward against other iPhones but not a great a leap forward within cameras as a whole to make me think this is the way for me. There is a scene in Peep Show - and I’ve used this analogy before about phone cameras - but it still sums up my perspective about them… Jeremy is on a date in a restaurant and tastes some expensive wine and says : “Wow, this wine tastes amazing. I mean, obviously it's not really delicious like hot chocolate or coke, but for wine... brilliant." None of that stops me being interested in other people’s uses with them though. I’m trying to see through the hype about the 15 Pro Max to learn about how many people are actually now using them in a serious enough manner to be interested in a product that I may or may not have developed for it 😉

It’s not about iPhone log per se it’s just that I thus far haven’t seen anything from a phone that would persuade me to use one over a real camera. Outside of convenience that is but that’s not the be all and end all for me even though I am inherently a lazy bastard. That’s not what I said at all. I was asking the question of other people who DO own an iPhone 15 who previously carried a compact camera and using the RX100 as an example of one.

For mobile video as in literally video on mobile phones or just mobile video as in a compact setup ? If its the former then I've no real opinions as I don't use my iPhone for anything other than non-photo/video things aside from the odd snapshot. If its the latter then per my point about matching what, to me at least, is the average looking image in that particular video then for the same price as the 15 Pro Max we could probably be here all day listing options. I've seen other videos where it has been exploited better but I don't see anything in and of itself which supports it being anything other than a step forward for iPhone filming. Phone cameras have always left me cold (particularly in terms of the price of these high end iPhones) but I did have a weather eye out for this one as it might have been the one to change that. I realise I might be in a minority here but thus far it hasn't moved the needle that much for me. I'm curious to know how many people on here have one of these yet and if it has changed anything for them in terms of being a camera replacement other than it just being a better camera than their previous one. For example, has anyone who always used, say, an LX100 or an RX100 etc as a compact camera now completely dropped those and only use the 15 Pro Max ?

On the whole, I thought that was really lacklustre to be honest and I'd say that, quite appropriately, he phoned that one in. Ironically, that made it quite informative set against the slew of shock faced "OMG I can't believe I shot this cinematic masterpiece on a phone" videos on YouTube where a lot of production work has gone clearly in to them as this shows what you get out of one shooting in a more casual can't be arsed sort of manner. I can think of far cheaper cameras than the £1299 the base model costs in the UK with which to get similarly meh results with that approach. It hasn't stopped the vast majority of commenters on it saying not only is the emperor not naked but he is wearing the finest of hand woven garments though, so I'm guessing they're seeing something different to me. Filters seem to be this year's LUT packs don't they and this felt more about them than the camera.

I use this SmallRig half cage on mine which has a basic but effective HDMI clamp.

I think the Accsoon Seemo might cover a multitude of sins as it gives you all the monitoring facilities without having as much bulk as a Ninja etc as it uses your iPhone. With the OG Pocket, the big advantage is that you can deploy it or not on a per needs basis as with it being your phone you are already carrying it with you so the only extra bulk you would be carrying is the unit itself which is basically the size of a phone holder (plus battery). They are around £130 so not a particular bank breaker either. https://accsoon.com/accsoon-seemo/

Indeed. "retired" is doing a lot of heavy lifting in that statement. He "retired" in much the same way as Boris Johnson did.

And....here comes the return of Jeromy Young as MD and CEO. https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/ATOMOS-LIMITED-50061253/news/Atomos-Limited-Announces-Board-Changes-45676557/

Which is why I used the word era. Of course it won't be in perpetuity.

It records everything internally to an ide drive which everyone swaps out with a €10 adapter to record onto compact flash cards instead.

Its a 24bit 18 track recorder and each track has 16 virtual nondestructive sub tracks for alternative takes. 28 channel fully automated digital mixer, per channel effects, global effects, mastering suite function with CD burning (which shows its age!) or disk metering. Its a traditional recording studio in a box with the advantage of modern features such as copying and pasting etc so if its audio you're after then theres nothing it can't do really. Again, its the dedicated nature of it that appeals which means its fast as fuck to operate. Obviously Zoom do newer versions but they are fiddlier, lack a lot of ins/outs for aux sends, have no digital in/outs and most importantly for me lack MIDI timecode sync to use it with sequencers. Also, none of them are as affordable as this one as It only cost me €150 ! Its a complete relic really (I got my original one over 25 years ago) but for the needs I have nothing comes close to it as a standalone product. I'd say it has a reassuring heft to it at 7KG ! Size wise it isn't huge at 55 x 35 x 10 cm but it being a decent size is appropriate to the ease of use.