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Interesting little camera.. the lens options seem to be quite good too (unlike the FF systems right now). The reviews say it doesn't have IBIS? How is the DR and low-light on it? I couldn't find any DR tests except people parroting the claims from Fuji, and we all now that DR specs are amongst the least trustworthy pieces of information available across all of human history. Yes, MFT prices seem to have risen, I assume it's because they only release large flagship cameras now. Yet another one of the [everyone says X online] -> [manufacturers respond] -> [everyone complains about cameras on offer] pattern of behaviour. I've been thinking about this more since posting and I think I'd actually prefer an MFT solution. I watched some video of the S9 and new 18-40mm f4.5-6.3 kit lens, and even at 18mm F4.5 it still has enough background blur to make me nervous about focusing. [we want crazy-shallow DoF] -> [manufacturers go all-in on larger sensors] -> [now everything is out of focus.. waaaaah] On MFT focusing is still an issue of course, but the issue is typically acquiring focus, not selecting which thing in the frame to focus on. Of all the focusing failures I've seen over the last ~5 years, 90% of them are it successfully focusing on the wrong thing. With MFT I don't have this issue. Encouraging news! I did wonder if it would swing in this direction. When out shooting / touristing I've actually heartily embraced the dorky-dad aesthetic because it encourages locals to give you a bit of leeway if I'm accidentally rude or film them when they'd prefer not to be, and it also separates me from the vacuous volumes of professional narcissists. Before I switched to WFH I shot a number of times in the CBD before work to test a camera, and when you're wearing office attire and shooting with a camera people seem to get very paranoid. I was shooting a composition of people walking through my shot (away from the camera) and one guy stopped right in the middle of the frame and then stood there for ages. At the time I was just annoyed because it ruined my shot. When I looked at the footage later it turned out that he clocked me with a sideways glance, then stopped, pulled out his phone and using the selfie camera to see behind him without turning around he super-zoomed in on me and took lots of photos of me. I'd assume he was a conspiracy nut.

You'd have to find a direct comparison to compare the two.. I recently saw an FX30 latitude test and the way the person exposed it for the 'normal' exposure it had almost no stops under but heaps of stops over, so it might be that the different sensors and log profiles are skewing things rather differently. I say this because I've noticed that in high-DR scenes you might want to expose things in a non-normal way, ETTR or ETTL. Everyone knows about ETTR, but I discovered that with the GX85 you want to ETTL because what's clipped is clipped but you can bring up the image 1-2 stops in post, so if there are higher-DR scenes then you'd ETTL in order to avoid clipping things too hard.

Absolutely. But, this is where things are highly contextual. I've written about this before, but the summary was: Priority 1: Get the shot - You can't use the shots you didn't get. Priority 2: Get shots in the best way - Shots that are in focus, aren't shaky, have usable composition, don't have nervous-looking subjects or people in the background are staring at the camera, etc. Priority 4: Get the nicest image quality - Insert all the normal camera stuff here... DR, colour science, etc. No, I didn't mis-number this, priority 4 is so far away from priority 1 & 2 that there is no Priority 3. Now to context. When I came up with that I was shooting my family and friends. The most frequent Priority 1 challenge was security guards wouldn't let you shoot in museums, art galleries, shopping centres, some zoos, and even in parks if you had a "professional looking" camera, and the most frequent Priority 2 challenges were that I couldn't frame up fast enough to catch the moment, shots weren't in focus, and were too shaky. The only times that Priority 4 challenges came up was shooting shots where they weren't moving, or random shots without them in it, like landscapes and street scenes of markets etc. I also spent a lot of time analysing professional and award-winning edits of similar materials (travel / travel food shows such as Parts Unknown, Chefs Table, Street Food, as well as YT) and I discovered that in the professional stuff: the quality of their shots is solid but not breathtaking the quantity of shots was stunning - they're shooting vast quantities of material (one 45 minute episode had 2000 cuts!) the magic came from the structure, the interweaving of images combined with music and sound design, and the layering of interviews with voice-over narration I used to shoot with the GH5 and manual primes as my main camera, but recently realised that the GX85 with AF zooms was the faster way to go, because it was smaller and less 'pro' looking so got into more places and when I was using it the AF and zooms made far more shots in focus, I got far more shots because I was quick enough, and lots less shots had random people in the background staring. The GX85 became my main camera for this reason. Then the kids moved out and so the previous trip (which inspired this post) was just about the location, so I knew that Priority 1 and 2 would be far easier to satisfy. In South Korea many of the interesting places are public spaces (street malls and markets, not big shopping centres - although they have those too) so no security guards to worry about, and because I can mostly take all the time I need to frame up and expose and focus, mostly it came down to image quality. However, you'll notice my setup wasn't only the BMMCC. It was the BMMCC and GX85 for a reason. My thinking on the previous trips and for my next one is that there are four types of places where I might shoot: Tourist places like lookouts etc, where everyone expects people to be filming Use the big camera Public places that are busy but not touristy, where people wouldn't be surprised to see someone filming Take both setups and try the big camera but switch if you have to Public places that people wouldn't expect to see someone shooting Take the small camera, try with a zoom but swap to pancake lens if required, or use phone Places where shooting wouldn't be expected and maybe not welcomed Take the small camera and pancake lens in a pocket and keep it in the pocket when not taking a shot, but potentially grab quick shots with phone instead In terms of the logistics, the BMMCC requires a backpack anyway because the rig is too large for a sling bag, so any time I take it anywhere I take the GX85, zoom, and pancake lens as well. The GX85 and zoom fit into a sling bag, and the other zoom and pancake lens also fit in there, so I take those too. This means I can always "downsize" the rig I'm shooting with, depending on the situation. This is the setup I plan to take on the next one. There's no way I'd just take the "big camera", regardless of what it was (GH5, GH7, BMMCC, Komodo, etc).

Update.. I've booked another trip for next year, and have been doing the post-trip analysis and working out what I'll do for next time. We all know the BMMCC sits in a very narrow niche of size, performance, and features, so I won't rehash that, but I figured my analysis on alternatives might be useful to anyone else still interested in this camera. Options Keep the same setup as I used previously Big camera: BMMCC with 12-35mm F2.8 Small tourist camera: GX85 with 14-140mm Tiny stealth camera: GX85 with 14/2.5 Extreme low light: GX85 with 7.5/2 + 17/1.4 + 50/1.2 Buy: nothing Pros: no cost, known setup Cons: no AF - manually focusing took time but wasn't a huge deal some moire - only a few shots had moire dim monitor - only a problem when in bright sunlight limited low-light when hand-holding - native ISO with 12-35/2.8 lens is 'enough' for ok lit places but not for dim places, and my fast primes don't have OIS so aren't usable with a tiny hand-held rig limited focal range when on tripod in low-light - I like to shoot little scenes at night from out the hotel window and the 50mm is the longest fast lens roll not stabilised - OIS can't stabilise roll so footage does have roll jitters from hand-holding in a smallish percentage of the shots Same setup but minor upgrades Buy a brighter monitor to get visible screen in bright conditions Buy OLPF to ensure no moire Buy 85mm F1.4 to get fast tele for low-light Use my OG BMPCC As cool as the OG BMPCC is, is still suffers from most of the issues of the BMMCC as well as introducing new ones. The monitor doesn't articulate at all, is useless in almost all daylight situations, and is the wrong polarisation for my sunglasses so is black, so I'd still need an external monitor and therefore I'd need a rig for it to protect the notoriously fragile tiny-HDMI connector on the side. It also needs an external power solution. All to give me one of the slowest AF mechanisms ever invented. Use the GX85 only This really simplifies the setup with one camera, but severely limits the dynamic range. This is important for any time the sun is low, which is a lot when you're on holiday, but is also (surprisingly) more of a problem at night when you want to be able to see the people walking in the streets but don't want to blow out the people inside the shops and bars and restaurants eating etc. I've done a bunch of side-by-side tests recently and have (finally) managed to get the GX85 files to have some of the mojo of the BMMCC, so I'm less obsessed with the filmic and organic look of the BMMCC that I was. It's really about DR, which just isn't enough to consider this a good alternative to the BMMCC, and is a recurring weakness for other options. Use my GH5 as the main camera DR is still poor compared to BMMCC (almost two stops less?) Flippy screen is a PITA because to tilt it (I like to shoot from the hip and high angles) you have to flip it out to the side first AF is solved (I only use AF-S so no worries there) Moire is solved Dim monitor is solved Low-light when hand-holding is solved - I can use the 12-35/2.8 with a higher ISO or use the primes with IBIS Focal range when on tripod in low-light is partly solved - I can use the 14-140mm F3.5-5.6 with higher ISOs Roll stabilisation is also solved by IBIS Buy GH5ii Same as above, but DR is only around one stop less and instead of being free it's AUD1500. Not worth it compared to other options. Buy BMMSC 4K G2 Same as current BMMCC setup, but.. No AF without having that stupid handle that's larger than the entire rest of the rig Moire is fixed Dim monitor still an issue Low-light when hand-holding is fixed due to dual-ISO (400 and 3200) which means 12-35mm f2.8 lens on this becomes equivalent of a T1.4 lens on BMMCC Focal range when on tripod in low-light is also partially fixed as 14-140mm F3.5-5.6 becomes equivalent to T1.8-2.8 on BMMCC Roll still not stabilised Additional issues including: Large file sizes from 4K BRAW, must buy SSD, must buy mount and cable protectors for SSD, cost around AUD1500 plus SSD plus cage Buy GH6 DR is better to BMMCC AF is fixed Moire is fixed Dim monitor is fixed Low-light when hand-holding is fixed - native ISO for V-Log in DR Boost mode is ISO 2000(!) Focal range when on tripod in low-light is also fixed by high native ISO 2000 so the 14-140mm lens is good enough Low light becomes so good that I don't even need to take the fast primes on the trip (I'd still take the 14/2.5 pancake lens for use with the GX85) Roll is stabilised High-DR scenes had streaking issues that I'm pretty sure I'd encounter, considering I am shooting scenes where I am simultaneously clipping the white and black points of the BMMCC which has 11.2/12.5 stops of DR AUD2500+(!!) Buy GH7 This fixes all the issues with the BMMCC. DR is much better than the BMMCC AF is PDAF Moire is fixed Dim monitor is fixed Low-light when hand-holding and focal range when on tripod in low-light are both fixed, and I don't need to bring the fast primes Roll is stabilised by IBIS Also doesn't have the issues that other options have: Screen tilts as well as flips Can record internal Prores (not Prores RAW, although it does that too) at various resolutions (down to 1080p) and in various flavours No streaking or image issues The only downside is the cost - AUD3400 or so currently. Non-MFT cameras This is pretty simple, there are no good options currently available that are equivalent prices. Any non-MFT option currently suffers from at least one of the following issues: Variable aperture 10x zoom lens options don't exist or are large or heavy or both Faster 3x zoom lenses are typically large / heavy I have to buy a new body as well as at least two new lenses, which simply can't compete with the price of just an MFT body I also suck at selling things, so that's a whole hurdle I'd rather not have to deal with. I also seem to keep finding uses for old gear, so there's a reluctance there too. Conclusion My conclusions were pretty simple: The reduction in DR from the free options (using the GX85 or GH5 only) weren't worth the benefits, especially as things like the dim screen / moire / roll shake weren't bad enough in practice The cost of the GH5ii, BMMSC 4K G2 (plus SSD), and GH6 weren't worth it considering how many issues they didn't solve (or new issues they introduced) Therefore the GH7 was the only worthwhile option currently around So, my decision is that unless I'm buying a GH7, I shouldn't invest in anything that doesn't align with that direction. Considering I don't want to casually spend AUD3500 right now, this means I'll be keeping the current setup, perhaps with a few minor things if they're not that expensive. The advantage of this do-almost-nothing approach is that when I get around to looking to upgrade, I won't have locked myself further into the MFT ecosystem than I am now, so if I decide to change systems later on I still can. I also looked at the RED Komodo and found even a minimal rig was about 3x the weight of the BMMCC rig, so would be too heavy even if I could afford it. So that eliminates all cinema cameras too, making things like buying a fancy external monitor a waste when my next camera is likely a MILC. Hope this is useful 🙂

Yep, P4K over the M4K, the only problem is that it's 112% wider, 23% deeper, 46% taller, and 140% heavier... and if you do a volume comparison, it's literally 3.8x larger. This doesn't count things like the battery jutting out the back of the M2K and the monitor you'll need for the M2K (but might also want for the P2K as the screen doesn't articulate), but still, you're going from one of the smallest cameras around to one of the largest! The camera market for cinema cameras sure is strange at this lowest end of size and capabilities. I did a big comparison trying to work out what alternatives there might be for the BMMCC and one thing that I worked out was that a RED Komodo setup was at least three times the weight of a BMMCC rig.

The other major changes that I noted with the BMMSC4KG2 were: B-RAW only No internal recording - SSD or external recorder required (and appropriate rigging) There's some strange things about the monitor setup IIRC - something like the menu options only appear on the 1080p HDMI output and the 4K SDI output can only output 10-bit and not RAW so depending on how you use it you might need two monitors, or to swap between the inputs on the one monitor but only be able to see a clean feed If you want to control it via USB (like if you have the handle accessory) and also want to record to SSD then I think it works but you might need a USB hub, and if so not sure if it needs power Compared to the BMMCC it's actually very different and has a bunch of strange quirks. It really is a studio camera designed to work while streaming and being remote-controlled. The fact it can record to a USB SSD and has the minimum number of buttons a camera could possibly have make it possible to use as a cinema camera, but it's sure a hell of a long way short of being nice to use as a cinema camera. The way I think of it is that the BMMCC is fiddly and annoying in many ways, and in those ways this one is worse!

Yeah, cheaper, but not that much cheaper! I guess my challenge with these is that they're both around a third of the price of the BM Micro Studio camera, which apart from coming with an OLPF installed, also provides: 4K sensor that is larger (MFT vs S16) Will have greater DR than the 1080p one on a 1080p timeline (because new one will be downsampled to 1080p from 4K) Dual ISO More bitrate options - from 3:1 to 12:1 Plus, it's a brand-new camera not one that's potentially almost a decade old. The OG BMMCC seems pretty well made, but electronics don't have an infinite shelf life.

Thanks, this is interesting info. I haven't looked into them yet, except to see the price and have my eyes go really wide! I didn't know they're also an IR/UV cut filter, which is useful although not much of a deal for me as mine is just joined at the hip with my vND filter. Also interesting to note with minimal loss of resolution, this is perhaps the greatest weakness of the BMMCC I think - imagine the image if it was a 2.5K sensor. @PannySVHS do you know what version you have? I did get moire on my trip, but it was only on a handful of shots IIRC, so although a problem, a pretty minor one, and for the kind of stuff I'm shooting which is atmospheric shots and nothing in-particular, if I miss a shot it isn't critical.

Great stuff! Lots of little interesting stuff to notice in there, like you making sure people are clapping in time to your soundtrack, etc. Some fun characters too - there's nothing like a grumpy person staring down the barrel of the camera lens! Those Sony 6000 series cameras can make some great images. I was considering the A6300 at one point, but an IBIS bug put me off at the time. I think the major issue for those cameras was that getting good colour out of them required more skill than people had at the time. Now there's more support for folks in terms of tools like colour management, the film emulation plugins, and more knowledge of colour grading techniques, so it's much easier to make the most of the files. Amusing about your son - kids are funny sometimes. Just as I thought I'd figured mine out (even just partially) they'd change and go through a new stage and I'd go back to being completely confused again!

I can verify I bought my BMMCC + rig from @mercer and would definitely recommend buying from him 🙂 I'm contemplating getting an OLPF for my BMMCC but you have mentioned this before and it stuck in my mind as a reason to avoid it. Did you try compensating with a bit of post-sharpening? It's a Smallrig one. I can't see it on their website now, so I assume it's superseded, but it just tilts forwards/backwards and attaches with 1/4-20 bolts to the camera and monitor. Shouldn't be too hard to find a reasonable one that fits what you want. If I take the BMMCC with me on my next trip in April next year then I'm contemplating a new monitor that's a lot brighter. I did a side-by-side with the BMMCC and GX85 on the beach a few weeks ago and literally couldn't see the Ikan at all, but the GX85 screen was totally usable.

Another thought, I really think it's down to the IBIS implementation. The GH5 has two IBIS modes, one that smoothes motion, and the other eliminates it creating a stationary frame. The normal smoothing one is how you describe, but it's the other one that's of interest. If you put it in that tripod mode, but then pan the camera, it keeps a stationary frame until you've moved it too far and it realises it has to 'follow' you, and if you keep panning you get the smoothest pans I've ever seen without sticks. The level of stabilisation is incredible. When you're doing it the feeling is a cross between pulling the frame through treacle and one of those time-warp things where reality is delayed (because it moves a second or two after you start, and then it keeps moving a bit after you stop again). I really miss that mode on the GX85, as it only has a normal smoothing mode, and if you hold it steady the frame sort of floats around randomly because it didn't completely eliminate all the motion. Interestingly, the OIS from the 12-35mm F2.8 on the OG BMPCC and BMMCC (which don't have IBIS) tries to keep a much more stable frame - if you hold it steady then it will have a much more 'locked off' shot with far less drift than the 'normal' modes from the Panny cameras. I haven't compared it between cameras, so it might be the lens, or might be the camera doing this. I think there could be a lot of benefit if they included several levels of smoothing on the IBIS mechanisms. Light, Medium, Heavy, and Tripod modes would be very useful I think.

I was the opposite - it was the hand-held shots in the car etc where I saw the jumping the most. That's why, to me at least, using a tripod for the buildings etc will fix those but still leave a gap for the in-transit hand-held moments. Thus my earlier reply about addressing that gap. This style of video is something I've been thinking about a lot for myself, and the way I see it is that to create some movement and contrast in the edit, I'd mix up pacing and subject matter such that there are in-transit shots, abstract shots, wides, teles, people, architecture, looking up, low-angles, high angles, shots with diagonals and leading lines, shots with lines horizontal and vertical lines (e.g. from looking at a building straight on), etc. I've also been contemplating an enhanced way to do the sound design too, so that it fits better with the edit.

Depending on your preferences, there might be benefit to testing some options for stabilising hand-held shooting as well as taking a tripod. For example you had lots of shots inside vehicles and while on the move, where a tripod isn't really practical. What I mean is that for things like IBIS, if you can reduce the shake from being just-too-much for the IBIS to instead where it is operating within its travel, you can cut out all that jumping/lurching that the IBIS does when movement is beyond its limitations. This might only require a reduction of (say) 30% of camera shake but could reduce the vast majority of shake-related issues in the resulting footage. Things to consider to stabilise hand-held shooting could include: Different ways you hold the camera (where your hands are gripping the camera) Different positions of your arms (e.g. shooting at belly height and pushing your elbows into your sides) Use of extras like wearing a camera strap and pulling the camera tight against it as a third point-of-contact Adding something small/foldable to the camera (table tripod sort-of thing) that can act as a stabiliser like an Edelkrone FlexTILT which can obviously act as a table tripod but can also act as a handle when hand-holding, or can even be extended backwards to form a shoulder-rig or pressed against the chest as a third point-of-contact You could even get a very compact/light travel tripod and hand-hold the camera with it attached, essentially using it as mass to make the rig heavier and larger. Alternatively, you could shoot much wider for such shots and then stabilise aggressively in post with a large crop. This risks having shake-related motion-blur in the shot that doesn't align to the post-stabilised motion of the final frames, but it can work in many situations. My approach is to use as much stabilisation as possible (ideally technique+rig+OIS+IBIS with post-stabe if required), so that all the mechanisms are operating comfortably within their ranges and will therefore create less artefacts and also allow more usable shots. For b-roll where no specific shots are critical, there's also merit in just shooting a lot and being pickier in the edit 🙂

Nice! I think the FLC is a bit of a game changer for trying to get higher-end looks with non-cine-cameras. You could get most of the same results doing things manually, but it makes it so much easier and faster to do that it really unlocks it. What lens(es) did you use?

Yeah, it's definitely geared towards remote control. For a run-n-gun setup, by the time you add the zoom demand, it's now larger than the P4K, which is truly saying something. I genuinely don't know what I'll do for my next trip, although the likely option is to keep the same setup as there's nothing out there that is better without also having massive downsides or a massive cost associated with it.

"I don't shoot coverage, I know what I am doing" 🤣🤣🤣

If you start with the desired aesthetic and then ask yourself what the equipment and settings are that creates that aesthetic, then you quickly realise that anything above 24/25/30p is a specialist tool. For me, 60p conformed to 24/25/30p creates an aesthetic that is surreal. If the subject motion is significant then it can pass for reality but through a highly intense emotional lens. I've seen shots that were 60p but didn't look unnatural in situations of extreme grief, shock, and euphoria due to love, drugs, or adrenaline. The aesthetic of 120p conformed to 24/25/30p is absolutely into the territory of a special effect. I filmed dozens of hours of footage from my kids sports games in 120p and am very familiar with the look, and it screams at the viewer that they're watching special effects footage. This is appropriate for heavily stylised content such as fight scenes or extreme action shots that take place outside reality, for example movies that are set in someone's mind or in virtual reality etc. 120p doesn't align with our senses observing our reality, except perhaps if there was an incredible amount of drugs involved. The other potential uses for 120p or slower is to see things that aren't noticeable to the naked eye. Documentaries showing animals doing thing very quickly like frogs shooting their tongues at bugs, birds diving into water to catch fish etc. This is a special effect but a useful one to extend our perception in time. The Slowmo Guys on YT make great use of this. The upgrade of a smartphone from 1080p120 to 4k120 is of almost zero practical use in film-making. Discussion of it at length outside of a very narrow niche can only be academic or fetishistic.

BM support replied, and yeah, no camera control from Video Assist units. "Unfortunately you cannot control any settings from the Video Assist units. The only controls a Video Assist supports is trigger recording. For the control functions you require, the options available are either through the ATEM control protocol, if you have one of our ATEM vision switchers, or you can use the REST API over USB Ethernet for external control via HTTP." Seems like if it can trigger start/stop then a protocol is there, so it should be possible for them to do it, but with the PYXIS monitor being over USB and therefore a completely different implementation it seems unlikely they'll convert the VA units to control their Studio series. I guess all hope for a tiny BM cine camera now lies in them releasing a new Micro model that uses the Pyxis monitor. This would be an incredible option actually, as the monitor has full camera control, it's nice and bright, is compact and light-weight, and draws power from the camera so no more duplicate battery situation. However, if you live in the real world then don't wait on a fantasy to come true.

It very much seems like segmentation in their product lines and development departments. The studio team created a range of cameras designed to be remote controlled and mixed etc, and they setup (what looks like) a comprehensive control system through the ATEM products. The "cameras that leave the building" team created the cinema camera range with screens and buttons, and the Video Assist range, and probably don't care their monitor doesn't have a way to control the hermit cameras from the other department. Definitely seems like a lost opportunity to have one camera be useful in both scenarios though.

Just read that thread, and yeah, it's a mixed bag. It seems like a great studio camera, but in an attempt to cost-cut or simplify or <insert some reason or other here> they hamstrung its ability to replace the BMMCC and be used outside the studio. Once again I'm reminded of the "industry blind spot" of camera size. If it's small then it's unnecessarily crippled, and if it's not crippled then it's physically large, and if it's neither then it's old and people are sitting around saying "they don't make them like they used to".

This looks like a great solution - you'd know by touch which button you're on. Awesome stuff! Pity it wasn't made more ergonomic from the factory.

Perhaps even more strangely, you can only have gyro enabled when OIS is disabled on the lens.

Interesting work-around but realistically for me, anything that makes me move from MFT glass will have to compete with me moving to any other camera system available, so it's a much larger investment for me and there's much stiffer competition involved. If I got the Video Assist can that control the camera? BM say "External Control: LANC, SDI and HDMI start/stop and timecode run." on the tech specs page for the Video Assist, which doesn't seem like "full camera control for all BM cameras". The camera page says: " External Control Blackmagic Zoom Demand and Blackmagic Focus Demand for controlling your camera and lens from tripod handles. Blackmagic Control Protocol over SDI and HDMI for external control when used with a compatible ATEM switcher with ATEM Software Control or ATEM Camera Control Panel. Includes control of some camera settings, focus, iris and zoom with compatible lenses, color corrector, tally and record start and stop to external media via USB expansion port. Camera Control REST API over USB Ethernet for external control via HTTP when used with REST client applications such as Postman. " If you search for "Blackmagic Control Protocol" then you get no hits that also mention the Video Assist units, so it seems like the answer is no. I've just emailed support asking so we'll see what they say. The more I look at this, the more that I think the options for replacing the BMMCC are either: 1) don't 2) wait for BGH1 to get updated with a GH7 sensor in it 3) GH7 4) some other camera system entirely, likely with significantly larger lenses

I have the BMMCC, and completely agree about the buttons being irritating beyond words. I set it up to be native ISO, 5600K WB, 23.976p, 180 shutter, and set the 12-35mm F2.8 lens to be at F2.8, and then there's no need to interact with the camera during use at all. Everything is done via the vND or lens focus or zoom rings. Occasionally I would run out of ND in very bright situations and so would stop down to F5.6, but that's a moment of fumbling every few hours of use, so not completely intolerable. If you can check I'd appreciate it. If there's no way to trigger an AF from the body then it makes it a non-AF camera or requires a pretty significant change to the rig. If it does allow it, I think I'd probably put a small dot of superglue on the button so it's easy to feel which is the right one.

Does anyone have one of these? If so, what do the buttons do in record mode? I'd assume that the Up and Down buttons adjust aperture, like the BMMCC does, but what does the SET button do? Hopefully it triggers the AF? I've read the manual and it doesn't mention it in there. If the SET button doesn't trigger the AF, can it be configured to do so?