eatstoomuchjam

This depends entirely on the camera. If 3200 is the second native ISO, it'll look great (and probably better than 2000 or 2500). I'd even go to 4000, 5000, or in the case of like an FX3, 12800 if that matched a native ISO.

Part 1 of a "first look" of the UC12K featuring Shane Hurlbut is up:

DJI just dropped prices for the Ronin 4D series. The 6K version is now $4,999 (down from $6,800) The 8K version is now $9,999 (down from about $13,000) The raw license just went from $979 to $1. Wish I hadn't bought it just a few months ago, but that's great news for existing owners who haven't bought it yet. Note that with the base 6K package, the RAW license is likely to be useless without buying an overpriced DJI ProSSD ($800 for 1TB). https://www.cined.com/dji-ronin-4d-price-drop-raw-license-now-1-instead-of-979/ If I'm guessing, I'd say that DJI are both aiming for a big sales bump with all of the press the R4D has been getting lately (especially with Adolescence) as well as finally undercutting the Komodo-X, C80, and Ursa Cine 12K. I'd still say that it wouldn't be my choice if I only had one camera, but since I got it, it's been to set with me for every short film that I've worked on and I've used it every time. The image from it is really nice, especially from the 8K.

They pulled the launch video because of some unspecified mistake in the processing of the camera's footage. If I had to guess, I'd say they exported at the wrong resolution and then included it in the video, but that's just a guess.

The Alt Cine folks have been posting on the cinepi boards for the last little bit that they are building some cameras around cinepi with some software tweaks/additions/add-ons. Today, they announced them - all based around a super 16 Starvis sensor. Looks like they can record raw up to 4Kp60 in 12-bit readout, 4Kp30 in 16-bit readout, and 1080p90 in 12-bit. Media is cf express type b. Interface is 4" touch screen. "Eve" has a c mount and is the most affordable option, battery mount is swappable, they mentioned np-f or v-mount, though it seems like the mount is non-integrated so power will be by dc barrel only - sells for about 450-480 GBP and you need to BYO Raspberry Pi 5 (8GB) "Elite 16" has similar specs to Eve, but a nicer/more robust body (which fits the Kondor Blue V-Raptor cage) with better I/O and has integrated v-mount as well as the DC barrel. It has a Micro 4/3 mount which may or may not be electronic depending on licensing - sells for about 950 GBP and includes Raspberry Pi 5 The footage looks pretty nice (with the caveat that they're still tweaking the output). Once they're a little further along, if things are looking good, I'll probably pick up the Eve. Could be a fun camera to use with my old Super 16 lenses. The price of the Elite 16 is, I think, a good reflection of the time and effort they put into it, but for me, the body size and cost are a bit more than I'd be excited to pay for a super 16 setup.

I have multiple types of raw available to me here (Canon, BM Raw, PRR, and Red). They're all very nice and if you spend time working with them, you can get very good results. A lot of times, the perceived secret sauce seems to be in how nice the images look immediately after import and before adjustments are made - and that's how I perceive it. The Komodo-X has it, the Komodo has it (but a little less). The Ronin 4D has it. The C70 has it (maybe I'll miss mine now that I traded it in). The Ursa Cine 12K... might have it? The one time I took it out was inconclusive since the weather here has been a bit shit for the last couple of weeks. The sunset I shot looked nice, though. The GFX 100 II has it, but less than some of the others. The EOS R5 does not have it. The raw that comes from it is totally fine. You can work with it and get nice results. Skin tones are generally very nice SOOC. I don't think I ever once, though, have imported files from mine and thought "Wow, that's amazing."

This is why I standardized on Arca-Swiss a long time ago. They're available in all kinds of sizes, native on a bunch of different tripod/monopod heads, converter plates for them are plentiful and cheap (for those that don't natively accept them), and there are even some that have feet. They're also available in a bunch of different lengths - from little Peak Design square models to great big 6+ inch plates - and the same goes for the receivers. I use the ones with feet on bigger/heavier cameras where they don't change the weight meaningfully and it's nice to be able to set them down without them tipping one way or the other. Also, for some tripod/monopod heads that don't natively use Arca-Swiss, there are sometimes converter kits available - I converted a couple of my older Manfrotto heads with kits from Hejnar.

To be clear, the only "complaint" is that it's in a bulky $3,000 camera that probably won't produce an image that's better than a smaller/lighter camera that I can buy for $800 which has the same sensor and can, I assume, record the same raw codec if I connect it to a VA 12G. Keep in mind also that "mediocre" does not mean "bad." I'm using it in the context of middle-of-the-pack. It's also hard to judge from some random clips that somebody on a forum might choose to show something - especially when you have no idea of the conditions in which a clip was exposed. Like with a lot of things, it's best to do the test for oneself. And if you have no real interest in the camera and in testing it for yourself, that's totally valid too.

Oh! I have absolutely no idea! Seems plausible, given frame rates, etc. I have no personal experience with either, though stuff I've seen shot on the original S5 has looked very nice (and outside of YouTube, I've not seen much shot on the II). "Looks a bit better than a $1800 camera" is still not a great selling point for a $3,000 camera, though. 😅 There's nothing wrong with Pyxis and it even has some great additions like doing power+display over USB-C for the monitor - which also apparently means that I can get a pretty nice touchscreen monitor with camera control for my Ursa Cine for $300 (if I don't want to use the fold-out screen that's already the same size)? That's pretty cool. Though I think that I need to give the camera 26v to deliver power over the front monitor port. Yes. And now that I go to look at their site to understand it, I see that there is the "Pocket Cinema Camera" line-up which contain M43 and S35 sensors with the "Pro" at the top of the lineup. And then I see that there's a "Cinema Camera" which is full frame. I guess that since none of the cameras could possibly fit in a pocket (Matt Granger excluded!), the "Pocket" must refer to the size of the sensor? Anyway. Without meaning to, I'll forget all about that now so apologies in advance for the lack of clarity when future me calls the full frame the "Pro" again.

Evil boss: "Now... we're going to kill you with these lasers. We have the best lasers. Elon made the lasers. Folks, nobody has ever even seen lasers like these. And the best part is nobody knows you're here." Henchman: "Sorry, boss. I accidentally included the other agent who escaped on a text message chain about the execution and gave lots of details about the location and time. You know how you sometimes have a contact, but it has somebody else's number attached to it" Evil boss: "I'm sure they didn't notice. Everybody makes mistakes." (After Bond escapes yet again with the help of the other agent) Evil boss: "I never said anything about lasers. I don't even know what a laser is. Biden probably left that laser on when he left."

So... a pretty old sensor that's a bit "meh" by today's standards. It's a fantastic sensor to find in an $600-800 used camera - a bummer to find in a brand new $3,000 one. I strongly considered picking one up when they got so cheap - as above, that was a hell of a value. I will freely admit that the naming for BM's consumer/prosumer cameras confuses me. 😅 Well, that's actually awesome! Nikon cameras suddenly got a lot more interesting to me! 😅

Pyxis uses a pretty old sensor that is extremely meh by today's standards - and it's basically the same one as in another cheaper camera from BMD that was out for at least a year first. I think a lot of the target market already had the other one and if you already have a 6K pro, there's not much reason to buy a boxier camera with the same sensor. That said, it's full frame and has dual native ISO so depending on use case, it could still be a desirable choice over Komodo. Same if a person has a bunch of L mount glass. It's a good point about 16-bit vs 12-bit raw encoding. Also, FWIW, I suspect that at least the alpha channel of ProRes RAW is 16-bit to match ProRes 4444 XQ - even if the color channels are encoded as 12-bit log. It might be one of the reasons that Ronin 4D files seem to have extra "mojo" since it, like some Sony cameras (with Atomos), is sending 16-bit linear to the encoder. Whatever it is, it's enough that DJI advertise on their website that it stores 16-bit ProRes RAW. 😃

There's not much point in arguing about whose raw codec is best. There's a good chance that N-RAW, ProRes RAW, and even BM Raw are better than it in many ways - unless something has changed, Red's is apparently based on Cineform raw which was released in 2005. It's nearly as old as H.264. In some ways, sure - but one could say also that in a well-lit scene, a lot of people wouldn't notice a difference between a GH5 and an Arri - or BMPCC 4K, Panasonic S5, or any number of cameras available for less than $1k on the used market. Of graded footage? That's going to be down more to the skill of the person doing the grading. And for a side-by-side comparison of ungraded footage, I don't have a Z8. I also suspect that if you google it, you'll find a bunch of people saying that the Red footage has magic for them and a bunch of people saying it's nothing special. If you've found nothing special about Red raw from your Epic, I doubt that you'll find Komodo footage to be special. 😃 I like it, though. Understandable. An Epic brain is more than 2kg, even before adding I/O modules. I suspect it's closer to 3kg before it could be used at all. The OG Komodo, on the other hand, is just about 1kg (a whopping 90g more than the Z8) and the only thing is needs to become usable is a fairly small Canon battery. I'd add a monitor so that doesn't need to be held at waist level to see the small built-in screen - that's more weight than the integrated screen on the Z8, but it's also a 5" screen instead of a 3" or so screen. In terms of dimensions, the Komodo is barely bigger than a Canon R5 - and even closer in size to a Z8. I've gone on hikes with the Komodo-X which is a bit bigger/heavier than the Komodo. It didn't bother me at all to carry it with a small v-mount and some of Canon's plastic consumer RF primes - or with the EF adapter with an inline filter slot and smaller EF lenses. That said, it's not my first choice for hiking or travel. There are a whole lot of reasons that I'd choose the GFX 100 for that - and it's the opposite of the Komodo in almost every way. 😅

If your basis for comparison is a small mirrorless camera, the Komodo is certainly a bit big and unwieldy. Though with the right accessories (which, of course, increase the cost), it's not really all that much so (I'm excited for RVLVR to get in their production cables for using Clutch with Komodo). Compared with the Nikon Z8 specifically, the Komodo has about 1 stop more of DR at base ISO and is global shutter (6K) vs 15ms (in 8K). Are either of those things going to be world-changing? Would things like EVF and IBIS make up for them? That's up to the individual and their use case. For Z8 vs OG Komodo, I'd also be willing to bet that the Z8 looks a hell of a lot better in low light since it's dual native ISO - and Komodo is ISO invariant and everything is just metadata from ISO 800. For mounting to a car on rough roads (my use case), IBIS is not only a minus, but may result in destruction of the camera after a while - those magnets are only so strong and unless some manufacturer has changed it, turning off IBIS doesn't result in a physical clamp holding the sensor in place. They just try to hold it in place with the same magnets that do IBIS. Komodo was created to be a crash camera and it shows - a lot of the UX for it is weird and awkward. Ports are in a dumb place on the bottom rear of the camera. There's no front record button - just a weird little nub on the side of the camera. I'd also say that vs my OG R5 or my old Sigma fp, I feel like there's some "magic" in the Komodo files when I edit/grade them - but that sort of thing is highly subjective.

Wow! The Komodo-X is, generally speaking, a better camera than the Komodo. Button placement is better, low light performance is better, I/O placement is better, CF Express vs CFast, native V mount, and (of course) frame rates. But it is not, and I mean not 2.3x better (K-X is still selling for $7k as far as I can see). The difference got smaller with the latest firmware release when they added user pages to the OG Komodo (they're huge for making the camera faster/easier to use). I just sent in a bunch of stuff for trade-in and held back my Z Cam E2-S6G for mounting on the car in dusty environments since it's robust and fanless. The new pricing has me thinking that maybe I should just trade it in toward a dedicated car mounted Komodo and I could just tape a dust filter over the air intake. Once used prices catch up with the changed new pricing, this becomes a crazy good deal! Dang, it's an exciting time to be a low-budget filmmaker.