The video content from my Blackmagic Pocket Camera journey in one simple place….

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un canale in tasca from Philip Bloom on Vimeo.

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No prizes for guessing what the title means… 🙂

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This is a simple little piece of shots I did using the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera whilst arriving in Venice and going down the canals o the location of the workshop. Shot 30p and conformed to 25p in cinema tools to give a teeny bit of slow motion and smooth things out a bit.

I wanted a more classically shot example of footage from the camera even though a lot of this is handheld using the Zacuto Marauder Rig ( gopb.co/ marauder) which gave more steadiness and reduced the rolling shutter issues. The tripod had way too much fine vibration going through it from the boat’s motor but there are still a few shots from the tripod. I REALLY needed a Gondola!

Minimal warp Stabilise was used in Premiere CC to steady it more. It’s a tricky plugin when there is a lot of work to do and the frame changes so much, after all the boat is moving the whole time….it’s close to being spot on though!

This was shot for the upcoming part 3 of the Blackmagic Pocket Camera review which is coming in a couple of weeks or so after I have spent more quality time with the camera!

Glass used was Lumix 7-14mm F4 and 12-35 F2.8

Music: Verdi Nabucco Chorus of the Hebrew Slavescvppbbanner

Blackmagic Pocket Camera Review Part 1 from Philip Bloom Reviews & Tutorials on Vimeo.

MUSIC COURTESY OF THE MUSIC BED: gopb.co/musicbed All credits at end of video.

STAY TILL THE END!! 🙂

Made in conjunction with CVP.COM

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Blackmagic Pocket Camera Review Part 2: The real world from Philip Bloom Reviews & Tutorials on Vimeo.

Although this review has been partly subsidised by CVP, about 10x more time and effort has gone into making these than what that covered. In fact, it only covered a fraction of Part 1. So, if you find any of these reviews helpful or useful and want to help keep them going in the future, I have activated tipjar on them. Thanks if you do use it!

Part 2 of my 3 part review of the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera. This is the one where it’s all filmed on location finding out what is it actually like to shoot with?

Music is all supplied by The Music Bed gopb.co/musicbed apart from Gustav Holst, Mars

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a pocket home video from Philip Bloom on Vimeo.

I took a break from editing part 2 of the Blackmagic pocket camera review to spend the afternoon with my family down in Kent. Although taking a break for me doesn’t mean leaving the camera behind of course! Last time with them, it was medium format film and my Leica M 240. Yesterday, it was the pocket camera.

I really wanted to try out my vintage Angenieux 17.5-70mm zoom as well as an OIS lens on the camera. The 14-140mm kit lens. Plus I had dug out my old wooden “rifle butt” shoulder support from my 8mm bolex. This way I could get more stable shots and lose that fine vibration that mars the camera without a rig or IS.

It’s a great little rig, you can see pictures of it on my blog. It’s for when I want to look utterly unprofessional whilst being professional! The lovely Zacuto Marauder rig looks far too pro for filming in places where I shouldn’t. This simple piece of wood does what I need when shooting in basic mode with the camera!

This is taken from part two of the review and was shot actually after I shot part 2, which technically breaks the idea of the review being evolving, but I had this lovely footage and I wanted to use it!

Part 3 hasn’t been filmed at all yet, so don’t expect it for at least a week. I am off to Venice tomorrow. Maybe I will do some filming there? 🙂

Music courtesy of The Music Bed. gopb.co/musicbed
“My my love” by Joshua Radin

Graded with FilmConvert 2 within Premiere CC. 10% off with code bloom or via this link gopb.co/filmconvert

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Hiding Place from Philip Bloom on Vimeo.

This is a subtle regrade but also looks different, as I have spent a lot of time fine tuning the shots within Premiere CC and Warp Stabilze (but used in the tiniest amount mostly using position, which keeps some of the wobble and shakiness and loses that shifting warping perspective). I did lots of experimentation to make it still look like handheld, and this is the 2nd version I have uploaded as the 1st one looked too “warpy!”

It’s also uploaded in ProRes Proxy, which actually was around the same size file as my high bitrate H264. The H264 couldn’t handle the fine detail, but the prores proxy did and Vimeo’s conversion holds that.

I prefer it and am much happier now. I didn’t need to do much for the night stuff as I had the Zacuto Marauder rig for that, so it was much steadier! USE A RIG! Always better to stabilise when shooting. Fixing in post is never fun. On the eye I had no choice, unfortunately.

Music courtesy of The Music Bed. Holly Maher “Hiding Place.”

ProRes HQ version downloadable from the review post on my website: gopb.co/pocket

You can also download the non graded edit. Check out James Miller’s post about grading. The link is in there along with loads of info! 

Filmed on the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera.

With the lovely actress Kate Loustau @kate_loustau

Graded with Film Convert using Provia Stock. 10% off at gopb.co/filmconvert

All shots on the London Eye filmed in “stealth mode.” No rig and one lens. The SLR Magic 12mm F1.6 with a Schneider Optics Variable ND.

Shots at Waterloo Bridge shot with the Samyang/ Rokinon 35mm F1.4 and Metabones Speed Booster for MFT Nikon Mount. I used the Zacuto Marauder Rig to get fluid handheld motion. Much better!

St Paul’s Cathedral shot filmed with the Leica 90mm F2 on a tripod!

A huge thanks to actress Kate Loustau whom I asked if she wouldn’t mind letting me film her for a few shots to test out the Pocket Camera for my review in exchange for dinner. If she had known, she probably would have preferred to have gone hungry!

The London Eye is ridiculously strict about what you use camera wise in the capsules. Multiple lenses, tripods, video camera are a big fat no. Had many a…disagreement in the past 🙂

This was filmed for Part 2 of my Blackmagic Pocket Camera Review.

Thanks again to Kate. You made this piece lovely.

 

39 comments

  1. When it was announced I figured they would sell like hotcakes, being bought by keen amateurs and curious pros, and we’d all be treated to some fantastic backcountry videos made by people thrilled to not be carrying an SLR rig anymore. Then the battery life issues were discovered and I figured after a few weeks they’d pop up on ebay for half the price. Then the supply issues emerged, and I only know of two people in Australia that have actually received theirs…

    I have to ask… Considering the shoulder rig, microphone, viewfinder and suitcase of spare batteries, this ‘pocket’ camera, well, isn’t. So really, what’s the point?

    That said, the Venice video is superb. At any point did you find yourself wishing you had a ‘proper’ camera?

  2. Hi Phillip, big fan of your work. I’m a newbie seriously considering getting the BMPCC. I’ve been shooting for a few months on an iPhone 5 and GoPro, with cheap slider, cheap tripod, and cheap shotgun mic. I’m looking upgrade to “pro” gear (at least by my definition). Do you think you could list al the components of your handheld rig shown in the picture of this post?

    I’m interested in the Zacuto Marauder, but would like to read a review before committing that kind of money. I would like to know which viewfinder you are using, and everything else on your rig down to the “bolts” you use to hold the mic etc. What is the Kessler thing on there? A cage? I’m looking to get the Lumix 12-35 F2.8 as my first lens ever.

    Any advice would be appreciated.
    Best regards,
    Jorge

      1. Would you recommend using that Z-finder or waiting till a properly sized one comes around? Sounds like your cutting off portions of the frame and possible getting adhesive on the screen itself.

      2. Hi Philipp,

        I have the same kind of profile than Jorge, shooting with GoPro3, bloggie or Iphone family movies. So sick of lack of focus control and looking to use semi pro stuff and learn out of FCPX and to use the Blackmagic I recently received!! Thank you for your fantastic blog and videos.

        Regarding the Z-finder I see there are few ones available, worried that they seem to work for 3,2″ screen and none available for the 3,5″ blackmagic pocket cinema camera. Would you mind sharing the reference?

        Also, are you planning any business trip to Paris, would love to assist at any workshop you might do there. Or if you know of any good ones that I could follow, please let me know!!

  3. I really love the image this camera is producing but my attention is always drawn to some pretty nasty compression artefacts. You have mentioned the H264 not handling the fine detail very well. Why is this in your opinion? The high prores bit rate? I’m not massively techie, but I would have thought higher recording bit rate meant better image, period.

    Is there a chance that the Film Convert plugin is adding to the blocky artefacts?

      1. Around 2:13 in the deep shadows…

        Also the aliasing is pretty obvious in the fine details like the windows with bars in front.

        Also find that the strobing effect is a tad too obvious some times as you travel sideways next to vertical objects like the pillars and habour wooden things. (don’t know the word).

        In many ways, the “pocket” camera could end up being the camera worlds new Mac Pro… buy accessories to really make it shine! 😉

      2. Hey Philip,

        Few bits that caught my eye…

        Walls, windows, roofs: 1.08 (is this aliasing?)

        Walls: 1.54

        Under Bridge: 2.18

        Blue rug at back of boat: 2.56 (looks like mad moire or something)

        Don’t want to be a pixel peeper, but I was quite interested in this camera – so was having a good stare.
        I do think there’s a lovely quality to some of the images but a lot looks full of digital mess to my eye. I know this is probably due to compression, but you kinda need to compress it at some point.

  4. Hey Philip, thanks for your review videos and information, it’s very helpful!

    I’ve ordered a BMPCC a few weeks ago along with the Metabones Speed Booster (for Nikon) and the new Sigma 18-35mm lens. I’m wondering if you found it a good choice for the camera, and how helpful OIS was from the Panasonic 12-35mm?

    Cheers

  5. Dear Philip, thank you so much for testing all of these cameras out it is much appreciated by myself and the community. If at all possible, could you do a rolling shutter comparison between the pocket camera and the 5D mkIII and/or the GH3? For me this is the most important issue that keeps coming up from camera to camera (although the GH3 seems to be slightly better than the 5D in this regards but I’m not sure)

  6. I’m 18, i live in Italy. Your video of venice made me cry. The Nabucco is awesome, Venice is awesome, YOU, Philip, are awesome. Thank you for being what you are.

  7. Please Help !!!!!The biggest prlboem I have, is I shoot so much my clips often perform a whole re-cycle of the file names. This is an issue as I have x2 60d, a 5d and a 7d. With all these cameras out on location daily, often they come back with the same clip name. I wish I could add an extension to the file naming in-camera’ so every clip started with a 5d001.mov or 60dcam1001.mov or 60dcam2001.mov or 7d001.mov etc ..Does any one else have this issue?????

  8. Would you be willing to show your export workflow and how you upload with prores422 proxy to vimeo. I am always struggling to retain quality with Vimeo’s compression and it would be great to see how you do it. Both videos with the pocket cam look insanely good! Awesome job, I appreciate all you do for the filmmaking community!

    Thanks!

  9. Hello, Philip. I’m a civil engineer and one of my hobbies is video. Every once in a while I shoot for me, friends and friends of friends, mostly with DSLR’s and a Canon XA10. I’ve been studying (and my God, it never ends) and learning so much thanks to you, and of course I find it irresistible for me to buy a Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera, because it offers the image quality I’ve never had at a very low price. I think my only question is if the “blooming” issue is really something I should worry about? Considering that I am not a professional and I can and have lived with so many other limitations or issues related to video.

    I was writing this when I found what appears to be an answer on the internet on a post apparently directed to you, if I may:

    “Hi guys,
    As promised, here’s an update on the ‘blooming’ sensor topic.
    All sensors, be it CCD or CMOS, will have a ‘blooming’ effect when during severe overexposure, the pixel is over saturated and excessive charges overflow to neighbouring pixels. It just looks different depending on the sensor type.
    We are not seeing this on some of our test cameras so it might be something that is calibration related. Please contact your nearest support office and we’ll run another calibration on the camera.
    regards
    Kristian Lam
    Blackmagic Design”

    Regardless and since this is my first time writing after so much time being a fan, I wanted to say hi either way and thank you for your beautiful work and setting the bar high for the many people who dare to make a video.

    Cheers from Mexico.

  10. Dear Philip,

    taking Verdi back to the people is great. I am observing you for a long time now and you are one of my major hopes that this world is not only covered with idiots. Your intelligent, friendly, knowledged appearance is very inspiring.

    General Smitt, Vaduz, Liechtensetin

  11. Hi again Philip,

    I’m curious to find out how you connected your Rode mic.
    Because I got the ultra compact video mic pro and looks like it is made to connect only to DSLR as it has a connector like a flash. Did you get any accessory to plug it on top of your BMPCC or maybe this is another model?

      1. sorry reading this, I think it could be misleading, it does have the right jack, I meant to ask how you mounted it on your camera.

        Because I end up buying 2 different mounts (1 from Manfrotto) it looks kind of weird.

  12. Hello Philip, your video looks fantastic, i loved the look of the film. But i have a question i thought ‘grading’ and ‘color correction’ was the same.

    But in the venice video you graded with filmconvert, and you colored it with looks? whats the difference of grading and coloring?

    Thanks 🙂

  13. hello phillip,

    yesterday I got my BlackPocket and a “Panasonic Lumix G X Vario PZ 14-42 mm PowerZoom Lens”…
    I found your forum and I read you are using one too.
    also I read you had issues with this lens.

    my issue is… when I attach it to the cam, everything works fine… zoom, focus, etc.
    but the nice small pancake is now a big lens … when I turn of the cam it don’t folds back to a small pancake.

    do you might have any idea ?
    is it the black magic pocket, that don’t send a close signal to the lens ?

    please help if you have any help 🙂

    kind regards from berlin, germany
    max

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