v6.1 issues (possible)

With the old firmware I can't detect samsung T5 500gig ssd when it's pluged when turn on. - Now it does, no more unplugging, that's good.

With Old firmware, I cant review prores recording but recording was fine in NLE - Now, It WON'T record ProRes at all. It will stop at 1 frame and hang up the camera, with an "!" on record red dot.
I would need to turn off and on the camera. - this is bad.

With old firmware there was delay of audio on the headphones when monitoring mic via 3.5 jack. -Now this seem fixed. -This is Good.

Ray,

Can you do me a favor and quickly check if your ProRes recording is ok?

It hangs up the camera on mine after the update. Any flavor or ProRes, Wether SSD or CFast, no go.

I haven’t updates mines yet has the battery life improved

The firmware did appear to update the performance of the 3.5mm audio-in, but the added 6db, if that's how it actually measures, is still way too low for recording.

I believe battery life has improved.

Ray,

Can you do me a favor and quickly check if your ProRes recording is ok?

It hangs up the camera on mine after the update. Any flavor or ProRes, Wether SSD or CFast, no go.

FWIW, I just tested ProRes HQ to an SD and it recorded fine.

Battery Life improves. LP-E6 type Powerextra brand 2600 mAh
Old FW: 43 min / 6.1 FW: 60 min or 1 hour. Straight recording. -that's good.

Has anyone tested the Viltrox ef-m2 with the new camera fw? Read some posts mentioning it wouldn't work anymore.

Does the import of saved configs from the older fw work?

Cheers

Importing old presets works fine.

I can confirm Viltrox not working here in version 3.2. Reverting back to 2.3 at least gets iris working. Not tried any other function yet. Tested on Canon 40mm 2.8stm and 16-35mm f4 L.

Interesting info in the updated manual:

Some customers have been creating custom made power devices as a means to power their Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K. If you are creating your own power solution with a dummy battery, caution needs to be taken to ensure that you are not supplying too much voltage to your camera, as this can cause permanent damage. The voltage requirements of the Pocket Cinema Camera 4K are as follows:

‚The battery input connection is rated from 6.2V to 10V max.
‚The DC input is rated from 10.8V to 20V max.
‚The camera requires 16W when in standby and is not charging the battery. ‚
The camera requires 30W when charging the LP-E6 type battery.
‚When powering your camera with a custom made power source, we recommend removing the LP-E6 type battery.
‚The camera requires 22W when recording to external media with an active lens, full screen brightness, full tally brightness, high frame rates and is not charging the battery.

Yes, I am one of the few men on earth who do RTFMs

"‚When powering your camera with a custom made power source, we recommend removing the LP-E6 type battery."

Would that include V-mount batteries? I guess anything running from the side that isn't the wall adaptor could be considered custom made?

‚The battery input connection is rated from 6.2V to 10V max.
‚The DC input is rated from 10.8V to 20V max.

Looks like some people tried to power it direct from a vlock trough a dummy battery. Smoke it..

‚The battery input connection is rated from 6.2V to 10V max.
‚The DC input is rated from 10.8V to 20V max.

Looks like some people tried to power it direct from a vlock trough a dummy battery. Smoke it..

That 10.8V is close to what I found to be the minimum reliable DC input voltage when I did some testing with a benchtop power supply.

An important error correction is missing!
- deliver the cameras to the customers

My Prorez recording and playback is fin now. BUT Cinema DNG will allways record in 50 frames. My project Framerate is 25 and the only way i get the camera to record in 25p is to set Off Speed Fremarate to 25 fps and turn Off Speed Recording ON! think i go back to 5.2, i can live with the choppy playback in Prorez.

I'm a little afraid to update, given some of the reports with adapters. Has anyone found any negative reports on 6.1 w/the Metabones .71x adapter?

"‚When powering your camera with a custom made power source, we recommend removing the LP-E6 type battery."

Would that include V-mount batteries? I guess anything running from the side that isn't the wall adaptor could be considered custom made?

Curious about this, as well. Been keeping the LP-E6 in to act as a power backup, but don't want to damage the camera, obviously.

I'm a little afraid to update, given some of the reports with adapters. Has anyone found any negative reports on 6.1 w/the Metabones .71x adapter?

You can always downgrade back to the old 5.2 firmware:
https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/suppor ... c2/Windows

I tried some of the stuff people here wrote about and it seems like, I got lucky. No problems with ProRES (422) & RAW, no matter what FPS I record in and what medium I record on (SD & SSD tested, don't have CFast). So far, 6.1 seems to be pretty cool.

Getting the camera connected to my computer on the other hand..

... Some customers have been creating custom made power devices as a means to power their Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K...

The battery input connection is rated from 6.2V to 10V max.
‚The DC input is rated from 10.8V to 20V max... ‚
The camera requires 30W when charging the LP-E6 type battery.
‚When powering your camera with a custom made power source, we recommend removing the LP-E6 type battery...

Yes, I am one of the few men on earth who do RTFMs

I’m reading the manual, but haven’t got to that yet which sounds like it’s near the end.

I don’t consider powering the 2-pin connection via regulated 12VDC hanging from a Cinema V-mount battery to be a “custom made power device.” But it doesn’t matter what I think.

I’d appreciate if BMD let us know here that what I’ve proposed will be safe with a Canon battery in the slot charging when needed since delivering 30 watts or more is a given in that configuration. A future update to the manual might clarify that point, but good to let us know here.


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So 6.1 is here, yaaay!

But, I may have come across an issue. Battery concerns.

I was at a shoot today after updating last night (I know, risky). I've noticed that battery power drops at a considerable rate even while the camera is turned off. I put a new battery in showing 99%. I turned the camera off and put it on the counter. I powered up to get a couple shots about 15 minutes later and the battery was down to 58%.

I had a T5-500 plugged in at the time. This was a Wasabi battery off of Amazon so quality is slightly questionable but I had charged the batteries the night before and the initial battery level was 99%. The drop did happen while the battery was in the camera and the camera was off.

Can anyone else confirm this happening to them as well?



UPDATE: 02/06/19 NEW ISSUE-LENS @Robert Niessner mentioned that his "Olympus 12-100 f4.0 and the Panasonic 12-35 f2.8 II" loose connection after a rack focussing a couple of times.

UPDATE: 02/07/19 Regarding battery life concerns @Al Slamecka - "it's good indication that the voltage readout vs. the battery remaining percentage is the most accurate way to monitor power when using any LP-E6 brand of battery."

[Kristian Lam]

I wouldn't rely too much on percentages readout for no-Canon batteries when they are under the current draw that the Pocket Cinema Camera 4K demands. Most of the 3rd party cameras don't get the Canon protocol correct.

Tap on the battery icon and have a look at the voltage reading instead. The camera shuts off at 6.2V.

With my Hedbox batteries I just made a test - put a fresh battery into the camera and it shows 80%. Left the camera running for almost an hour until it shut down at 6.2V - or 60%.
Before FW 6.1 the same battery could only provide power for 25 min.

Roughly double the runtime is very encouraging! Kudos to BMD for their tuning efforts.


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I wouldn't count on the same gain with the best batteries. Probably the better power management is helping in squeezing out more from the weaker ones in particular.

After the 6.1 update I'm still experiencing an issue with the BMD supplied battery. It never indicates a remaining percentage - a solid white battery icon appears as opposed to the outline of a battery with the remaining percentage in the middle. Fortunately tapping on the icon shows the voltage so I'll have to use that to gauge when the battery is about to give out. Maybe it's faulty battery...

My non-Canon replacement batteries are showing similar results as other's are reporting. A fully charged Watson LP-E6 battery displays between 60% - 63% remaining utilization when placed in the camera. I haven't tested if they last longer however it looks like I'll need to monitor the voltage on these as well.

Al

[Kristian Lam]

After the 6.1 update I'm still experiencing an issue with the BMD supplied battery. It never indicates a remaining percentage - a solid white battery icon appears as opposed to the outline of a battery with the remaining percentage in the middle. Fortunately tapping on the icon shows the voltage so I'll have to use that to gauge when the battery is about to give out. Maybe it's faulty battery...

My non-Canon replacement batteries are showing similar results as other's are reporting. A fully charged Watson LP-E6 battery displays between 60% - 63% remaining utilization when placed in the camera. I haven't tested if they last longer however it looks like I'll need to monitor the voltage on these as well.

Al

This is to be expected. Our batteries do not show percentage readings.

Unfortunately one thing hasn't improved for me with the update.
My camera still loses connection to the lens electronics after a while when doing several push AFs in a row. Lens are the Olympus 12-100 f4.0 and the Panasonic 12-35 f2.8 II
You can see that AF suddenly seems to be stuck, then the rectangle and the f-stop number disappears.
After rebooting everything works again. It's just annoying.

This is to be expected. Our batteries do not show percentage readings.

Thanks Kristian.... good to know!

I noticed a bug this morning. I was doing a battery run down test, so I left the camera running unattended. Several minutes in, I happened to notice that the camera was deep in the menus, with options changed as if someone had been interacting with the touchscreen.

Since I was alone, either 1) my office is haunted, 2) my camera has a defect, or 3) this is a new bug.

Since my walls aren't dripping blood and I've not had a single issue prior since October, my money is on option 3.

I noticed a bug this morning. I was doing a battery run down test, so I left the camera running unattended. Several minutes in, I happened to notice that the camera was deep in the menus, with options changed as if someone had been interacting with the touchscreen.

Since I was alone, either 1) my office is haunted, 2) my camera has a defect, or 3) this is a new bug.

Since my walls aren't dripping blood and I've not had a single issue prior since October, my money is on option 3.

Call the Ghostbusters my friend.

AWB bug still present -- camera intermittently returns a value of 10000 off a grey card, in daylight. No obvious solution, workaround or cause. At other times, it works as expected.

AWB bug still present -- camera intermittently returns a value of 10000 off a grey card, in daylight. No obvious solution, workaround or cause. At other times, it works as expected.

I don’t know I awb with gray card in daylight half a dozen times turned camera on and off and it’s not changing to 10000.

I updated my BMPCC 4K to the new 6.1 Firmware, and now the camera doesn't record in any of the ProRes formats on my Samsung T5 500GB SSD. Before the firmware update, I was able to record Losless Cinema DNG at 24 fps on my Samsung T5 500GB. I was also able to record in all the ProRes formats before the upgrade.

At the moment I can only record in Cinema DNG 3:1 and 4:1. When I try to record in order formats, the camera only records 1 frame and stops.

Is anyone else experiencing this problem? How can I fix this problem? Is there a way for me to roll back to the previous firmware before this new 6.1 firmware?

The improvement in battery life does have an exponential effect and this improvement cant be understated.

My initial benchmark shows a 17 minute improvement for LP-E6 type battery from 43 to 60 minutes or 1 hour.

When using NP-F770 5000 mAh it's a 51 minute improvement! From 1'45" to 2'36" ! Not bad.
I like using the mid sized 770/750s compared to the heavier 970s.

On the new firmware my V mount battery now shows 6:31 remaining on a full charge vs 5:10 on the old firmware.

I noticed a bug this morning. I was doing a battery run down test, so I left the camera running unattended. Several minutes in, I happened to notice that the camera was deep in the menus, with options changed as if someone had been interacting with the touchscreen.

Since I was alone, either 1) my office is haunted, 2) my camera has a defect, or 3) this is a new bug.

Since my walls aren't dripping blood and I've not had a single issue prior since October, my money is on option 3.

Phantom touchscreen use is a bug that was in the old firmware. Restarting does stop this problem.

... Some customers have been creating custom made power devices as a means to power their Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K...

The battery input connection is rated from 6.2V to 10V max.
‚The DC input is rated from 10.8V to 20V max... ‚
The camera requires 30W when charging the LP-E6 type battery.
‚When powering your camera with a custom made power source, we recommend removing the LP-E6 type battery...

Yes, I am one of the few men on earth who do RTFMs

I’m reading the manual, but haven’t got to that yet which sounds like it’s near the end.

I don’t consider powering the 2-pin connection via regulated 12VDC hanging from a Cinema V-mount battery to be a “custom made power device.” But it doesn’t matter what I think.

I’d appreciate if BMD let us know here that what I’ve proposed will be safe with a Canon battery in the slot charging when needed since delivering 30 watts or more is a given in that configuration. A future update to the manual might clarify that point, but good to let us know here.


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The old firmware worked fine with the 8v output from my Feelworld F6 Monitor to the DC camera input powered by NP-F750 batteries and an LP-E6 in the camera, The old firmware seamlessly switched to the E6 when the F750 ran out.
The 10.8v minimum power requirement with the new firmware is strange because the same 8v input seems to power the camera fine, I think what they mean to say is that 10.8v are necessary to charge an E6 battery in the camera. But that's just a guess. When I called tech support USA I just heard the official line parroted that 10.8v is necessary for the camera to operate properly. I guess I have to run some tests.

Several things you could try:
1. try another USB-C cable, if you go a spare one, just to rule out a cable issue
2. try to reformat the SSD in camera. Try exFAT.
3. try to reformat the SSD on your computer.
4. does it make difference if have the SSD plugged in before starting the camera vs plugging in later while camera is already on?
5. is it possible to record ProRes to an SD card, or does it stop there too?
6. you can roll back the firmware to 5.2 (which is the version which was originally on the camera)
Get it here:
https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/suppor ... c2/Windows
https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/suppor ... c%20OS%20X

I have read from another user having the same problem, but can't find his posting. I think after rolling back to 5.2 he was able to record ProRes again.

EDIT:
Here is the posting:
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=85669#p475831

And it is also with the T5 500GB, so the problem might be related to that particular SSD model.

I'm new to Blackmagic Cameras and to this forum. Before the 6.1 upgrade my ProRes was recording fine but playback was compromised. After the upgrade the ProRes stops recording on the first frame and then hangs the whole camera. I went to a camera shop and we tried every SD and Cfast card they had including the Sony Tough series but it kept on giving the same problem in ProRes.

Are there any other users finding the same problem?

As a first time BM Camera user I'm quite concerned.

Everything works except for Viltrox's iris control.
We need it back asap, add braw and it's perfect.

Remote start/stop trigger would be great too.

I've run mine with 8.4V through the external power socket without drama.

Be aware that it can take some time to kill the camera this way, under powering devices mid work for some time, even months until it happens.

I've run mine with 8.4V through the external power socket without drama.

Be aware that it can take some time to kill the camera this way, under powering devices mid work for some time, even months until it happens.

I still kinda think the 10.8v minimum is required to charge the E6 battery when in camera. OTOH
I would have been helpful if the first version of the firmware and user guide mentioned it as a minimum power requirement so some of us didn't invest in power solutions that may be problematic.

I did get a message back from the support rep whom I begged for more info:

"I spoke with our engineers. They said that they can't predict what issues may arise if you use power solutions outside of what is specified. They recommend sticking to the specs to avoid any potential issues."

It would be helpful to know what the potential issues are......

Since this thread is primarily about battery performance under firmware 6.1, it would be useful to change the name of the thread.

I'm posting the result of a simple 3rd-party battery test using a Watson LP-E6 replacement battery.

As BMD stated earlier in this thread, 3rd-party batteries that do not follow Canon's OEM protocols will likely report inaccurate remaining battery percentages to the BMPCC 4K. In this test, the fully-charged Watson battery reported 83% remaining charge to the camera but I've had other copies of the same brand report at low as 60% when fully-charged.

The purpose of my basic test was to assess whether the voltage displayed in the BMPCC 4K is accurate for the Watson battery. If so, the camera should shut off when the voltage is ~6.2V and I could be fairly comfortable with the assumption that voltage displayed is accurate regardless of battery brand. This would also allow me to know when to change batteries.

For this test I turned the camera on but did not shoot any video. The only additional load on the battery was the USB-C attached Samsung 1TB SSD drive. I kept the lens caps on which potentially lowered the power draw of the LCD since it was essentially black the entire time.

The battery lasted a full 1hr 21min and the camera shut down with 6.4V displayed. Interestingly (but no longer surprising), the remaining battery percentage displayed 0% for at least the last 20 minutes. When I restarted the camera, it stayed powered for another 4.5 minutes and the voltage display dropped evenly from 6.4V to 6.2V (with red characters at 6.3V).

This was not a real world usage test but I believe it's good indication that the voltage readout vs. the battery remaining percentage is the most accurate way to monitor power when using any LP-E6 brand of battery.

Hey @Al, When I started the thread, I didn't intend this to be specifically Just about the battery. It was just the first thing that I noticed.


@Robert Niessner mentioned that his "Olympus 12-100 f4.0 and the Panasonic 12-35 f2.8 II" loose connection after a while.

It could just be that the 6.1 update crossed a lot of the previous issues off the list (yaaay and kudos BMD). It also could be that 6.1 is still very new and some new or remaining issues that haven't been resolved fully just haven't been realized yet.

IMO, A single thread that covers any potential existing or new issues would be better than having a bunch all over the place.

I'll update the original thread to add Roberts lens issues.

For this test I turned the camera on but did not shoot any video. The only additional load on the battery was the USB-C attached Samsung 1TB SSD drive. I kept the lens caps on which potentially lowered the power draw of the LCD since it was essentially black the entire time.

It's highly unlikely that the power draw of the LCD would be lowered by just showing black. This would only be the case for an OLED display, but the PCC4k is using a backlit LCD. The only way to save power is to lower the LCD brightness.

A bug that didn't go away with 6.1: lens stabilization of Four Thirds lenses (adapted with the Panasonic DMW-MA1) still doesn't work, although it did/does work with old BM Pocket 1080p.

I had reported this as a bug to BM's customer service months ago.

Oh great, someone thought it would be a good idea to mash together 3 threads.

Good luck trying to keep conversations straight in here now.

I was trying to compress issues brought up by people on the first post I made so that it was all on one page, at the top. Guess I don't need to bother now.

I've run mine with 8.4V through the external power socket without drama.

Be aware that it can take some time to kill the camera this way, under powering devices mid work for some time, even months until it happens.

I would do this only as a last resort to get me through if my other power sources ran out.

So this means that all the 7.2v external power solutions designed for the camera, such as the Tilta power handle with the F970 battery, can not be used with the DC plug, but only with a dummy battery? A shame that Blackmagic didn't realize this until the 6.1 firmware.

IndiPro does offer a sled where two large Sony camera batteries can be run with the combined voltage delivered to the 2-pin power source being comfortably within the 10.8-20VDC zone. But of course if you had to change batteries in that configuration, there could be a power interruption if we are not supposed to have a LP-E6 battery in the camera slot now to keep everything powered.


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