ATEM Television Switcher and Pocket Cinema Camera

The box and advertising on the ATEM Switcher says that it will work with any camera from consumer to high end professional, HDMI or SDI. However, the Pocket Cinema Camera is a 1080p camera and the ATEM only takes 1080i and the BMPCC does not work with the ATEM Television Studio, or so I'm told.

For multiple camera Live Stream do I need

A higher level, more versatile switcher that takes 1080i, 1080p etc.
A 1080p to i converter
A camera upgrade

Or does the BMPCC work with the ATEM Television Studio?

Thank you in advance,
Mark

This is classic BM marketing, the key is always in what they DON'T tell you. But you're right, it currently doesn't work.

They have a couple of newer switchers (the 4K variants) that does this but i am unsure if the camera outputs 50/59.94 at any given moment, even if i know the sensor only operates in 24-30.

You'll be better off buying the smaller Blackmagic Micro Studio Camera 4K, using the same lenses as your BMPCC use. The Blackmagic Micro Studio Camera 4K actually does 1080i50/59.94 but also 1080p50/59.94 if you want to use it, although that requires a switcher upgrade.

There was a version of the BMPCC firmware (1.5 or 1.51, from memory) in which the HDMI o/p did work with the TVS (e.g. 50i output with the camera set to 25p). If you hunt through these forums (from around the time when v1.5 had been a recent version) you'll find a similar question being asked and someone from BM posting a picture to show that it worked, but it turned out to be a "temporary" feature which has not reappeared in all subsequent firmware, sadly. Given that it was shown to be possible, it would have been nice to have the option in a menu setting.

BM divided the line when it came out with the Studio and 4K Production cameras, the Cinema camera line (BMCC and BMPC) became dedicated Cine you cameras with the wide latitude and great color science capability, while the Sudio and Production cameras were designed to support TV productions, and support 50/59.97 Progeessive/Interlaced outputs via SDI. The Production 4K camera has its feet in both doors, and cam be used for both. The Pocket camera wS designed for stand alone recording to camera or ext. hard drive recorder via HDMI.

Look to the new Micro Studio 4K camera to support multi cam, ATEM switching situations. Both the Micro and standard Studio camera use MFT lens mounts, like the Pocket camera does.