Thu Apr 18, 2024 8:38 am
Apart from occasional dead horse beating, I find this thread most fruitful regarding the new 16 stops sensor, so here are my additional thoughts.
Our small indie-film-docu-mercial production could benefit from this additional dynamic range FF sensor.
What we own is already fantastic, I still think including new developments from BMD offer, at least for us to own the UMPG2 and P6KP is the best combo. Checking these three sample clips and playing with them made me relook at our test shots we always do before projects with our own cameras. And wow, they are not far, especially the UMPG2 and its fast sensor reacting to handheld. Stunning.
The problem with upgrading UMPG2 to UC12KFF is simply the price tag. You are stepping into a new ecosystem of power/media and larger file sizes which means even more archive space. The price for us would be quite above 20K€ for upgrading to FF/8K/+2 stops of DR(if there are?).
Well for us this is too much to be reasonable for a camera, that has 1 year of warranty support, which means that this investment should cover itself in a year. For 20K€ in a year we can rent the hell out of the best Arri cameras and glass plus lighting, so why bother anyway?
My point is that for small productions, which I presume are most of the BMD customer base, there is a cutoff price point of owning. Plus also GPDs of countries warry, maybe for US 25K$ is ultra cheap, but for us, it ain't.
Listening to BMD reps on YT NAB coverage I have an idea for the price, size and design of UC12K. They believe we have grown into that class. Well, at least we have not because here it's either no to small budgets or the highest budgets. There is no in-between in the EU at least for commercials and we do not strive for nonstop commercial work but still are crazy enough to think our cinema breakthrough is possible. And if you work at films you are out for 2-5 years, sometimes even more, so you are forgotten in commercial waters.
If we had grown that much, well then there are other brands we would go with to be frank. Because then we would also rent them out.
UMPG2 is a really nice camera and comes close to the best ones out there but still, it's affordable enough to own it and have it available 24/7 which is essential for our type of filmmaking.
UC12K potentially seems an upgrade worth some extra money. Ideally for us, it would be the same UMP body compatible with what we already own. If this potential "Ursa Mini Pro FF 12K" would cost up to 9K€ this might be a viable investment for us because we could just swap the bodies and job done.
But I can imagine there are many reasons for this new sensor in a bigger and heavier fiber-plastic body. Since its sensor is bigger I doubt the UMP ND filter system size could cover it. Also, the lack of mounting on the right side is probably because the body is injected fiber composite. To prevent people from going nuts at it bending by hand I assume BMD put this focus puller fixed screen which can be nice but all gaffers/1stACs I know of pull it from wireless monitoring follow focus. Even promotional photos on a staged set with this new camera show focus puller on such a system so this monitor and its features are a nice addition but I think mounting points would be more handy but that would require magnesium body and that would make this new camera even heavier.
So yea, is nice, the path that BMD is on with the new sensor is promising but the price class from 6K€(UMP12K) to UC12KFF is quite a jump for owning, therefore I believe there are two possible scenarios; either a price reduction or a new cheaper/smaller/crippled version comes for us normal people.
I know there is no competition for these features for his price, but for 25K€ you can buy used Alexa Mini from Arri. The whole system would cost more probably and is used etc.. but that's buying an f-ing Porsche.
Regarding 3 sample clips; much of the cinematography comes to light/film set/set design/costume so this shoot is really pleasing so I partially agree if you'd film the same scenes on iPhone and put them side by side on YT most of the people would not know to tell which were shot on which so a hands-on test is a must as always.
P.s.: Now some forum members here are welcome to attack me and my shared opinion, I really hope you feel better afterwards. I shared these since I've been waiting for an FTP upload to finish before I can start to work and invested my time here to give BMD my feedback on why I was hot and now I am cold regarding buying their new and I imagine excellent sensor tech.