Blackmagic Forum

A click away from purchasing BMCC 2.5k for my wife. she is used to being in front of the camera, but now she will be behind the camera for first time. She have no professional camera or lens at hand and have her mind on BMCC (not BMPC). I have gone through the research with her and she is leaning toward MFT as she will have more lens choices (mainly primes) for wide angles she loves to shoot...and also from what we read the majority in this forum lean towards the MFT for many different reasons. My wife claims that the EF mount leaves her to a specific lenses and to the bottom few of those specific lenses because of the crop factor.

Now she have these listed as best suited for MFT version and waiting for right time to buy...but i want to buy it now and surprise her. can you guys see if the list is missing anything crucial, interesting items.

Voigtlander 25mm f/0.95 Nokton Manual Focus Lens for Micro 4/3 Mount
Voigtlander Nokton 17.5mm f/0.95 Manual Focus Lens for Micro 4/3 Mount
SLR Magic HyperPrime Cine 12mm T/1.6 Lens for Micro Four Thirds Cameras with Built-in Lens Gear
SLR Magic 25mm T0.95 Hyperprime Cine Lens, Micro Four Thirds (MFT) Mount
Bescor BM-EPIC Battery & Charger for the Blackmagic Camera
Intel SSD 520 Series (240GB, 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Drive)
Pearstone Digital Video Camcorder Bag
Marshall Electronics M-CT7 7" Camera Top Monitor with Canon LP-E6 Plate/Battery/Charger

Her audio an lighting list is separate.

Another question is that since this mount is not powered...what other lenses can she mount on it and with what adaptor?

Your genuine input is much appreciated.

Not trying to sound condescending but seeing as this will be her first camera would it not be advisable to see if you have the software to deal with the codecs? Yes you do get Davinchi Resolve but if your not familiar with either is the BMCC REALLY a good choice for first camera? It's not designed for plug and play it's a steep lerning curve and many people have opted to give it up as it's not what they expected. Sure if she's got the time then I'm sure she'll get on with it but many of us have had DSLR experience and endured the frustration that came with them but for the first camera for someone who hasn't had that much experience, in my humble opinion may not be a wise choice. Please don't take my comments the wrong way but many relationships have been tested through Camera Frustration!!!!:)

I'm curious as to why she wants the BMCC? What is your target your goal your hopes? This is after all a "cinema" camera, not a camera for Jimmies 5th Birthday Party, although it can totally be used for it if you want. Why does she want a Cinema camera? Why not a DSLR or a camera that specifically just is a consumer or prosumer camcorder?

Dawitsamuel wrote:A click away from purchasing BMCC 2.5k for my wife. she is used to being in front of the camera, but now she will be behind the camera for first time. She have no professional camera or lens at hand and have her mind on BMCC (not BMPC). I have gone through the research with her and she is leaning toward MFT as she will have more lens choices (mainly primes) for wide angles she loves to shoot...and also from what we read the majority in this forum lean towards the MFT for many different reasons. My wife claims that the EF mount leaves her to a specific lenses and to the bottom few of those specific lenses because of the crop factor.

First off, the wide-angle choices for the BMCC are not all that wide. The Lumix 7-14mm zoom, which works beautifully on an active MFT mount is pathetic on a passive mount. Ditto a number of gorgeous Olympus lenses. The SLR Magic 12mm looks cool, but I don't think you can actually buy it: all retail outfits that offer it say it's out of stock with no date given for new stock.

I have the three Voigtländer lenses, and they are wonderful. But because of the crop factor, it's like I have the 35mm equivalent of 40mm, 60mm, and 100mm. That's nice, but not very wide.

If my 7-14mm worked, I'd have a sweet 16-32mm zoom equivalent.

Now she have these listed as best suited for MFT version and waiting for right time to buy...but i want to buy it now and surprise her. can you guys see if the list is missing anything crucial, interesting items.

Voigtlander 25mm f/0.95 Nokton Manual Focus Lens for Micro 4/3 Mount
Voigtlander Nokton 17.5mm f/0.95 Manual Focus Lens for Micro 4/3 Mount
SLR Magic HyperPrime Cine 12mm T/1.6 Lens for Micro Four Thirds Cameras with Built-in Lens Gear
SLR Magic 25mm T0.95 Hyperprime Cine Lens, Micro Four Thirds (MFT) Mount
Bescor BM-EPIC Battery & Charger for the Blackmagic Camera
Intel SSD 520 Series (240GB, 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Drive)
Pearstone Digital Video Camcorder Bag
Marshall Electronics M-CT7 7" Camera Top Monitor with Canon LP-E6 Plate/Battery/Charger

Her audio an lighting list is separate.

Another question is that since this mount is not powered...what other lenses can she mount on it and with what adaptor?

Your genuine input is much appreciated.

If you go the MFT route with the BMCC, you should know that you will be mostly stuck with ONLY manual lenses, which is a tiny, tiny fraction of all lenses made in the past 20 years.

I have long been very frustrated with the limited dynamic range of video cameras, and to me the BMCC is wonderfully liberating. But as many have pointed out, the amazing imagine platform is compromised by almost incomprehensible decisions in almost every other aspect of the camera: no audio meters make it truly difficult to capture audio reasonably. And even if you could meter properly, the quality of the audio preamplifiers are so bad you would not want to use them. So you really need a completely separate audio rig.

Blackmagic assume you are going to be using a lot of extra equipment for video monitoring, too. 13 stops of dynamic range is great, but you're going to need a waveform monitor. It could be an ultrascope attached to your Mac. It could be an external monitor with Waveform capabilities. But you cannot use the camera for reliable video level monitoring, either. So that's another thing you need to buy and manage.

But once you get the right exposure dialed in, the imaging is amazing.

You don't list a tripod, but you should: there's basically no sane way to hold the camera while shooting.

But one you have the camera properly locked down or stabilized, the imaging is amazing...if all of the other pitfalls and shortcomings don't frustrate you and your wife so much that you wind up putting them on eBay.

Tnx for sincere responses

Cinematic looks and best footage for the price were the reasonings considering the bmcc
She has other opinions on the DSLRS....
My wife will be directing and editing a film with a ten members crew. Handling the software s were the first thing she considered...she played around with the free version and footage from the net and she looks extremely comfortable with it. She has software programming background and equipped with the latest Mac desktop that can store the US congress library. Her camera crew led by her brother have spent enough time at a local store toying around this camera. Yes the wide angle limitations has been an issue for her like many other compromises on this camera.

My desire is to buy it and surprise her any other valuable advise would be appreciated

Cheers

I've owned a BMCC EF for 11mth now, I also have the BMPCC. This is just my personal opinion from using the cameras.

Looking at your list it seems like a good starting point. You'll need to think about support (tripod and/or shoulder rig) as the BMCC is heavy. Much heavier than a DSLR and without support you'll get jittery footage.

Things I'd question on your list are the battery solution and the monitor. Why?

1: I think that powering the camera with a battery system that is not an industry standard is silly because if you are a away on location it'll be much harder to find a replacement if you need it. V-mount or Anton Bauer are easy to get hold of from professional camera hire companies all around the world.

2: The battery system will also only power the camera. It won't power the monitor. So you end up with multiple battery types and chargers. Means you have extra gear to lug with you. You could power both from a V-mount or Anton Bauer

3: The camera has a screen. Yes it's not great but outdoor in the sunshine you will also have issues seeing the image on the Marshall. You might be better off with an EVF. I have both and EVF (Alphatron EVF) and a monitor (smallHD DP6). I tend to use the EVF more than the monitor. I love the monitor for studio work and I love the smallHD's "Focus Assist Plus" (best I've used) but shooting outdoors or on the go I prefer the EVF as I can see the screen and it's small enough to position better for hand held use.


As for other lenses... I have the EF mount. There are still lots of options out there for the EF mount and you get a powered mount which means you can use EF and EF-S lenses that have IS, like the EF-S 17-55mm f2.8 IS. This can be very helpful when shooting handheld. For wide stuff I use the Nikon mount 11-16mm Tokina (similar FOV as ±25-36mm on a Full Frame DSLR). You can also adapt to many other lenses. Nikon, Leica R, and more...

I mostly use cine moded Carl Zeiss ZF.2 primes with a Nikon to EF adaptor.

On the MTF mount you can adapt many lenses that you can't use on the EF mount. Like PL cine lenses. You can also use all the manual MFT lenses you list. Another plus is you can use the MetaBones Speedbooster. This will make any Full Frame or ASP-C DSLR lens 0.71 wider and effectively add an additional stop of light.

So using the above Nikon mount 11-16mm Tokina with a Nikon mount Speedbooster will give you an effective lens of 18-26mm f/2 (when compared to a Full Frame DSLR). That is pretty wide and fast.

Another great lens that has been getting great reviews is the 18-35 f1.8 Sigma (effectively a 42-80mm when compared to a full frame DSLR). Add the Speedbooster and you effectively have a 30-57mm f1.3 when compared to a full frame DSLR. It's on my shopping list.

Your wife is lucky.

That being said why two 25mm 0.95 lenses?
Get another focal length instead.

Also consider getting her an excellent DP for her project (that might come with equipment), it will make her look like a first time genius and greatly impress everyone in your social circles.

Finally if she gets bored with all this and picks up a new hobby, you can message me and I will unload some of those lenses off your back if you make me a good deal !

Also that Marshall CT7 monitor sucks ass, it's cheap crap don't get it.

This is a great forum...thanks in advance for your all valuable responses some of it I had to re-read to comprehend...

Townio.
Actually iam the lucky one. One of the least reasons why iam lucky...My wife developed a kickass software I use for my personal training business...liberated me from the do it all on ipad day to 11 trainers working with me. I don't know why two 25's on the list but iam only getting one for her. She has updated her lens list since last week.. She has listed SLR 12, 25, 35, 50 n 17.5 of the Voigtlander

Adam Roberts great advise. Tripod was part of the list but I only wanted to discuss the camera particularly as it is the most controversial of all. A guy at a local distributor gave me similar advise as of yours but he owns non of the bmcc. He is helping me update and beef up the whole list my wife made. The list was made according to what was available here nearby...that explains the power option.
I have seen the EF version with Sigma 18-35, Sigma 8-16 attached on it...I admit the zooms look better aesthetically...But my wife is firm on primes being the director' eyes. however my wife likes the EF with Sigmas a lot too and she thinks the sigma 18-35 was a game changer...now I am considering to get the (BMCC EF) for her as well.

I will post the updated and ready to buy list soon.
Thanks for all your inputs everyone.
Sincerely Dawit