Blackmagic Forum

Hi,

I have tried many times to change/update my Blackmagic Pocket 4K camera's date and time but it does not keep the new values. I update it but when the camera does not have a charged battery inside for some hours (battery recharge) it looses the updated date/time and goes back 4 days and 10 hours. The firmware is the latest and the camera works perfectly except for that small detail.
Any ideas of why this could be happening?

Thanks in advance

You might not want to hear this:
Yes, this is correct, because the clock needs power. Without a battery it can't run. But beside that, even with a battery inserted, the clock drifts quite heavily within a couple of days.

kontrakatze wrote:You might not want to hear this:
Yes, this is correct, because the clock needs power. Without a battery it can't run. But beside that, even with a battery inserted, the clock drifts quite heavily within a couple of days.

Well it's quite better than what I originally thought (no time for Tech Service)

Thank you for for the help!

I'm glad I am not the only one having this issue. I generally don't worry about the date / time setting on my Pocket 4K but I noticed this weekend the date/time drifted two months over a three day period with the battery in the camera the whole time! Given that computers can keep precise time with just a small watch type battery powering the bios you would think a video camera could do the same? Especially since I've never had this issue with any other DSLR camera I've owned even with the main battery removed from those units.

rwmorey71 wrote:Especially since I've never had this issue with any other DSLR camera I've owned even with the main battery removed from those units.

That's because other cameras use a little internal battery to keep time; that battery will ultimately die and you'll have to get it replaced. The Blackmagic cameras use a supercapacitor instead, which only maintains a charge for a short time. On the plus side, you'll never have to bring it in for an internal battery replacement. On the negative side, you have to adust the date/time before every shoot.

If you have easy access to the USB input on the camera, you can update the date/time just by plugging it into a computer. That doesn't work for me because I have my cameras in cages mounted on plates, and the plate obstructs the USB input (I'm using the Micro Cinema Camera; updating the date and time on those takes a couple of minutes of punching tiny buttons and cursing).

I've always wondered why Blackmagic doesn't add a small batter to run the clock. On those occasions where you're in a hurry or just in general it would be nice. At least my vote, not that voting might count anymore.

Personally I’m glad there’s no battery to replace. Before every shoot, there’s a list of items to verify are set correctly and the system time is one of them. Recently I didn’t check the time and the file creation dates were a few days off in one camera. Thankfully all media Timecode values were correct thanks to the Tentacles.

In the old days, professional cameras had easily replaceable lithium batteries (usually watch batteries). Prosumer cameras often had them soldered internally and difficult to get at without disassembling the camera. If the only option is the latter then yes it's better to have none at all.

rwmorey71 wrote:I generally don't worry about the date / time setting on my Pocket 4K

As that data makes it way into Clip Names, I find it very useful myself.

The drifting internal clock in a high tech device is a bit weird considering we've had electronic clocks for decades. It is what it is now, but in the future I'd like to see a user replacable battery.

I wonder if it would be possible to update the internal clock from timecode with a firmware update. Now, if you plug a timecode device in the camera the timecode updates, but the internal clock remains in what time you set it to be - or forgot to set. Just have the internal clock update when a timecode device is detected. It's a bit ironic when there's a device plugged in feeding accurate to the millisecond time and the camera still thinks it's three days ago at 3:07 in the morning.

Incredibly frustrating. I have 2x 6K Pros and over the course of a week, I had A-Camera's clock drift backward 1 year, and B-Camera's clock jump forward 4 years!

I understand drifting a few hours at this budget range, but I would call this unacceptable, even for affordable cameras like this.

Is it possible to have the time of day updated by an external timecode generator, like a Deity or Tentacle? I thinking like turn on the camera(s) plug in the TC generator, set timecode but also update ToD, then you're good to go for the rest of the day.

So frustrating.

Another option for BM, could put a GPS chip in it, get the time from the GPS sat each time it powers on.
Seems crazy in this day and age that the time isn't kept automation.

I have a new-to-me BMPCC4K and I want it to update the time via NTP from the server - in this case time.cloudflare.com. Didn't find anything in the manual. It doesn't even mention the Automatically / Manually menu items.

In an earlier post it was suggested that if I connect it to my computer's USB it would do the rest. No go.
There's some text right about the "time.cloudflare.com" saying CONNECTION FAILED!

I found a Protocol screen where it's set to use DHCP. Sounds good but it's not working and I see no status info.
When I go to the Network Settings on my mac I can see the mac sees it as configured - but with a bogus IP address even though it's set to DHCP.


Can anyone help?

Of course I can enter this manually but since the feature is there I'd prefer to use it.

One more thing...
I tried to manually set the camera's IP address to a "proper" static IP.
The camera displays said IP but the mac - even if I detatch/reattach the cam's USB cable - still shows the old address.

Joe Shapiro wrote:One more thing...
I tried to manually set the camera's IP address to a "proper" static IP.
The camera displays said IP but the mac - even if I detatch/reattach the cam's USB cable - still shows the old address.

Hello Joe, in order to use NTP, your BMPCC4K needs to be plugged to a network and to do so, you have to use a usb-c to rj45 adapter.
You plug a network cable from your router to your adapter and then you plug the adapter to the usb-c port of the BMPCC4k.

I've just tried it and it worked.

Regards

So the camera is unable to use a usb-connected computer to talk over the net and get the current time? That’s too bad because that’s the 99% case for these cameras. It’s pretty unlikely that someone will connect the camera to a wired LAN adapter just to set the clock.

Joe Shapiro wrote:So the camera is unable to use a usb-connected computer to talk over the net and get the current time? That’s too bad because that’s the 99% case for these cameras. It’s pretty unlikely that someone will connect the camera to a wired LAN adapter just to set the clock.

That’s not how the TCP/IP protocol works.
But normally the camera setup software should set date and time from the host computer when the camera is connected via USB.