Blackmagic Forum

With the announcement of the new Atlas Mercury Anamorphic lenses I'm curious if there is a 1.5X Anamorphic Desqueeze option in the URSA Mini Pro models? I checked the UMPG2 and couldn't find it. 1.33X or 2X are the options. What about the 12K?

If it's not there, then my request is for a firmware update for all the models to include the option.

https://www.newsshooter.com/2022/09/01/ ... ic-lenses/



P.S. Note that an UMPG2 was used in the marketing video.

I second this Tim. I’m liking the look of those mercury’s. I hope BM can put this in an upcoming firmware update.

I support it! please add settings 1.5

Absolutely!
I knew the Blackmagic cameras had some kind of de-squeeze, but haven't had the privilege of shooting on anamorphic yet to dig in to that functionality. But seeing the Atlas Mercury, as well as Laowa's Nanomorph's all featuring 1.5x, and then reading in this thread that it isn't currently a de-squeeze option, I too am hoping to see this in a future update!

For the higher end Ursa/Atlas kind of crowd, it seems a lot of our feature requests don't make the dev team's priority list - perhaps, as has been suggested by others, because the user base and overall ROI for BM is lower in this market segment.

However, I predict the nanomorphs and pocket cameras will be a very popular combo over the next couple years. So perhaps there is hope for a firmware update to bring functionality to that demographic? I myself own a pocket 6k and an ursa g2, and am interested in the nanomorph as an introductory anamorphic lens to get my feet wet.

Finally, we are currently at firmware 7.9.2 I believe? It seems reasonable to assume that at some point there will be a firmware v8 to look forward to, and I wouldn't doubt that it would be a good place to put in something like a 1.5x desqueeze!

Here's to hoping!
-Daniel

Well, sadly the URSA Mini Pro G2 has been on Firmware 6.5.1 since August 28th, 2019. That's three years ago now. If there's any URSA Mini Pro updates coming up before V8 then it will be the last chance for the G2. The 12K (AKA the G3) will certainly get Firmware 8. Here's to hoping that both get 1.5X Desqueeze as an option.

There definitely is a divide between the Pockets and the URSA line. The Pockets definitely feel like they get more updates. But I'd rather the URSA line be built properly for the money. Sure I'd like new features added regularly, but as long as the cameras don't need a lot of firmware updates that means that the cameras were built well. Either way, I'd like to see some more love for the URSA line.

I have a feeling we'll be seeing new URSA cameras released soon however. The last major camera release in the URSA line was the UMP12K in July 2020. So we're due to see a new release within the next year.

I would like to see this in the URSA Mini Pro G2 firmware and hopefully other features long been over due like Gen 5 color science.

Ellory Yu wrote:I would like to see this in the URSA Mini Pro G2 firmware and hopefully other features long been over due like Gen 5 color science.

That's nothing. Oliver Twist voice: ''please sir, can we have some Gen4 for Ursa Mini 4.6k? Or BRAW? No? Stick to gruel?'' hahaha.

I still hope.

Lenses look nice. Shipping in 2023 .

Would love this, and a 1.8x desqueeze too. Both while shooting in the full 16:9 sensor mode.

People are right to say the 1.5x Nanomorphs will be extremely popular in BM's target market, but I think Great Joy are set to give them a real run for their money with the freshly announced 1.8x 35mm having a constant squeeze factor.

Chris Cronin wrote:Would love this, and a 1.8x desqueeze too. Both while shooting in the full 16:9 sensor mode.

People are right to say the 1.5x Nanomorphs will be extremely popular in BM's target market, but I think Great Joy are set to give them a real run for their money with the freshly announced 1.8x 35mm having a constant squeeze factor.

The Nanomorphs look nice on youtube. Shipping date is all over the place though and they don't respond to emails (even queries from their distributors). BH lists them as Dec 2022 (which probably means March...). They'll be super popular if they can actually ship them .

VMFXBV wrote:The Nanomorphs look nice on youtube. Shipping date is all over the place though and they don't respond to emails (even queries from their distributors). BH lists them as Dec 2022 (which probably means March...). They'll be super popular if they can actually ship them .

Not super inspiring customer service, but in theory the IndieGoGo ones are shipping imminently!

Chris Cronin wrote:

VMFXBV wrote:The Nanomorphs look nice on youtube. Shipping date is all over the place though and they don't respond to emails (even queries from their distributors). BH lists them as Dec 2022 (which probably means March...). They'll be super popular if they can actually ship them .

Not super inspiring customer service, but in theory the IndieGoGo ones are shipping imminently!

Is that normal imminently or Blizzard Entertainment imminently? haha.

Chris Cronin wrote:Would love this, and a 1.8x desqueeze too. Both while shooting in the full 16:9 sensor mode.

People are right to say the 1.5x Nanomorphs will be extremely popular in BM's target market, but I think Great Joy are set to give them a real run for their money with the freshly announced 1.8x 35mm having a constant squeeze factor.

I had seen the Great Joy offering before, but not the 35mm 1.8x. Looks pretty cool!
That will be interesting to see if they become a real contender in the specialty lens market.
Cheers!

VMFXBV wrote:Is that normal imminently or Blizzard Entertainment imminently? haha.

Uh... I'll get back to you on that. They've released a shimming tutorial for the PL/EF mount version, so surely they've done that in anticipation that people will be receiving theirs shortly.

My contribution status hasn't changed to "locked" yet and I'm a backer somewhere in the 230s/240s of 362. Could be a while before they start fulfilling these.

Some reviews are popping up on YouTube but I'm not sure if they're from people receiving their IndieGoGo orders or provided by Laowa themselves.

Daniel Rheaume wrote:I had seen the Great Joy offering before, but not the 35mm 1.8x. Looks pretty cool!

That will be interesting to see if they become a real contender in the specialty lens market.
Cheers!

I think they've got about as good a chance as anybody else. Their lenses are bigger and heavier than the Nanomorphs, but as an owner of the 1.8x 50mm, I just love the image despite what some would consider deficiencies. So much so that I might even buy a V2 with a consistent squeeze factor, now they appear to have fixed it for the 35mm... my bank balance weeps at the prospect.

Chris Cronin wrote:
I think they've got about as good a chance as anybody else. Their lenses are bigger and heavier than the Nanomorphs, but as an owner of the 1.8x 50mm, I just love the image despite what some would consider deficiencies. So much so that I might even buy a V2 with a consistent squeeze factor, now they appear to have fixed it for the 35mm... my bank balance weeps at the prospect.

Are Great Joy delivering outside their indiegogo campaign? Dunno how I can write off indiegogo campaigns on my business account so I'm waiting for normal delivery through ''distributors''.
Waiting on Laowa EF/PL as well.

VMFXBV wrote:Are Great Joy delivering outside their indiegogo campaign? Dunno how I can write off indiegogo campaigns on my business account so I'm waiting for normal delivery through ''distributors''.
Waiting on Laowa EF/PL as well.

I believe so, yes. You can buy the 50mm directly from their website right now, but you might be better waiting to see if they do a V2 with constant squeeze.

Chris Cronin wrote:

VMFXBV wrote:Are Great Joy delivering outside their indiegogo campaign? Dunno how I can write off indiegogo campaigns on my business account so I'm waiting for normal delivery through ''distributors''.
Waiting on Laowa EF/PL as well.

I believe so, yes. You can buy the 50mm directly from their website right now, but you might be better waiting to see if they do a V2 with constant squeeze.

Yeah, will do that.
Still waiting on the Nanomorphs, when those come available I'll decide on a set.

Thanks for the info.

My set of Nanomorph lenses arrived today (silver edition). They look beautiful through the viewfinder of the 12K. The name is fitting - they're small! Hopefully, a 1.5x de-squeeze firmware update is around the corner. With the Mercury lenses coming next year from Atlas, 1.5x will come in handy with this camera.

Quick pic on my Instagram account (@yonderbluefilms)
Frames will come later. Neck deep in work.

Small update on Nanomorph shipping: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/laow ... /updates/8

I understand some people *are* receiving theirs, but for the rest of us I think it'll be November.

Chris Cronin wrote:Small update on Nanomorph shipping: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/laow ... /updates/8

I understand some people *are* receiving theirs, but for the rest of us I think it'll be November.

Sorry for the double post, but I've been fortunate enough to have mine shipped and should receive them by about Monday. Will try to provide some impressions and whatnot when I've got them.

Will also be my first time having to shim a lens, so wish me luck...

Chris Cronin wrote:

Chris Cronin wrote:Small update on Nanomorph shipping: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/laow ... /updates/8

I understand some people *are* receiving theirs, but for the rest of us I think it'll be November.

Sorry for the double post, but I've been fortunate enough to have mine shipped and should receive them by about Monday. Will try to provide some impressions and whatnot when I've got them.

Will also be my first time having to shim a lens, so wish me luck...

Awesome. However it seems they are having trouble keeping up with the preorders . Means a long time waiting for direct purchase. Oof.

Apologies for the rubbish phone camera picture, but they're here!

Unfortunately I seem to have received the Amber versions when I filled in the Google form to switch to Silver. Waiting to decide whether to kick up a stink or not before I shim the lenses and stick the EF mount on.

Remarkably small lenses for what they are. Certainly live up to the Nanomorph name.


Here's the 27mm with a Coke can for scale.

+1 on 1.5x desqueeze.

I just got my nanomorphs this week and would love that 1.5x in camera.

There are also 1.25, 1.33, 1.6 and 1.8 lenses. Why not offer an option for oddball squeeze ratios which you can set yourself, like you can set frame markers?

I would also love an update with more de-squeeze options (1.5, 1.6, 1.8, and 2.0) than just 1.33 across the camera range (from BMPCC4K and up).

VMFXBV wrote:

Chris Cronin wrote:
I think they've got about as good a chance as anybody else. Their lenses are bigger and heavier than the Nanomorphs, but as an owner of the 1.8x 50mm, I just love the image despite what some would consider deficiencies. So much so that I might even buy a V2 with a consistent squeeze factor, now they appear to have fixed it for the 35mm... my bank balance weeps at the prospect.

Are Great Joy delivering outside their indiegogo campaign? Dunno how I can write off indiegogo campaigns on my business account so I'm waiting for normal delivery through ''distributors''.
Waiting on Laowa EF/PL as well.

I've been looking at the Laowa 1.5x anamorphic or nanomoorph lens with EF/PL mount. Has anyone tried it yet on the Ursa MIni Pro G2? Not sure ther are option for 1.5x de-squeeze but I'm pretty sure the Video Assist HDR model has the 1.5x option?

Yes, I can confirm the BMVA12G7 supports squeeze options 1.33x, 1.5x, 1.66x, and 2x.

Notably missing is the 1.8x anamorphic squeeze but that’s always possible it’s coming in a future firmware update. In reality if you own 1.8x lenses, I don’t think it’s going to be a showstopper when you have the option of viewing the frame at a 2x or 1.66x squeeze.

Wanted to give this another bump as I've been using my PL-converted 6K pro more and more as a director's viewfinder on larger sets as well. Would be great to get more options outside of 2x and 1.3x desqueeze and also get those for all formats, including 1.5x.

Anyone know if this is possibly a hardware limitation or purely a software decision made by BM?

+ 1

Also, keen to add 1.5 kit silver, once I do some testing.

This feature will certainly be appealing to BMD pocket range cameras

Odyssey 7Q + monitor / recorder had 1.5x option since 2015 along the all others

Is there an option now with the P4K to view 2880X2160 without the anamorphic squeeze enabled? I sometimes just want to shoot in 4:3. 1.5X mode is a start for sure.

The 2x squeeze monitor view cannot currently be overridden. The other options are grey. But this is only affecting your display which could be used anyway with a spherical lens with some practice. Once you get the footage into Resolve it will look normal. You can still use the footage you record. Give it a try.

rick.lang wrote:The 2x squeeze monitor view cannot currently be overridden. The other options are grey. But this is only affecting your display which could be used anyway with a spherical lens with some practice. Once you get the footage into Resolve it will look normal. You can still use the footage you record. Give it a try.

That's fair. It would be a cool feature if you could override it.

Curious if the developers at BMD have this on their firmware roadmap? Anyone reading here from BMD that could give us an indication? At least whether or not this is even technically possible or perhaps a hardware limitation? With their history of adding firmware features long after release I have faith that this will come eventually, just a bit curious this is taking so long. Seems like anamorphic budget lenses with all sort of squeeze factors are making their rounds and would be great if BMD would accommodate for them.

We’ve seen requests for support for 1.5x, 1.6x, 1.8x, and the request to make the option user selectable (including no desqueeze if the user selects a window that BMD intended for always have a 2x desqueeze). Probably a lot of work to implement these if most of the developers are busy working long days readying the next camera for NAB2024 or IBC1024.

Hmm, Cinema P3 for the iPhone has a variable de-squeeze option. You can simply choose your needed ratio with a slider. The developer seems to be pretty much working alone.
So, either Tom is a genius or it can’t be that hard to implement. Or could it be that Apple is offering it in their API?

Generally BMD never comments on future firmware updates or features for future cameras. They are very tight lipped.

Which I can understand.
In their early times of camera development they were more open regarding product announcements and received a sh*tstorm when they couldn't deliver in time.

Looks like the Sony FX6 is getting 1.5X Anamorphic De-squeeze via firmware update. So, the ball is in Blackmagic's court to also do such a firmware update. https://www.newsshooter.com/2024/01/17/ ... -fx3-fx30/

Hi!
I have the same laowa nanomorphic 1.5 lenses and I'm shooting on an ursa 12k. The footage doesn't look great cause the 12K put the information as 1.3x or 2x. What do I need to change In the settings so that it looks good? Aspect ratio? de-squeeze? Nothing really seems to looks good. Just wondering if there is some math I'm missing.

If I can paraphrase someone has said “Happiness isn’t about getting what you want, it’s just wanting what you have.” So I would say there’s nothing wrong with asking for improvements, but before they arrive, best to learn to use what you have.

Users-defined squeeze ratios might be the ultimate solution that one would like to see so it wouldn’t matter if your anamorphics were 1.33x, 1.5x, 1.6x, 1.8x, 1.9x, 2x, 2.4x or 2.66x. Until then, I would use the 1.3x desqueeze if that option is available on the camera’s monitor view. Your footage will appear to be too ‘skinny’ but everything should be recognizable and in post everything will look fine as you apply the correct desqueeze.

Has anyone tried Blazar Remus anamorphic on the 6kFF? Are these the best budget range at the moment?

WahWay wrote:Has anyone tried Blazar Remus anamorphic on the 6kFF? Are these the best budget range at the moment?

I think so. They are well built, deliver pretty good quality, and are extremely affordable.
I preordered a month ago. Don’t expect mine to arrive for a while.

Not speaking specifically to1.5X (which I've asked for as well) but in general...

The processing that's done for the built in display and output, things like false colour, peaking etc is done by a seperate "computer" to the one that does the business of recording the sensor output and saving it as a file.

Anything to do with the display takes a lot of computing overhead because it has to do it in real time with no latency.

Each anamorphic setting has to have its own maths and they can quickly run into limits with doing that. It's basically doing a raw decode / demosaic in real time remember. I always thought variable scale that's user defined would be best (hey I used to do a very mild squeeze in telecine to make the actors look a little thiner) but I've been told that's pretty hard to do on the existing hardware. That said they're always upgrading the processors....and 1.5X is pretty common with 135 format / Full frame so....

JB

In terms of maximizing your sensor real estate shooting with anamorphic glass:
On a 16:9 aspect ratio sensor, a 1.5x squeeze results in a 2.66:1 deliverable which seems to be a popular format when shooting with anamorphic lenses. I suspect that is the driving force for the lens manufacturers who offer that 1.5x squeeze option. When you have a 16:9 sensor and want to deliver 2.39:1 widescreen, the 1.33x squeeze is more appropriate with a very small crop of the vertical resolution.

On a 6:5 sensor, a 2x squeeze ideally results in the common ‘digital’ wide aspect ratio of 2.4:1 but perhaps that sensor window is not particularly suitable for other squeeze factors.

On a 4:3 sensor, you have several options. 2x squeeze gives you the familiar 2.66:1 aspect ratio; 1.8x squeeze is another 2.4:1 aspect ratio; 1.5x squeeze results in a 2:1 aspect ratio which has appeal, and 1.33x gets you back to a 1.77x aspect ratio.

On a 3:2 aspect ratio sensor which is again becoming popular here, 1.33x squeeze, results in a 2:1 deliverable. 1.6x squeeze gives you a 2.4:1 deliverable. 1.8x with a small horizontal resolution crop gives you 2.66:1. 1.5x and 2x squeeze would both give you recognizable aspect ratios with vertical and horizontal crops respectively.

Thanks for this Rick.

I'm seeing Dune Part 2 on Thursday. I'm sure after seeing it I'll be a big proponent for the IMAX aspect ratio of 1.44:1 and spherical. Granted, that was shot on the Alexa LF models, so should Blackmagic get out the URSA Mini Pro 16K VistaVision then we'll have an IMAX capable Blackmagic Camera.

However, VistaVision still isn't close to 1570 Film. But no digital sensor has reached that size yet...

NAB 2024 Blackmagic IMAX 36K 72mm x 53mm sensor.

Tim more likely an Ursa full frame

As for the largest digital sensor in the world, look to Chile and the Vera Rubin telescope:

https://www.digitalcameraworld.com/news ... 66-iphones

John Brawley wrote:Not speaking specifically to1.5X (which I've asked for as well) but in general...

The processing that's done for the built in display and output, things like false colour, peaking etc is done by a seperate "computer" to the one that does the business of recording the sensor output and saving it as a file.

Anything to do with the display takes a lot of computing overhead because it has to do it in real time with no latency.

JB

Appreciate the insight JB! Just came across a newsshooter article regading the Ursa Cine that claims

you can also use the large sensor area to shoot anamorphic and deliver in a range of aspect ratios with 1.3, 1.5, 1.6, 1.66, 1.8 and 2x de-squeeze factors

So it seems like software-side this is being implemented. Would be interesting if this is implemented across Blackmagic OS and if so, which cameras would get it, considering the processing limitations JB mentioned.

Watched Cam Mackey's hands-on with the Pyxis and it looks like that's getting the additional desqueeze options that the Ursa Cine has.

Interesting! So assuming the Pyxis and the 6KFF share the same hardware this should come to that camera as well? I guess time will tell!