Raw in the Pocket

Just received my Pocket Camera and it feels just great.
As for now I can only shoot ProRes and that's fine for now but when I am heading for next assignment I need the RAW-latitude.
Does anyone know when RAW is due?

Thanks

Peter

Congrats on the new camera.

Peter, I'm with you in reeeally needing RAW - it's the raison d'être I've been gung-ho about the BMD cameras. As eager as I am for my BMPCC to arrive, it will be a shadow of what I'm hoping for until the RAW firmware arrives.

I believe that at this point, a delivery date is pure speculation. That said, my speculation is that it will arrive along with another BMD product; either

the public release of DaVinci Resolve 10 later this fall, or

the distribution of the new 4K Production camera. Both are total guesses, with no basis in reality.

And please don't think I'm giving the Pocket Cam short shrift; it's just that 12-bit RAW is the reason I'm buying the Blackmagic cameras. It's the whole deal for me, and I don't mind waiting for it to arrive on the Pocket (as long as it does!)

Yes RAW is also the reason for me buying and for never touching a DSLR.
If you have lived with the dynamics of film there is no other option.

Yes RAW is also the reason for me buying and for never touching a DSLR.
If you have lived with the dynamics of film there is no other option.

Hopefully Resolve 10 and BMPCC raw and BMPC4K by the end of September, but what do I know? Nada.

Rick Lang
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

As much as BMD may be late with their hardware deliveries, I've got this general feeling that their software development seems to be lagging behind even more. Stating "it's firmware upgradable" is one thing, but so far we've mostly seen bug fixes for the BMCC, though not all problems have been solved yet (especially the big ones, audio issues and battery indicators) and there have not been as many new features as one would have hoped.

The main issue might be technical--are there SD cards that reliably support recording DNG raw in the planned compression scheme? ProResHQ at 220mbit/sec (almost 30mbyte/sec ) is already stressing for the best of the cards. 1920x1080 raw at 750 mbit/sec (ca 100mbyte/sec with audio/overheads) is beyond the reach of current SD cards, it must be compressed. On the current cards 4:1 compression would work, but it's mathematically lossy. "Visually lossless" is the marketing euphemism. Truly lossless compression is up to 2:1, but 50mbyte/sec cards (sustained write) are a challenge.

The main issue might be technical--are there SD cards that reliably support recording DNG raw in the planned compression scheme? ProResHQ at 220mbit/sec (almost 30mbyte/sec ) is already stressing for the best of the cards. 1920x1080 raw at 750 mbit/sec (ca 100mbyte/sec with audio/overheads) is beyond the reach of current SD cards, it must be compressed. On the current cards 4:1 compression would work, but it's mathematically lossy. "Visually lossless" is the marketing euphemism. Truly lossless compression is up to 2:1, but 50mbyte/sec cards (sustained write) are a challenge.

Do you suggest that my 95 mbyte/sec SD cards will not fork for DNG?
That is troublesome.

Peter

I have already purchased Sandisk 128GB Extreme HD cards. Are you telling me I have wasted my money?

and battery indicators) and there have not been as many new features as one would have hoped.

Auto Focus.
Interval Recording.
Fat Formatting.
Battery % in single percent increments.
IS

Are all unannounced new features that have been added since launch.

jb

The speeds given on the consumer cards usually relate to the highest peak read values.
DNGraw would need 100mbyte/sec write sustained across the card without any data loss.
Panasonic professional P2micro cards (SD form factor) are good for writing 100mbit/sec (13mbyte/sec) AVCHD codec but not certified for higher speed AVCUltra. Their read is 250Mbyte/sec though (2gbit/sec) and data is RAID protected (UHS-II spec). Also good for 1000 read/write cycles, which cannot be said about consumer brands (even if they have "extreme pro" in the name).
Probably BMD problem with DNG raw is making it so compressed (5:1?) that existing SanDisk extreme/pro 64/128GB cards will sustain safely the writes.
(eg. Class10 means that the card guarantees sustained non-fragmented write of video at 10mbyte/sec=80mbit/sec. That is written on my "SanDisk ExtremePro 95Mbyte/sec" 64GB SD card. )

and battery indicators) and there have not been as many new features as one would have hoped.

Auto Focus.
Interval Recording.
Fat Formatting.
Battery % in single percent increments.
IS

Are all unannounced new features that have been added since launch.

jb

Fat formatting? So it can format cards to the File Allocation Table File System?
If so that's great but wouldn't it be problematic with 4GB files? NTFS might be a better option. Not that I'm complaining.

If I'm mistaken about what you mean, I've just taken this off on some odd tangent and I apologize.

Yes, it sound reasoneble, BMD is perhaps holding RAW firmware update until there is a SD card on the market that is capable of handling such high data flows.

Perhaps Sandisc has already developed their new highspeed card to meet BMPCC spec but they are late in production.

Anyway, SD card are comming, sooner or later.

I'll think I'll wait with buying expensive 90mb/s cards untill RAW firmware is releesed.
Who nows, perhaps RAW need a 130mb/s card or something.

Therefore I think I will, when i got the camera, only buy cheeper cards just to run Prores.

But I can understand you guys who need RAW in production now, I hope RAW firmware and high speed cards are comming soon.

and battery indicators) and there have not been as many new features as one would have hoped.

Auto Focus.
Interval Recording.
Fat Formatting.
Battery % in single percent increments.
IS

Are all unannounced new features that have been added since launch.

jb

Fat formatting? So it can format cards to the File Allocation Table File System?
If so that's great but wouldn't it be problematic with 4GB files? NTFS might be a better option. Not that I'm complaining.

If I'm mistaken about what you mean, I've just taken this off on some odd tangent and I apologize.

Yes. You're correct. Sorry.

Hey. I'm a Mac guy.

JB

Fat formatting? So it can format cards to the File Allocation Table File System?
If so that's great but wouldn't it be problematic with 4GB files? NTFS might be a better option. Not that I'm complaining.

If I'm mistaken about what you mean, I've just taken this off on some odd tangent and I apologize.

It's ex-FAT so largest file can be about 1.6E20 bytes (that's 16 and 19 zeros). Should be large enough for most
Wouldn't matter for RAW since each frame is stored individually. ProRes is of course one file.

Jules

I have already purchased Sandisk 128GB Extreme HD cards. Are you telling me I have wasted my money?

camera is not shipping with raw capability

I have already purchased Sandisk 128GB Extreme HD cards. Are you telling me I have wasted my money?

camera is not shipping with raw capability

If that was a question the answer is NO.

what I meant was, if you bought the extreme for raw (which I think the manual says is required) then yes. But the card will still work in the camera while shooting pro res

what I meant was, if you bought the extreme for raw (which I think the manual says is required) then yes. But the card will still work in the camera while shooting pro res

Thanks for the answer. My card was listed in the manual but with all the discussion about data rates I thought I had made a mistake.

what I meant was, if you bought the extreme for raw (which I think the manual says is required) then yes. But the card will still work in the camera while shooting pro res

Thanks for the answer. My card was listed in the manual but with all the discussion about data rates I thought I had made a mistake.

The manual currently lists cards for ProRes. No mention yet of cards for raw on the BMPCC. At NAB 2013, the indications were that the raw compression might be about 1.5x for mathematically lossless compression. On the BMPC4K, the indications were possibly 2.5x visually lossless compression but that does mean lossy. Of course no one knows for sure until the cameras are updated to include raw recording.

Rick Lang
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

Rick, that's a good point about the projected two different versions of raw compression. Frankly, in all the excitement, I'd lost track. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the lossless version in the Pocket cam...

what I meant was, if you bought the extreme for raw (which I think the manual says is required) then yes. But the card will still work in the camera while shooting pro res

Thanks for the answer. My card was listed in the manual but with all the discussion about data rates I thought I had made a mistake.

The manual currently lists cards for ProRes. No mention yet of cards for raw on the BMPCC. At NAB 2013, the indications were that the raw compression might be about 1.5x for mathematically lossless compression. On the BMPC4K, the indications were possibly 2.5x visually lossless compression but that does mean lossy. Of course no one knows for sure until the cameras are updated to include raw recording.

Rick Lang
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

I read that manual a million times, the specs must have changed in it, there was clearly a recomended card for raw, I almost bought one, then I canceled my pocket and went bmcc after the price drop.

I am pretty sure is was extreme, like 140+ for a card right?

Auto Focus.
Battery % in single percent increments.

These two features currently only apply to the Pocket, not the BMCC, right?

Auto Focus.
Battery % in single percent increments.

These two features currently only apply to the Pocket, not the BMCC, right?

Yes but it should migrate to the other cameras on the next firmware cycle.

Along with better focus peaking.

JB

Interval Recording.


Are all unannounced new features that have been added since launch.

jb

I haven noticed this before?
What is interval rec, is it time lapse?

Fat formatting? So it can format cards to the File Allocation Table File System?
If so that's great but wouldn't it be problematic with 4GB files? NTFS might be a better option. Not that I'm complaining.

If I'm mistaken about what you mean, I've just taken this off on some odd tangent and I apologize.

It's ex-FAT so largest file can be about 1.6E20 bytes (that's 16 and 19 zeros). Should be large enough for most
Wouldn't matter for RAW since each frame is stored individually. ProRes is of course one file.

Jules

Thanks for clarifying, was hoping it wasn't FAT32 but there's a lot of manufacturers out there who consider it a standard.

@JB: Thanks for that.
It's ok I'll forgive you

What is interval rec, is it time lapse?

Yes, check the manual for more information.

i wonder if they will allow the hyperdeck to write dng compressed files. that would be a great solution.

I wouldn't mind a decrease in resolution and no audio in order to get RAW (like ML on the 5D2).

I read that manual a million times, the specs must have changed in it, there was clearly a recomended card for raw, I almost bought one, then I canceled my pocket and went bmcc after the price drop.

I am pretty sure is was extreme, like 140+ for a card right?

Sorry, not sure of that, Steve, as I haven't reviewed every iteration of the manual, just looked at the latest version recently.

Rick Lang
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

http://www.blackmagicdesign.com/media/5 ... y_2013.pdf

page 14 recommended cards for raw. I think there was one more revision of the manual that said only extreme pro for raw. See below.

I"t's important to use SDHC and SDXC cards with the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera as these cards are rated for fast data speeds and support larger storage sizes.
SDHC and SDXC cards recommended for lossless compressed CinemaDNG RAW and Apple ProRes 422 (HQ) video recording include:
‚ Sandisk 64GB Extreme ‚ Sandisk 128GB Extreme ‚ Sandisk 64GB Extreme Pro"

http://www.blackmagicdesign.com/media/5813056/Blackmagic_Camera_Manual_July_2013.pdf

page 14 recommended cards for raw. I think there was one more revision of the manual that said only extreme pro for raw. See below.

I"t's important to use SDHC and SDXC cards with the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera as these cards are rated for fast data speeds and support larger storage sizes.
SDHC and SDXC cards recommended for lossless compressed CinemaDNG RAW and Apple ProRes 422 (HQ) video recording include:
‚ Sandisk 64GB Extreme ‚ Sandisk 128GB Extreme ‚ Sandisk 64GB Extreme Pro"

Yes, you are correct, Steve. Sorry I wasn't recalling the reference to compressed raw!

Rick Lang
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

no doubt man! there have been a couple revisions, I was reading the manual daily until I decided to ditch the pocket and go bmcc, which I think I might purchase another instead of going pcoket for b

here is another blurb from the current pc page that seems to reference XC cards for RAW, I do think that the XC cards should work with raw, we will have to wait for the camera to be capable of shooting raw first.

"
Record to SD Cards
Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera features a built in SD card recorder that captures stunning ProRes 422 (HQ) and lossless compressed CinemaDNG files to fast SDXC cards."

here is another blurb from the current pc page that seems to reference XC cards for RAW, I do think that the XC cards should work with raw, we will have to wait for the camera to be capable of shooting raw first.

"
Record to SD Cards
Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera features a built in SD card recorder that captures stunning ProRes 422 (HQ) and lossless compressed CinemaDNG files to fast SDXC cards."

Dan Chung has posted several News Shooter interviews at BIRTV 2013 on Vimeo. Check out the interview of Richard from BMD. Richard confirms that the Sandisk Extreme 64 GB 45 MB/s card will support both the lossless compressed raw and ProRes HQ on the BMPCC. He has many interesting things to say but I don't want to spoil it for you.

Rick Lang
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

I currently only own a BMCC, but will be into buying a pc when it has raw, will check it out for sure though!