USER REVI EW | BLACKMAG I C RAW
produce a data rate that is faster than the recording media can cope with (don’t even think about using the SD card slots, though they are fine for 8:1 or 12:1 CBR). With decent CFast cards, this is only really likely if you are shooting 4.6k at 60fps – the camera still lets you select Q0 at high frame rates, so it’s up to you to decide whether you want to take the risk. Personally, I think that’s the right decision – if the action can be repeated, why not try Q0? If it can’t, stick to Q5 or CBR. Blackmagic’s URSA Mini Pro has always been capable of producing excellent images with CinemaDNG Raw, but you had to work at them to get the best results. The new BRAW Codec certainly simplifies the workflow – images look great with minimal work in Resolve and, of course, you have lots of flexibility once you are in the grade. CinemaDNG is still an available option on the camera, but I just can’t see why you would ever use it. As well as the metadata contained in the Raw file itself, any software built with the Blackmagic SDK will be able to generate and process sidecar metadata files. Opening a Raw clip in this software will automatically create the sidecar
heavily processed). Let’s say you are filming with Blackmagic’s URSA Mini Pro, which has 4608x2592 pixels. Remember that this is the number of photo sites on the sensor, so the basic bit rate from the sensor is 4608 times 2592 times your analog- to-digital converter bit depth – 12 bits – times your frame rate. The bit rate from the same sensor once it’s been converted to 4:2:2 is twice as much (at 12 bits per colour and the same frame rate), as each frame now has 4608x2592 pixels of luma data, plus two chroma channels of 2304x1296. So you need twice as much compression on 4:2:2 data as you do with Raw, plus you will have introduced more artefacts by de-bayering and then compressing. In practice, even with the 12:1, CBR Codec (which ought to be the lowest quality available) compression artefacts are very hard to spot in real world images. Blackmagic may introduce some higher compression ratios in the future but, as it stands, I would be happy with 12:1 for general shooting, and it produces very manageable file sizes. VARIABLE BIT RATE The variable bit rate Codecs are also excellent. Hypothetically, Q0 may
“THE NEW BRAW CODEC CERTAINLY SIMPLIFIES THE WORKFLOW”
ABOVE Blackmagic RAW is now available as a public beta via the Blackmagic Camera 6.0 Beta Update for URSA Mini Pro. The final release is expected to ship in several weeks’ time once further testing is complete.
file, which stores details of, and modifications to, the Raw settings you make. For instance, perhaps you change the ISO for the clip – the Raw file still contains the ISO information that you set on the camera at the time of shooting, but the value in the sidecar file will take precedence in any Blackmagic RAW enabled software. So if the DOP makes a change in Blackmagic’s free viewer, that change will be seen when the grader opens the clip in Resolve. It’s non-destructive, of course. MORE INFORMATION: Blackmagic RAW is available now on URSA Mini Pro, but will roll out to the other cameras, including the new pocket camera, over the coming months.
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