GEAR BLACKMAGIC URSA MINI PRO G2
USED FOCUS
Bear with us: this major cine cam remains a minor miracle
WORDS AND PHOTOS ADAM DUCKWORTH W hen a cinema camera starts out by offering amazing performance and spec at a great price, it’s always destined to offer sensational rates in the used market – especially when it’s built like an absolute tank. Such was the Blackmagic Ursa Mini Pro 4.6K G2, which cost a very reasonable £5265/$5995 body only at launch in 2019. That was the same price as the original version it replaced, yet added Raw capture, high frame rates and the latest colour science. Now, three years on, mint versions can be bought from reputable dealers like MPB, Wex or B&H for around £3900/$4900, complete with a warranty. That’s top value, although you can pick up new ones for £5798/$5995 as it’s still a current product, coming in EF or PL mount. The Blackmagic Ursa Mini Pro 4.6K G2 was one of the best- performing, most affordable cinema cameras you could buy when it hit the market – and still is. It shares the same user-friendly controls as the older Ursa Mini Pro, but this next-generation model benefitted from fast electronics and a Super 35 4.6K HDR image sensor with up to 15 stops of dynamic range. The old, data-hungry and largely unpopular CinemaDNG Raw was dropped, replaced by the faster Blackmagic Raw. And its new processing power allowed for up to 300fps shooting – faster than anything else on the cinema camera market at the time. However, 300fps isn’t available in full 4.6K resolution, even though there is now a new USB-C expansion
port for direct recording to external SSD drives, as well as internal dual CFast 2.0 cards. For full-sensor 4.6K images, you can go as high as 120fps – while windowed 4K DCI and 4K maxes out at 150fps. Windowed 2K DCI and 1080 HD gives the headline 300fps, shooting in Blackmagic Raw. When recording in ProRes 422 HQ, this drops down to 4.6K 80fps, windowed 4K at 120fps and HD windowed 240fps. Blackmagic Raw allows you to retain the advantages of working
“HD gives the headline 300fps while shooting in Blackmagic Raw”
54
PRO MOVIEMAKER
Powered by FlippingBook