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OT: Building a broadcast studio with Blackmagic and Bob Zelin
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[Ryan Holmes] “My experience has been that Blackmagic has a much higher failure rate than the other companies listed above.”
I have owned several Blackmagic i/o cards and converter boxes over the past 10 years and have never regretted those decisions. They have very limited costumer support compared to AJA for instance, but I have never had any equipment failures.
Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
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nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf -
I agree with Herb… The customer service and support at BM are virtually non-existent. On the other hand, you pay almost exactly 200% for similar AJA devices that do have the best support in the biz.
The bottom line is, do you have more time than than money, or more money than time?
Oh, and let’s not forget, if you choose BM I/O cards you can use Resolve, and most can even use the free version – choose AJA or another brand and you’re out of luck, no Resolve for you.
David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist
David Weiss ProductionsDavid is a Creative COW contributing editor and a forum host of the Apple Final Cut Pro forum.
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[David Roth Weiss] “The bottom line is, do you have more time than than money, or more money than time?”
Exactly. I’ll be using this in meetings coming up! Thanks David!
[Herb Sevush] “I have owned several Blackmagic i/o cards and converter boxes over the past 10 years and have never regretted those decisions. “
I’ve received “lemon” BMD devices that fail right out of the box, had converters fail for no reason, had ATEM video mixers fail during recording, had other ATEM’s output ports fail. I’m not saying I regret using them, but it is a question of time vs money. It has made me opt for other companies in certain situations because I don’t even want to take the risk. In my experience it’s cheaper and less reliable. But sometimes cheaper is exactly what the situation calls for.
[Herb Sevush] “They have very limited costumer support compared to AJA for instance, but I have never had any equipment failures.”
AJA has killer support. And in a pinch that can be the difference between getting the job done or not.
Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost -
[Ryan Holmes] “AJA has killer support. And in a pinch that can be the difference between getting the job done or not.”
That’s as may be, but what about the parts of the BMD product range that AJA doesn’t cover? Like switchers? What have your alternatives been for those?
Not meaning to debate or be contrary. I have no experience with any of this, and for once, am using this as guidance to not have an opinion. Just curious.
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[David Roth Weiss] “I agree with Herb… The customer service and support at BM are virtually non-existent. On the other hand, you pay almost exactly 200% for similar AJA devices that do have the best support in the biz.
The bottom line is, do you have more time than than money, or more money than time?”
My Blackmagic experience has been more in line with Ryan’s. Price is right, looks great on paper, but always underwhelmed enough during actual use that I’m left feeling like I sold myself short.
A place I used to work at was all Blackmagic and the Decklink cards we had (can’t remember exact model, but top of the line at the time of purchase) were always finicky which on more than one occasion meant we had to go out of house to make our tape masters. One out of house trip probably killed the price difference between BM and AJA.
Would I swear off BM products? No, but I certainly have more of a ‘buyer beware’ attitude with them than I do other vendors.
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Well, I don’t want to burn any bridges here with BM, cuz I really do like a lot if what they do, but I have say, that my experience with them from the sales side pretty much sucked even more than it does on the buyer side.
If a customer became frustrated, and would call me to try to get answers from BM, there was a 99% chance that, even with the assistance of my reseller rep, could get nowhere. I actually hope someone at BM reads this, though I’m certain they’d do nothing even if they did.
BTW, another huge issue at BM is their propensity to show cool stuff at NAB, take orders, then not ship the product for years. For example, when they acquired Teranex, it took them approximately two years to ship a working 2D model, and approximately three years to ship the 3D model, and both had huge issues too that took even more time to fix.
David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist
David Weiss ProductionsDavid is a Creative COW contributing editor and a forum host of the Apple Final Cut Pro forum.
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[Tim Wilson] “Not meaning to debate or be contrary. I have no experience with any of this, and for once, am using this as guidance to not have an opinion. Just curious.”
Tim, I’m no spring chicken here at the COW. There’s no way you don’t have an opinion about this! 🙂 I’ve been around long enough to know better….
But seriously, there’s nothing in the ATEM price range that can touch what BMD has to offer both in terms of functionality and cost. I’m actually running 2 ATEM TV Studios and 1 ATEM 1 M/E here for our various live event production work. For our new studio space I’ve been looking at moving “up to” a Ross switcher, but as such, that represents a huge price increase over the ATEM’s I’m using now. Is it worth it? Don’t know yet.
[Andrew Kimery] “Would I swear off BM products? No, but I certainly have more of a ‘buyer beware’ attitude with them than I do other vendors.”
You said this better than I did. Like I said, I have a bunch of BMD products, but I’m more cautious now than I used to be. And many of their products I run “behind” another product as a backup. So AJA provides my primary recording solution in the Ki Pro Rack, and the BMD Hyperdeck Studios (or Shuttle in some cases) are my backup recording. I would’ve liked to run all AJA Ki Pros, but the cost was too high for one particular setup.
[David Roth Weiss] “BTW, another huge issue at BM is their propensity to show cool stuff at NAB, take orders, then not ship the product for years. For example, when they acquired Teranex, it took them approximately two years to ship a working 2D model, and approximately three years to ship the 3D model, and both had huge issues too that took even more time to fix.”
You can also add all the cameras they’ve ever sold to this list! The Cinema camera missed it’s ship date by about 8 months (and needed some definite firmware tweaking after release), if I remember right. The 4K Production camera missed by a similar amount. My order for one wasn’t filled until March 2014, when they’d announced it NAB 2013 and said it’d ship by August 2013. The Pocket camera was also delayed over and over again that same year, etc.
The “race to the bottom” cost wise within the production side of our industry does concern me. What’s being sacrificed to get down there? Component manufacturing processes? Customer support? Engineers to maintain firmware? I appreciate how great it is that we can build whole studios now for fractions of costs compared to the 80’s or 90’s. That really shouldn’t be diminished. It is incredible! But we are sacrificing something to push those prices as low as BMD has gotten them.
This could easily be a spinoff thread but BMD’s software approach is free, subsidized by a large enough hardware market (kinda Apple-esque?). Give Resolve away from free, sell Decklink and Intensity Pro cards, and now cameras to support your costs. Long term I wonder what the impact will be on other companies – Sony, Panasonic, Canon, AJA, Convergent Design, Apple, Adobe, Autodesk, etc. If the vortex being created by BMD’s drive for lower costs continues, which is should, how do other companies maintain a profit margin as people migrate to a free NLE/coloring tool? Or how do niche companies, like an AJA, maintain profitability when they can’t sell their hardware because it costs twice as much but offers more options or better support? Maybe there’s room enough in the industry for both? Low margin player like BMD vs higher margin players like Canon/Apple/AJA?
Just wondering out loud….
Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost -
Wow! This is an interesting discussion, and Ryan, you raise some terrific questions.
Per your final question about AJA and others contending against BM’s disruptive pricing… All I tell you is, since I’ve been on both sides as buyer and seller, this is a very tough business for all on both dudes of the equation. The democratization of video has been a mixed blessing at best, wonderful for newbie filmmakers compelled to communicate their ideas, but not so wonderful for many who have invested their lives and their treasure to build successful careers before the democratization.
David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist
David Weiss ProductionsDavid is a Creative COW contributing editor and a forum host of the Apple Final Cut Pro forum.
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[Ryan Holmes] ” Or how do niche companies, like an AJA, maintain profitability when they can’t sell their hardware because it costs twice as much but offers more options or better support?”
AJA i/o cards had capabilities that BM didn’t match, much the same way that KiPro offers services that the BM recorders don’t match. When we shoot multicamera in-studio we go strictly KiPro because of the control software that lets you custom name the files. The xtra value far exceeds the xtra cost, which is where smaller companies like AJA can shine.
Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
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nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf -
[David Roth Weiss] “Per your final question about AJA and others contending against BM’s disruptive pricing… “
A race to the bottom is an interesting discussion and Walter Soyka has brought it up multiple times. Usually with the focus on software, not hardware. BM giving away Resolve Lite (which is barely less functional than the $999 Resolve), Apple (so far) just having a one time fee for it’s ProApps, Apple no longer charging for OS upgrades, Apple not allowing upgrade pricing in it’s stores, etc.,. (well, that’s a lot more than I originally intended but oh well), etc., and how does this impact software companies.
I think in general there has been a devaluation in IP (be it software or media) over the last 10-15 years and that is leading to business model changes such as more ad supported software, freemium (software is ‘free’ but expanded functionality costs money) and subscription services. The rise of mobile devices and app stores were supposed to open the door for the little guy, and they did, unfortunately the door generally leads to a giant abyss. According to the following link the average iOS app price is between $0.99 and $1.50, 94% are free to install, and only 1% will be financially successful. Ouch.
https://www.ibtimes.com/how-do-you-make-money-when-less-1-apps-are-financially-successful-1537962
Even these low price points mobile apps are still routinely pirated. Double ouch.
So, from the short term, consumer perspective this is pretty cool because we have many, many options at deep, deep discount prices but how long can it last? What does this mean long term for product development and, thus, long term for consumers? By cashing in on a short term gain are we setting ourselves up for a long term loss?
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