[Ryan Holmes]

[Andrew Kimery] “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.”

This was exactly what I was thinking about when I posed my original questions. It’s tangentially related to our discussion here. And much credit to Walter Soyka as I’ve found a good deal of smart critique in reading his posts. So I don’t claim to be original by any means…

But in looking at the App Store, as a user, if an App is priced at $9.99 or $4.99 I typically bypass it immediately. Too much money. So I drive towards the lowest cost app I can find and deal with the shortcomings. Overall in the app store market then those apps that are trying to hold on to make a profit by charging for better interface, more features, or better support get relegated to being unprofitable because another company is chewing the bottom out by offering a $.99, or more typically a free app.

Bringing this around to BMD, what is the cost 5 years in or 10 years into this model for our industry in terms of hardware or software? The effects do already seem to be playing out – Apple, Adobe, Avid, and Autodesk have all drastically lowered their costs for software. Apple – $299 one time purchase, Adobe – $50/month for the entire Master Collection plus additional goodies (Lightroom, Candy, Kuler, etc), Avid Media Composer – $50/month or $1600 outright, Autodesk (which is a mess right now) – Smoke $1,470/year. Those are drastically cheaper prices. And I don’t want to argue that BMD’s business model is the result of this. There’s a confluence of factors driving business decisions. But I do think BMD’s approach is at least one of the factors other companies are considering when building and marketing products.

[Tim Wilson] “I think there is. I know that Canon is going great guns right now. You can see it in the ads here, but I also see it in the forums and out in the world. I’ve asked a number of consultants, resellers, etc, and they agree, Canon is on a massive roll.”

Yep. Canon has a lot of my money right now. C100, C300, 5D3, and just yesterday purchased a set of Canon CN-E primes from Duclos Lenses (great lens shop by the way!)…so basically I’m a Canon homer at this point, I guess. But for so much of the work I do their product offerings nail exactly what I need – sharp image, high/clean ISO, portable, fast menu access via outboard buttons (I’m looking at you Sony and Panasonic), good run ‘n gun ergonomics, etc.

[Tim Wilson] “So, buyers being wary notwithstanding, that’s the kind of question I’m asking. Okay, disk recorders and some I/O have AJA alternatives. I asked about switchers — what about studio cameras?”

I don’t know that there are cost comparative options for BMD’s studio offerings either. Like you say, there aren’t moderately more expensive products on the market. Typically you have to spend a whole lot more or modify an existing camera to “act” like a studio camera. But that by itself doesn’t mean that BMD’s products are good, only that they are inexpensive. Again, if money is the driving factor for the purchase then BMD wins nearly every time.

Having owned the 4K Production Camera I’m very leery of BM’s quality in that segment. Every time we shot the camera my crew would say, “Well….it only cost $3K” in order to justify whatever inadequacy it was presenting us. I’m sure they’re getting better at cameras, but I’m currently not willing to “find out” by placing my cash there. In the year plus I owned that camera (just sold it off about 3 weeks ago) the firmware strides that they made were remarkable. And to their testament, they did seem to provide continuing support for the product via firmware updates. That’s something I don’t think the Japanese camera makers value nearly as much. Sony/Panny/Canon treat their camera like a car. You buy that year’s model and that’s it. If you like the new model, sell the old one and buy the new one. But they’re not going to unpack additional functionality via firmware updates (though Panasonic has addressed the GH4 market pretty well with firmware updates…so maybe positions are changing?).

Quite possibly BMD don’t need to “support” the products the way an AJA does because they don’t cost enough. So if your breaks, just go buy another one. If BMD is selling commodity hardware they may figure it’s not worth dumping millions into fast, reliable support workers because they expect the end user to just buy a second one because the costs are so low. And honestly, that’s what I’ve done with their products. I don’t treat them like a long term investment. I treat them like a one off product that will be replaced in 2-3 years time when it fails. Buy a $995 ATEM today, when it burns out in a year or two, buy another one for $995. And even then, I’m still no where close to the cost of a Ross, Grass Valley, Tricaster, etc price tag. For some of my builds, cost pushes me towards BMD products.

[Tim Wilson] “Hey, I admitted that it might be a first. LOL”

Fair enough. I just didn’t want some new video person reading this thread be under any disillusionment about who The Tim Wilson is! It could be dangerous for them thinking Mr. Wilson has no opinions! ha ha

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[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

[Ryan Holmes]

[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]

[Steven Cohen] “I’m well aware that FCP6 is dead and we are talking about upgrading to Adobe CC, but all it is, is talk right now.

Believe me sometimes I’m fighting with both had tied my back and on one leg.
“

I hear ya! At least forward my comments along to them! 🙂 Seriously!!! It’s 2015!

[Steven Cohen] “As far as setting up a new preset. I’m not sure how to do that.
I don’t have a lot of experience with Adobe yet.

Can you point me in the right direction.”

https://helpx.adobe.com/media-encoder/using/custom-encoding-presets.html

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Mark Suszko] “So I would say that while price is the usual major driver over all, the old saying is still true: the cheapskate always ends up paying twice as much.”

Mark – this is so true. While I like saving money if the gear doesn’t hold up that’s a problem. If it fails, I’m to of a job.

I have a mixture of Blackmagic components at our shop (converters, recorders, cameras), but also some AJA, some SoundDevices, some Convergent-Design, some Utah Scientific, etc. My experience has been that Blackmagic has a much higher failure rate than the other companies listed above. My vendor always warns me when selling me a Crackmagic device (their term, but I find it amusing), “As long as you buy 2, you’ll always have 1 that works. Keep the other on the shelf as an immediate backup.”

I think Bob’s article is great. Very nice work Bob! It’s a nice use of available technologies in order to achieve a desired end. My worry with Blackmagic is that when cost is the main factor in purchasing for a production/post-house, to the exclusive of other factors, and less expensive (or less tightly manufactured) products are sourced the failure rate tends to go up. And the crazy thing is you can literally buy 2 of a given BMD item and still be cheaper than some of the above named companies!

All that said, I’m still looking forward to several of BMD’s product releases this summer like the Video Assist recorder for $500! And Resolve…of course. Having owned their 4K Production Camera I’ll wait a while to see if they make some progress in the camera category before buying in again…

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Steven Cohen] “We currently edit in FCP 6 and are going to switch to Premier in the future.”

Oh, and the future is now! FCP6 is 8 years old and counting. Whoever signs the checks there or builds your network needs to be sat down and talked to! The fact that you’re using software from 2007 and trying to deliver broadcast work…well…that seems like the definition of fighting with one hand tied behind your back.

Tell them it’s ok, it’s time to move forward! 🙂

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Steven Cohen] “When I go into Media Encoder (version 5.5) and choose the MXF OP1a preset,”

What if you build your own brand new preset? Don’t use one bundled with AME. Can you adjust the audio in there?

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

You build “Presets” within AME. Those presets are drag-and-drop onto any file you bring into AME. So they work similarly, though not exactly, to Droplets. You can drop more than one preset onto a file at a time too (so if you have to do 10 versions, you can drop those 10 presets directly onto the file in AME and let your computer work).

For steps on how to build presets:
https://helpx.adobe.com/media-encoder/using/custom-encoding-presets.html

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Damien Molineaux] “I’m trying to import a FCP7 XML with MPEG-2 files generated by FCP7 from XDcamEX footage. Resolve does not see the files on the hard drive, as if they weren’t there.”

In order for Resolve to see your XDCAM footage it has to be in a Quicktime wrapper (.mov) and have the appropriate Sony codecs installed on the system, which must be a Mac. Resolve won’t see MXF wrapped XDCAM. If the Resolve system is a PC then you’re out of luck as it can’t work with XDCAM EX footage.

Best option is edit with your native footage, and when going to color do a conform on the timeline to export out ProRes or DNxHD options for the colorist. Those codecs are much better suited to editing, color, and vfx.

https://forum.blackmagicdesign.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=386

[David Roth Weiss] “We know what you want to do, but you have not explained why you have chosen to grade MPEG 2, which is certainly not a good choice for many reasons, including bad compression low color depth.”

XDCAM is a MPEG-2 based codec with a 4:2:2 color sample and an 8-bit color depth. While not ideal to edit or finish in it “technically” is broadcast worthy (at least according to Sony!).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XDCAM

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Tom Wille] “I’ll ask you the same question, though, would you anticipate a sharper image if I’m shooting outside to close the aperture instead of upping the shutter speed?”

If you’re trying to get a deep depth of field (meaning everything stays in focus), then yes, closing your aperture down will help this. Anytime you run a lens wide open (at the extreme end of it’s aperture) you’ll generally get a softer image than if you stop down a 1-2 stops. This is especially true when using cheaper lenses like Rokinon, Samyang, some Sigma, as well as cheap Canon glass. Higher end stills and video lens tend to do better with this, but there are physical limitations to any lenses ability to focus light onto the sensor.

I have the same lens we’re discussing, Rokinon 14mm, and haven’t noticed sharpness problems on it. But again I’m not shooting it wide open (it’s a wide angle so I don’t need shallow depth of field) and it’s tied to a Canon Cinema body.

Additionally, if you’re shooting video you need to start controlling light with ND filters, not by adjusting your shutter speed. The shutter speed is affecting the way motion is perceived by the camera. Keeping your shutter at 180 degrees (which is double whatever frame rate you’re shooting at) is the best practice for shooting, unless you have a specific need or reason to deviate from that angle.

In order to control light ND filters are the way to go. You can get ones that fit on the end of a lens (not the 14mm due to the bulge of the glass). For something like the 14mm on a DSLR you’d need a matte box to be able to control light. And here again, is one of the reasons that a dedicated video camera is great because most have ND filters build into the camera for controlling exposure.

Looking at that video link you gave, nothing is “wrong” with your footage. It’s a little over exposed as Blaise notes. But the “quality” of the footage looks like standard fair DSLR type footage (and I’m not trying to belittle that as bad, please don’t read my comment that way). Dropping a little color correction and sharpening on it are the way to go.

I would encourage you to look again at the Cinema line as you grow as you can now pickup a used body for the same price you paid for your 6D brand new (C100 Mark I is $3K brand new).

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost