More Thoughts on Why I Will NOT Buy the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera

I was seriously tempted to drop $500 on the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera but after giving it a little more thought, I decided not to buy it for two main reasons:

• Sensor Size/Crop Factor: With my micro 4/3 Speedbooster/lens adapter, I would still be working with a crop factor of 2x. This means that a 50mm Nikon lens is the equivalent of a 100mm lens. That's ok for some things, but not as workable when you need a wide shot. Not that I do a ton of wide shots, but still sort of an annoyance
• Battery life. Yes, I know you can just buy a lot of cheap Nikon batteries but nothing takes the joy out of shooting like impractical impositions like having to change your battery every 45 minutes. Or I could buy a big external battery, but then what's the point of a tiny camera? And I don't usually do long shoots, but I have come to love the battery life of the GH4 because it rarely interrupts my shooting.

The thing that makes the Blackmagic cameras so interesting to me is the ability to capture 4:2:2 10 bit or raw footage with a log-type profile made for grading. I'd like to try my hand at slightly more ambitious grading.

But over time, I'm finding that honing your lighting skills may be a more convenient way to work. This morning when shooting, I brought the footage in from my Atomos Ninja into Resolve and found that I didn't need to grade anything--the talking head clips all looked great straight out of the camera. And who doesn't want to get a final piece completed more quickly with the look you want?

In short, I'm still excited about what Blackmagic is doing with cameras but will look forward to see what the second generation of cameras from them look like. If they at least fix the battery issue, then this becomes a much more compelling option for me.

Thought I should explain a little. Let me know what you think.

Curtis