The AJ-PX5100 is a B4 shoulder-mounted P2HD camera-recorder which upgrades the company’s successful PX5000 series. With its breadth of recording options and exceptional image quality the PX5100 is targeted at network news, documentary, high-end corporate and sports production, as well as the rental market.
Studio 5.2 is available for download from September 14th.
Press Release
Blackmagic Design today announced the public beta of Blackmagic RAW, a new and very modern codec that combines the quality and benefits of RAW with the ease of use, speed and file sizes of traditional video formats. Blackmagic RAW is a more intelligent format that gives customers stunning images, incredible performance, cross platform support and a free developer SDK.
The Blackmagic RAW public beta will be demonstrated on the Blackmagic Design IBC 2018 booth at #7.B45. Customers can download the public beta for use with URSA Mini Pro cameras via the Blackmagic Camera 6.0 Beta Update. In addition, DaVinci Resolve 15.1 Update, which includes support for Blackmagic RAW, is also available free of charge from the Blackmagic Design website.
Blackmagic RAW has been in development for years and is a next generation codec that features multiple new technologies such as an advanced de‑mosaic algorithm, extensive metadata support, highly optimized GPU and CPU accelerated processing and more. It can be used from acquisition throughout post production for editing and color grading, all from a single file.
Traditional RAW codecs have large file sizes and are processor intensive, making them hard to work with. Video file formats are faster, but suffer quality problems due to the use of 4:2:2 video filters that reduce color resolution. Blackmagic RAW solves these problems with an intelligent design that moves part of the de-mosaic process into the camera where it can be hardware accelerated by the camera itself. This results in incredibly efficient encoding that gives customers the same quality, bit depth, dynamic range and controls as RAW, but with much better performance and smaller file sizes than most popular video codecs. Because the processor intensive partial de-mosaic is done by the camera hardware, software such as DaVinci Resolve doesn’t have to do as much work decoding the files. In addition, GPU and CPU acceleration make decoding of frames incredibly fast, so you get extremely smooth performance for editing and grading.
Blackmagic RAW is much more than a simple RAW container format. Its intelligent design actually understands the camera and the sensor. This means the image data, along with the unique characteristics of the image sensor, are encoded and saved into the Blackmagic RAW file, giving customers much better image quality, even at higher compression settings, as well as total control over features such as ISO, white balance, exposure, contrast, saturation and more.
In addition, Blackmagic RAW uses Blackmagic Design Generation 4 Color Science for superior imaging that results in reproducing extremely accurate skin tones and gorgeous, lifelike colors that rival those of cameras costing tens of thousands of dollars more. Images are encoded using a custom non-linear 12-bit space designed to provide the maximum amount of color data and dynamic range.
Blackmagic RAW also makes it easy for any software developer to access all this technology. The free developer SDK lets any third party software application add Blackmagic RAW support on Mac, Windows and Linux. The Blackmagic RAW developer SDK automatically handles the embedded sensor profile metadata, along with Blackmagic Design color science, for predictable and accurate image rendering that yields consistent color throughout the entire pipeline.
Blackmagic RAW features two types of file compression. Customers can choose either constant quality or constant bitrate encoding options, depending on the kind of work they are doing. This lets them prioritize image quality or file size. Constant quality uses variable bitrate encoding so complex frames are encoded at higher data rates to preserve detail and maintain the highest possible quality. Blackmagic RAW Q0 has minimum quantization and yields the highest quality, while Blackmagic RAW Q5 uses moderate quantization for more efficient encoding and a smaller file size. Blackmagic RAW 3:1, 5:1, 8:1 and 12:1 use constant bitrate encoding to give customers the best possible images with predictable and consistent file sizes. The ratios are based on the unprocessed file size of a single frame from the camera’s sensor, making it easy to understand the relative amount of compression being used.
The pristine camera native quality of Blackmagic RAW Q0 and 3:1 are perfect for effects heavy feature film and commercial work. Blackmagic RAW Q5 and 5:1 are extremely high quality making them great for episodic television and independent films. Blackmagic RAW 8:1 and 12:1 offer high quality and speed, making it suitable for productions that wouldn’t normally consider shooting RAW. Now, more customers than ever will be able to use high quality RAW images in an incredibly efficient way that was impossible before.
Blackmagic RAW dramatically simplifies and speeds up post production workflows. DaVinci Resolve 15.1, which was also released today, includes full support for Blackmagic RAW. The performance of Blackmagic RAW is much faster in DaVinci Resolve than any other RAW format. This makes editing, color correction and visual effects incredibly fast. In addition, working with single files instead of folders full of still image sequences greatly simplifies media management. When the RAW settings are changed in DaVinci Resolve, a .sidecar file can be generated or updated if one already exists. When opened in other software applications that support Blackmagic RAW, the .sidecar file, which contains the RAW settings made in DaVinci Resolve, will be automatically used to display the image. If the .sidecar file is removed then the file will be displayed using the embedded metadata instead. This innovative new workflow gives customers a non-destructive way to change RAW settings while working between different applications.
Featuring a fully scalable design and completely modern CPU and GPU acceleration, Blackmagic RAW is optimized for AVX, AVX2 and SSE4.1 enabled processors, multi-threaded, works across multiple CPU cores and is GPU accelerated with support for Apple Metal, CUDA and OpenCL. Frame decoding and image processing is extremely fast, making it super smooth for editing, color correction and visual effects in DaVinci Resolve. Another benefit of media being stored as single files, and not image sequences, is it makes media management easier and file copying much faster.
The free Blackmagic RAW Developer SDK is available on Mac OS, Windows and Linux. This SDK takes care of all the work for developers, so adding support for Blackmagic RAW to third party software applications is easy and fast. Developers get access to GPU and CPU accelerated algorithms for decoding files, along with unique information about the camera’s image sensor so their applications can accurately decode and display the files. The SDK features highly descriptive and flexible metadata options designed to support today’s modern workflows. Metadata is embedded directly in the .braw file or it can be stored in a .sidecar file. Metadata is important because it contains the RAW settings along with information for the slate, iris, focus, focal length, white balance and a lot more. The metadata in .sidecar files can be used on top of the embedded metadata without overwriting it. Blackmagic RAW also supports frame based metadata so customers can access values, such as focus distance, that often change on a frame by frame basis.
Availability and Price
Blackmagic RAW is available today as a public beta via the Blackmagic Camera 6.0 Beta Update for URSA Mini Pro. The final release of Blackmagic RAW is expected to ship in several weeks’ time once further testing is complete. The DaVinci Resolve 15.1 Update, which features support for Blackmagic RAW, has also been released and can be downloaded today free of charge from the Blackmagic Design website.
Press Photography
Product photos of all Blackmagic Design products, are available at www.blackmagicdesign.com/press/images.
About Blackmagic Design
Blackmagic Design creates the world’s highest quality video editing products, digital film cameras, color correctors, video converters, video monitoring, routers, live production switchers, disk recorders, waveform monitors and real time film scanners for the feature film, post production and television broadcast industries. Blackmagic Design’s DeckLink capture cards launched a revolution in quality and affordability in post production, while the company’s Emmy™ award winning DaVinci color correction products have dominated the television and film industry since 1984. Blackmagic Design continues ground breaking innovations including 6G-SDI and 12G-SDI products and stereoscopic 3D and Ultra HD workflows. Founded by world leading post production editors and engineers, Blackmagic Design has offices in the USA, UK, Japan, Singapore and Australia. For more information, please go to www.blackmagicdesign.com.
Blackmagic Camera 6.0 Public Beta software update adds support for Blackmagic RAW public beta to URSA Mini Pro plus Generation 4 Color Science, new LUTs, improved lens support and more.
What's new in Blackmagic Camera Setup 6.0 Beta
New features for URSA Mini Pro
Add new Blackmagic RAW codec support.
Add new demosaic algorithm.
Add Generation 4 color science.
Add Constant Bitrate 3:1, 5:1, 8:1, 12:1 recording.
Add Constant Quality Q0 and Q5 recording.
Add Blackmagic RAW clip based metadata.
Add Blackmagic RAW per-frame metadata.
Add '4.6K Film to Extended Video' LUT.
Add '4.6K Film to Rec 2020 Hybrid Log Gamma' LUT.
Add '4.6K Film to Rec 2020 PQ Gamma' LUT.
Add Level A support for 3G SDI.
Add support for SDI tally over-ride.
Add codec options in SDI Camera Control Protocol.
Add Blackmagic RAW info to URSA Mini Manual.
Improved lens support for servo zoom lenses.
New applications and SDK resources
Add Blackmagic RAW Player for Mac.
Add Blackmagic RAW QuickLook plugin.
Add Blackmagic RAW SDK Developer information.
Add support for .braw file format.
Add support for .sidecar files.
No new features in 6.0 Beta for other camera products.
DaVinci Resolve 15.1 Studio
This software update adds support for the new Blackmagic RAW format to DaVinci Resolve. In addition, DaVinci Resolve 15.1 update also adds new audio ducking features using sidechain compression, support for Fusion compositions outside of the edit timeline, Fusion loader nodes, audio bouncing with effects, source timecode overlays, keywords for markers and more. You can now round trip audio clips to third party audio processing applications from the Fairlight timeline, cache audio clips, deliver supplemental IMF packages, Netflix certified IMF packages, work with stereoscopic 3D EXR files, access frame based metadata and much more. DaVinci Resolve 15.1 Studio adds new collaboration indicators on the edit timeline for clips with color grade changes and Fusion composition updates in collaborative projects, and more.
Particle Illusion is a major new addition to the Continuum package. The completely redesigned high-end motion graphics generator (sparkles, smoke, fireworks) features a speedy GPU-accelerated engine in a simple, easy-to-use interface. The new Particle Illusion plug-in will be released later in 2018 as part of Continuum 2019 and the Continuum Particle Unit. In addition to Particle Illusion, Continuum’s Title Studio adds the ability to apply GPU-accelerated effects (image processing shaders) directly inside its interface along with 150+ new professionally designed templates; broadcast monitor support (Blackmagic only in initial release) for external applications like Particle Illusion and Title Studio; and the new Mocha Essentials interface featuring the new Magnetic Spline Tool.
Continuum 2019 highlights: