“Its a miracle! This is Canon-NEW wich everyone waiting for! Hallelujah! EF mount, batteries – all from Canon!”
– my friend, wedding photographer said after Blackmagic Pocket 6K official review.
Design of a new Blackmagic Pocket Cinema 6K is very similar to the Pocket 4K camera introduced last year, but compared with it looks more ugly with the bigger nose for EF Mount. But thankfully Super35 sensor, quality in low light will be improving a bit. The sensor is not much more than in 4K, but the boke is noticeable better. Pocket Cinema 6K still have ISO native is 400 and the maximum is 25,600. Recording 10-bit video in the Apple ProRes 4K and 12-bit DR in Blackmagic RAW with a resolution of 6144 x 3456 pixels up to 50 frames per second and 60 frames per second at 6144 x 2560 and also 120 frames per second at 2868 x 1512.
“Pocket 6K is a perfect camera for videographers with a great ability to shoot in BRAW 6K 50 frames and 120 frames in 2.8K resolution. If you using a right lens and have skills how to operate with a camera and lighting as well, then it’s possible to get footages which look like a big budget movie, using professional DaVinci software coming with a camera.”
Limits comparing to others
You can get 6K resolution with new Pocket only in BRAW, rolling in ProRes everything is the same as Blackmagic Pocket 4K, which is still enough, the most standards with final resolution after postproduction mostly 60fps-1080, and in the near future, bigger resolution won’t be needed.
Sadly, the updated camera still hadn’t received an SDI output as UrsaMini, honestly, I hate HDMI and missing to use my accessories with SDI on Pocket. Compared to Pocket Cinema Camera 4K the updated camera has become a bit heavier: 898 grams versus 721 grams. The internal battery still the same – LP-E6. Blackmagic officially claims the camera has the ability to record 45-minute video in a maximum resolution of 6K BRAW with a preset of display brightness in 50%. But I never used my Pocket4K without an external monitor, focus unit, wireless sender and other camera accessories, so any way to use an external battery is a must.
Then probably the most important thing you need to know before swapping to Blackmagic Pocket 6K.. honestly the same problem with using a range of lenses i had with my Production 4K EF before. The MFT mount used in previous 4K version can be adapted to use EF lenses and give essentially the same FOV (SpeedBooster) but the EF sensor/mount can’t go the other direction to let you use smaller, lighter lenses. The EF flange distance also makes it impossible to adapt to many other mounts. Using MFT mount you can adapt probably everything.
Resume
Blackmagic Pocket 6K resolution is nice for reframing and oversampling, but you are essentially paying double for less lensing flexibility. If you’re a one-man-band videographer, for example, you do run-n-guns, this small camera as Blackmagic Pocket 6K with few cropped zoom lenses honestly the best option for you, then you have abilities to feel light when traveling with your equipment and keep your costs down while getting smooth footages in high resolution.
