For those who don’t know the tool: Blackmagic Camera turns an iPhone into a manual camera app that can feed directly into Resolve workflows, now with wrist control via Apple Watch on iOS. Or the other professional controllers you might have.

A wrist remote for phone rigs

Phone cameras already live in all the inconvenient places. High on a stand. Gaffer-taped to a car. Wedged into a tiny corner for a cheat shot. The update to Blackmagic Camera targets that exact pain point with a companion app for Apple Watch that can control and monitor the iPhone camera remotely.

The Watch companion focuses on practical set tasks. It can start and stop recording, show framing, and display audio levels. It also exposes key controls from the wrist, including exposure, focus, and LUT selection. The whole point is simple: keep all hands off the phone when a touch would wobble the shot, it is too far away, or the camera’s protection against the environment (Animals, Art Directors, the Public) is already in place. The Watch companion installs through the Watch app on the iPhone, and it pairs up as a remote control surface for the camera app. If you want to see it in action, have a look at this video from 9 to 5 Mac:

New hooks for studio style control

This update also adds support for ATEM camera control when you use Blackmagic Camera with ATEM workflows. That matters for anyone building iPhone based multicam setups that need consistent shading and control.

The same update adds support for Blackmagic Focus and Zoom demands when used with Blackmagic Camera ProDock. That pairs the app with physical lens style controls, aimed at a more traditional camera operating feel on a phone rig. Those demands already exist as hardware controls for compatible lenses in Blackmagic’s camera ecosystem. Here, they extend into the phone rig world when you connect through the ProDock.

HDMI portrait output and other workflow fixes

The App Store release notes for the current version list several production-facing additions and fixes beyond the Watch comanion.

The update adds support for full-screen portrait mode HDMI output. That targets vertical capture pipelines where you still want proper monitoring on external displays, without awkward letterboxing or UI clutter.

Pricing and availability

Blackmagic Camera on the App Store is free. Hardware mentioned in the update, including Blackmagic Camera ProDock, carries its own pricing and availability outside the app listing. But you know that, don’t you?

The boring advice that saves shoots

New features feel exciting right up until they meet real world constraints like wireless congestion, rigging compromises, heat, storage, and a director who wants the fifth take to roll instantly. Treat the companion like any other control surface: test it, rehearse it, and build a fallback plan before you rely on it in production.

https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/blackmagiccamera

The post Apple Watch control for the Blackmagic Camera? first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

Nobe OmniScope gets Live Pack for on-set and live monitoring

Well, this exhaustive set of visualisation tools for all kinds of technical parameters in video and audio could always be used for live sources. But until now, any DIT couldn’t get very far if he/she needed to do some real-time grading on a film set or for a live broadcast. Yes, there is Resolve Live, but it’s rather limited. Time in Pixels has recently added the „Live Pack“ to Nobe OmniScope (NOS for short), which integrates with Pomfort’s Livegrade 7, as reported by DP on March 11th. By now, we have driven it through its paces.

Why not Resolve Live?

Even the free version of Davinci Resolve (DR for short) has this feature, which allows some live grading. But it seems a bit like walking into a store and looking for a product that has not been asked for in a while. Some salesperson may say: „Oh, I remember, it must be somewhere in that lowest drawer down in the corner“. Resolve Live is limited to a single input device, even with more than one unit connected you can’t change that. So, for several cameras your (physical) desktop would soon have computers piling up.

And then, you need to set the timeline precisely to the right frame rate and resolution for both timeline and monitoring, i.e. both the input device and the monitoring one must support the same resolution. If not, you won’t see anything, DR will not tell you the parameters of the incoming signal. It’ll just tell you to match whatever there might be. If you want to work in UHD, for example, but monitor your colors on a calibrated screen in HD with a cheaper interface, that won’t happen with Resolve Live. It’s normally not a problem if you don’t use the live feature.

Once you have developed a LUT, save and export it, then move it to your LUT box or camera and load it there. Not really a smooth process in the heat of production, and Blackmagic Design (BM for short) doesn’t seem to care much about adding any features to Resolve Live recently. Nevertheless, NOS can connect to it and deliver the signal to its scopes with very low latency by direct GPU access, and you can feed a Rec. 709 signal, even to monitors which don’t load a LUT, while working on log sources from the DIT cart. Scaling the output for an HD device is easily achieved with NOS. Don’t forget to exit from Resolve Live when done, since most of Resolve’s non-grading features are disabled while it’s running.

Why Pomfort Livegrade?

The whole toolset by Pomfort is a well-establised suite of software for the film and broadcast business, and Livegrade is their solution for real-time grading and look preparation. While it always had its own scopes, they are not as sophisticated and flexible as those in NOS. Livegrade can work with multiple sources, both cameras or references. Live grading for up to 4 cameras can be handled directly, but more than 20 can be controlled by loading LUTs into external LUT boxes, or into some cameras via Ethernet. All of this can be handled right from the software (full details here).

Looks developed here can also be exported as a CDL for dailies or post. Integration with NOS is currently limited to two live slots, but Pomfort is encouraging users to contact them if they need more, so they may be working on extending this number. Quote: „For workflows that require more OmniScope streams, extended configurations can be evaluated on request.“ NOS lists the slots you have prepared just like any other source, while both apps run concurrently. No wiring or additional interfaces needed. So, no extra cost, bad connections or latency introduced, since Direct GPU access is also applied to the signals from Livegrade 7. 

Configuration and Performance

NOS is highly optimized and still running pretty well on older machines. We tried it on a 2017 iMac, which is based on Intel and can’t run any system newer than Ventura (MacOS 13). It can support 2 HD sources and 7 Instruments without fully saturating the GPU, an AMD Radeon Pro 580 (see title). The older interfaces for HD, the UltraStudio Mini Recorder and Monitor, can be found cheaply on the second-hand market and that large screen and its design are still looking good. Maybe you got one waiting for resurrection?

Of course, it’s no match for modern Apple silicon. We tortured a Mac mini M4 Pro with 15 instruments, one source in HD and the other in UHD, and it didn’t break a sweat. GPU load was no more than 60%, most CPU cores were idle, and it used less than 4 GB of RAM. It’s absolutely credible that a Mac mini M2 Pro with 16 GB, as recommended by the author, will be plenty. All of this was tested without scaling or any of the performance options activated, but all the demanding QC features were running. Without all of the latter and some of the performance optimisations, even a Mac mini M1 with 8 GB will do. Nevertheless, you may want a Mac Studio to get more Thunderbolt ports if you need to connect more interfaces. Now, why don’t we mention any PC here, when there is NOS for Windows? (see here for hardware needs).

Well, the other component of today’s review is Mac-only, even Apple Silicon, for that matter. Minimum OS is Sequoia (15) or Tahoe (26). And then, you’ll need the latest Desktop Video driver by BM (15.3.1) for any of their compatible interfaces. There were some reports of installation issues in the forums with recent versions on macOS, but we didn’t experience any of them. It seems that you just have to watch and follow the messages popping up to give the additional components access rights under Apple’s overprotective mother, called an operating system.

All together now …

Once everything is up and running, both apps coexist nicely on our single machine, with Livegrade also just sipping on system resources, both regarding cores and RAM at about 500 MB. Finally, the installer for NOS is quite sleek at not much over 400 MB. The highly flexible and easily configured GUI of NOS can even co-exist nicely with Livegrade on one ultrawide screen like ours. Of course, you can also move the apps to two separate ones. And then, other than by DR, the parameters of incoming signals are detected by either app automatically once you have chosen the interface. You can even get an output in HD from UHD by NOS, so it’s a software issue in DR.

Latency

We measured latency using a 100 fps recording of a TC display, with 50 fps over the whole chain from the lens to the source display in Resolve Live or NOS, so the precision should be +/- 10 milliseconds. After slowing the recording down to 50 fps, we were stepping through the footage and observed the change of the frame numbers. The camera’s LCD was already about 40-50 ms late, but at that point, we don’t know if this is caused by processing in the camera or the display.

Display in Resolve Live was some 80-90 ms late, which includes hardware latency in the DeckLink card, of course. The value via Livegrade was a tad slower, like around 90 ms. The display in NOS via direct GPU access appeared about 10 ms later than in Livegrade, demonstrating the efficiency of that approach. The new focusing aids by coloured or isolated edges felt quite usable, not at all as if wading through molasses, like on systems with too much latency.

Recently Added Features

Support for multiple sources and the helpful Input Strip were already celebrated in DP last year, but now you can also record sources to disk in 720 or 1080 HD, either as H.264 or H.265 in an MP4 wrapper, or the two lighter versions of ProRes in MOV. These recordings are perfect for generating proxies for later editing. Most video speeds are already recorded correctly at constant frame rates; only those pesky fractional rates for the NTSC world are still showing VFR. But the author is aware and working on a fix. Even with 3 recordings running in the background, the GPU load didn’t climb to more than 70%.

New Instruments

There is even a new instrument, the Hectorscope, named after colourist Hector Berrebi. It enables you to examine your shot in 3D, with two dimensions representing the image and the third showing brightness. This is great for checking your shadows for noise or color casts. Loudness metering for the two established broadcast standards in audio, namely EBU R128 and ATSC A/85, is another recent addition. While SDI or HDMI output is already on board, recently the author has added Web Remote output as a very early alpha demo preview. The list of smaller, but nevertheless useful features added would literally fill several pages. Does that guy ever sleep?

Any Shortcomings?

There are only minor issues, like LiveGrade not being able to switch between SDI and HDMI sources. You’ll need to use BM’s Desktop Video Setup to do that, while NOS is handling such tasks in its own GUI. The GUI of Livegrade is less flexible than that of NOS, and it has rather coarse tooltips, whereas those by NOS are very detailed. When disconnecting a source in Livegrade, it’s still not available elsewhere; you’ll need to quit the software first. Both apps recognise and display incoming formats, but you’ll need to switch shortly between sources in Livegrade to see the new values if the source’s parameters have changed. Finally, if you quit only one of the apps and start it again, things can get messed up.

Documentation

Both apps have complete online manuals, including video tutorials. Some of the tutorials for Time in Pixels were made together with Daria Fissoun, who is also a specialist for DaVinci Resolve and explains the use of most of those scopes very well here. And then, the changelog for NOS is excellent, far better than many others; it leaves nothing unclear. If you’d like to dig even deeper, head over to Tektronix and read about the basics and scopes as artistic tools. Their hardware scopes, which used to be expensive marvels of engineering, can be found for a few hundred Euro second-hand now, left far behind by software like NOS. Their learning resources are still valid, though.

Commentary

Nobe OmniScope is getting better with every update and works fine both with LiveGrade and Resolve Live. Unfortunately, while being free, the latter is quite limited and not even really stable. We have experienced stalls when simply trying to add a node while Resolve Live was running.

Livegrade 7 is not cheap at over 1.000 € per year, but it’s stable and does what it promises. You can get a 10-day temporary license for 179,- € if you just need it for a single project.

OTOH, the Live Pack for NOS is a steal at its introductory price of 85,- € if you already own OmniScope Pro, and it’s a lifetime license. After the introduction ends, it is 128 €, which still is cheap for a tool of that magnitude. NOS itself is a subscription, but a fair one: it won’t stop functioning; you just won’t get updates anymore if you stop paying. You can even reactivate your subscription later.

The post Nobe OmniScope is a Live Act now! first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Uli Plank.

ActionVFX produces high-quality stock VFX footage, used in compositing software such as After Effects, Nuke, and Fusion. The assets are shot practically, designed for professional use in feature, TV, and game pipelines.

ActionVFX has made its Flamethrowers effects pack available as a free download until 13 January 2026. The collection includes 30 practical flamethrower clips shot for visual effects and motion graphics use. The footage is available under a commercial-use licence.

Real fire, real footage

The clips were filmed with a RED Gemini 35K camera at 96 fps, ensuring clean motion and strong exposure detail. The pack includes 5K RED R3D masters and pre-keyed 12-bit ProRes 4444 versions in 2K and 4K resolutions. These can be imported directly into any compositor that supports ProRes with alpha channels, such as After Effects, Nuke, Fusion, or Premiere Pro.

Shot variety and usability

The set features multiple camera angles, including side views and first-person perspectives. Each shot has been keyed and delivered with transparency, reducing setup time for artists who need instant, production-ready fire elements. The keyed clips are intended for drag-and-drop compositing without the need for manual rotoscoping or colour separation.

Short-lived offer

The flamethrower pack is free to download until 13 January 2026 via the ActionVFX website (Registration required). After that date, standard pricing will apply. The company also maintains a growing library of other free practical VFX elements, including fire, smoke, dust, snow, and sparks.

In production context

As with all VFX assets, users are advised to test the footage before deployment in active production environments. Proper grading and compositing are essential to match lighting and motion in live-action plates.

// https://www.actionvfx.com/collections/flamethrowers-stock-footage/

The post ActionVFX Ignites: 30 Flamethrower Clips Free first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

But now the “Scary Fast” event for the release of Apple’s M3 computers was filmed entirely on the iPhone, as the credits alone reveal. On YouTube you can find the “Behind the
Scenes…”, where it also becomes clear that the filming and technical effort was actually the same as always(is.gd/iphone_bts). But the dollies, cranes and the drone were actually just sitting on a new iPhone 15 Pro Max. In addition, the predominant visual theme was “black”, matching one of the new laptop colours.

The EU is to blame

This doesn’t mean that this iPhone is a low-light wonder (it isn’t), but that you can set the light to high contrast and then grade it to black. The decisive factor is that recording in ProRes with Log is now available. Apple would certainly have liked to hold on to an in-house connection for longer. But the EU has demanded that all smartphones that come onto the market here in 2024 must have USB-C. Apple has taken the plunge and has already installed the corresponding socket in the new series this year.

Data transfer

In the early productions with iPhones, the employees must have had incredible patience. Recordings had to be transferred via WiFi or the interface with the euphemistic name “Lightning” (or its 30-pin predecessor), which is very slow by today’s standards. Two short test clips of around 750 MB took over ten minutes via “AirDrop”, via USB-C the process was
the process was barely measurable in seconds.

Initially, there were still rumours floating around the web that, apart from charging the battery via USB-C, Apple might restrict the use of external devices to its own offerings or only allow its own cables at pharmacy, sorry, Apple prices.
None of this has materialised: A standard SSD connected via a normal data cable (not just a charging cable, of course) works without any restrictions. With the iPad, we still had to complain that FCP-X cannot work directly from connected storage devices (DP 23:05). On the iPhone, on the other hand, Apple does not force internal recording, as already available apps show. The Apple event was obviously recorded with the help of the free Camera App from Blackmagic (BM for short), Apple even thanks us in the credits.

Storage media

It is clear that Apple also wants to satisfy its shareholders: the new options are limited to the two top models. With the “Pro”, you also have to pay an extra 130 euros for 256 GB of internal memory to get full functionality with the memory-intensive ProRes even without an SSD. This is the basic configuration for the Pro Max. The internal memory is really fast, with 1.6 gigabytes per second (GB/s) when writing and reading. Measured with Diskio by Sergii Khliustin, a free app with witty comments – is.gd/diskio.

Externally, only regular USB-C is supported, no Thunderbolt. However, with a good SSD, this is completely sufficient to record ProRes 422 HQ in UHD with up to 60 fps directly, for which you only need around 200-225 MB/s. Initially, the app even listed ProRes 4444, but that was probably too much for the system. Even on an Arri Alexa, this codec is not always selected, and 422 HQ is completely sufficient as a source for the iPhone. In UHD at 60 fps, it needs just under 800 GB of space for one hour.

A Samsung T5 SSD, for example, as external storage shows around 373 MB/s throughput when writing, depending on the app being measured. Even a T7, which is not recommended for BM cameras, ran for two hours on the iPhone at 25 fps. The free OWC Drive Speed app can actually directly measure the suitability for various codecs, resolutions and the achievable frame rate. However, it already warns of picture dropouts,
without us being able to detect these in practice for the respective media, so this app is probably not yet fully developed.

Even a T5 is still relatively large for an iPhone, although thanks to MagSafe it can be easily attached to the back with a magnetic ring. Some people wonder whether a smaller flash drive with USB-C would also work. Samsung has relatively fast models for this, currently with a maximum of 256 GB. According to the company (we didn’t have one to test), these should be able to read 400 MB/s, but only write 110. This information is always given with the small addition “up to” and only refers to the 256 GB model. This should still be sufficient for ProRes 422 HQ with 25 fps, but ProRes 422 LT could also go up to 60 fps. Unfortunately, such sticks are often not compatible with the mobile phone case.

We have also not tested the idea of connecting a really fast SDXC card with a small USB-C adapter. But a Sony “Tough” or comparable cards with 300 MB/s should work with a really fast adapter. A card reader can of course also be useful for backups on the iPhone when working with conventional cameras. If you want to edit the material on the PC, you should pay attention to the formatting of the media: The iPhone does not recognise NTFS, but exFAT works up to 2 TB.

Be careful, there is a risk of data loss! The “classic” HFS or the new APFS, which the iPhone naturally supports, are better. One of these formats would therefore also be advisable for transferring to the PC. Under Windows there are programmes such as “HFS for Windows” or “APFS for Windows” from Paragon for using these formats. Of course, the iPhone also uses these two formats.

Power and heat

A fully charged Pro Max still showed 66 per cent charge remaining after one hour at 60 fps, and 42 per cent after two hours of recording in ProRes 422 HQ at 25 fps in UHD, with the T5 SSD also being supplied with power. The SSD absorbed the greater proportion at 25 fps, at 60 fps it is the other way round. The iPhone 15 Pro still had 58 per cent after one hour at 60 fps, the camera app needed the larger share, the SSD about 2/3 of it. This was the app from Blackmagic. This value is not the same for all apps, as we will see in their tests. These are amazing runtimes, but the iPhone does get very warm, despite iOS 17.1.1, which has essentially eliminated the initial heat problems. You should definitely remove any silicone case, we got overload messages at 60 fps on the Pro Max after a few minutes at an ambient temperature of 27 degrees. Another tip from BM was to switch off the overlays when recording, i.e. to “wipe them away”. This allowed the Pro Max to run smoothly even in slightly warmer conditions.

The iPhone 15 Pro may seem more attractive for video with its 3x lens and slightly lower price. However, its battery is smaller; in stand-alone mode with SSD, 20 per cent charge was still left after two hours. Unfortunately, the smaller housing also cools less well, and despite the above cooling measures, 60 fps was over after a few minutes. At 25 or 30 fps, the Pro also lasted without overheating and the app consumed less power in relation to the SSD. Very fast SSDs, such as a Samsung 980 Pro in an NVMe enclosure, require too much power and only run on both iPhones with an external power supply via USB-C hub. You don’t necessarily have to take a hub with you to externally power the iPhone itself, as there are already power banks for MagSafe.

Frame rate and synchronisation

With a runtime limited only by power and storage medium, another question arises: What about maintaining the frame rate and thus the picture-sound synchronisation over a longer period of time? In Apple’s film, no statement was longer than 20 seconds without a cut, which any smartphone can actually manage without becoming asynchronous. But unfortunately, practically all of today’s smartphones do not provide a fixed frame rate, but a variable one (VFR = Variable Frame Rate). Although DaVinci Resolve (DR for short) simply reports a highly precise 60,000 under “Shot Frame Rate”, the iPhone is unfortunately no different. Before recording, we switched to aeroplane mode and closed all other apps to rule out any interference.

However, a further measurement showed that this was not necessary. In the free MediaInfo, the information is slightly more correct, showing a frame rate between 59.940 and 60.181 fps – that’s a deviation of far less than one per cent! A longer recording with a film gate showed that the variable frame rate in DR is relatively unproblematic. The sound ran continuously one frame early for over 30 minutes (at 60 fps!), only at one point did we have the impression that it tended towards two frames. Since in DR the picture occasionally moved one frame ahead of the TC flap, which we kept continuously in the picture, the editing software probably does react to VFR. This is usually manageable, but the iPhone is probably not quite suitable for uninterrupted concert recordings lasting several hours.

Cameras and lenses

A few years ago, the statement “My smartphone has three cameras and a LiDAR scanner” would probably have been met with incredulous smiles. But there are actually three lenses here, each with its own sensor, just like before. In fact, most of it is even identical to the iPhone 14, only the signal processing has been further developed. The ultra wide-angle lens with 13 mm, the regular 24 mm and the 77 mm in the iPhone Pro are identical to their predecessors.

Only the 120 mm in the Pro Max is really new and a very clever design with a multiple prism that basically folds a relatively long focal length into the flat body. To us, such a design seems potentially more durable than a miniaturised zoom lens like the competition (usually referred to as a periscope lens), as there are no moving parts other than the sensor. It is therefore not an optical zoom at all, as is sometimes incorrectly written. Please note that in the following we use the term KB full frame for the photographic full frame of 24×36 mm, because experienced film cameramen tend to mean the S-35 full frame. However, its diagonal is not always the same, but depends on the respective widescreen format. The information provided by Apple and in the apps refers to the equivalent focal length of KB full frame. The main lens 1× has a real 6.86 mm with f 1.78 and the ultra wide-angle 0.5 has a real 2.22 mm at f 2.2, the 3× has 9 mm with f 2.8 and the 5× has a real 15.66 mm, also at f 2.8.

The iPhones also offer a zoom across the lenses, but this is based on continuous digital scaling. Unfortunately, this shows a disturbing jump when switching to telephoto due to the parallax of the separate cameras. In addition, even with sophisticated algorithms, the sharpness drops slightly when the resolution of the sensor falls below 48 megapixels (mpx), which is particularly noticeable on the way to 5x. This is a disadvantage that longer focal lengths also have with conventional cameras: The 77 mm only focuses up to 60 cm at close range, the 120 mm only up to 1.3 m.

You have to be careful here: The iPhone should be set to “Keep setting” for macro control. Otherwise, only the small flower indicates that the macro range is switched to the ultra-wide angle camera, although the original lens is still selected. However, this only has 12 mpx, unlike the standard camera. This automatic function can be deactivated. With the default setting, the photos from the 24 mm lens are downscaled to 24 mpx and recorded in HEIC, the full 48 mpx are only available in RAW (DNG format). The main camera also delivers the best quality for video thanks to downsampling. And for the selfies: The front camera has 2.69 mm at f 1.9, so it looks like a 15 mm, but only has just under 8 megapixels (actually photo cells = Sensel).

Photography

The DP is not explicitly aimed at photographers, but in view of the different resolutions of the sensors, a few comments seem appropriate. In our test of the Sony A7SIII (DP 21:05), we already proved that megapixels aren’t everything. Just as the Sony “only” offers 12 mpx, images from the iPhone would also be perfectly suitable for an A4 page. For large posters, however, we would generally recommend professional cameras, even if Apple sees it differently in its own advertising.

It should be noted that the sensor has an aspect ratio of 4:3, which is even closer to the square than the usual 35mm with 3:2. The HEIC photos are very compact at around 2.8 MB, whereas DNG requires over 67 MB for the same subject. A section in 2,400×2,400 pixels from the iPhone at 120 mm (equivalence) with the same section from the Sony A7 IV with approximately the same focal length differs primarily, of course, in the real bokeh, which is not simulated here on the iPhone either. The slightly different colours can of course be adjusted, as both are raw images with plenty of colour depth.
The resolution of the test chart in 48 mpx from the 24 mm of the iPhone is excellent and shows no moiré, but slight colour noise even at ISO 320.

The counterpart in standard setting as HEIC with 24 mpx shows less noise, but colour moiré and clear edge sharpening. The modern HEIC compression is very high quality in itself, but unfortunately Apple applies all the “image enhancements” to these photos that the fast A17 processor is capable of, such as smoothing and sharpening contours or local colour tone mapping. Edge sharpening in particular looks just as distracting as it does on amateur-class drones. Of course, Apple also knows that the sharpening of details in faces is usually undesirable. Accordingly, skin tones tend to be smoothed out, which often gives them the infamous “plastic look”.

The design of these functions is certainly based on comprehensive market analyses, as the vast majority of users will simply take photos with their mobile phones and presumably find all this attractive. Professionals who don’t want to be deprived of the opportunity to tweak their pictures themselves will therefore have to work with RAW Max (as it is called in the menu) and plan the necessary space for it, either conveniently and expensively in the iPhone or more cheaply on an external storage device. However, raising your eyebrows at “computational photography” in general is not entirely appropriate. After all, most professional cameras have been correcting various lens errors in the background for years, primarily vignetting and distortion. This means that lenses can be optimised in other respects without being sinfully expensive.

The iPhone goes beyond this and achieves amazing things in two areas: bokeh and low-light. The ability to use the (actually relatively coarse) information from the LiDAR to subsequently influence and target the depth of field was already available on a number of predecessor models. But Apple has significantly improved the algorithms and, at least in photography, the results can now only be recognised as fake with intensive pixel peeping, even with hair and other difficult edge zones.

The results in RAW (DNG) are impressively good, while artefacts can be seen in HEIC. However, we also photographed the test panel at 320 ISO for the wide angle and 500 for the telephoto. Vignetting or chromatic aberrations are hardly recognisable and the distortion correction for 24 mm is also better than with the uncorrected professional lens. Even moiré is hardly noticeable at 48 mpx from 24 mm and the resolution is even slightly higher, as the A7IV only has 33. At 77 mm or 120 mm, the A7IV has a recognisable advantage over the 12 mpx of the iPhones, although it was at a slight disadvantage in terms of speed each time. A 13 mm was not available to us for the full frame, so no comparison was made.

The Sony’s HIF images look cleaner because, apart from subtle noise filtering in extremely low light, everything else can be deactivated. In low light, the iPhone does all by itself what, in principle, any camera on a tripod can do: A series of photos that are then combined to reduce noise. Red has been offering something similar for 10 years (see DP 13:03). With the iPhone, this also works with good stabilisation from reasonably steady hands, but you can get even more out of it with a tripod. Some even recommend this for astrophotography; there is even a free app for this, AstroShader, which can also save raw images.

Now, we have too much light pollution near a city for a great starry sky, but you can focus on the lights of the city itself instead. It’s impressive what such a tiny chip can do with the help of a computer. The tree in the foreground was barely distinguishable from the night sky with the naked eye. Apple is clearly making a virtue of the A17’s computing power out of the necessity of the tiny sensor and calculating far better images than you would expect from a mobile phone. However, these calculations take time and cannot be used for video. So how do the 15s perform when filming? We use the Sony A7 IV (see DP 22:05) as a reference here, even if some people seriously compare the images with those from an Arri Alexa in grading(is.gd/quazi_iphone_arri).

Film: Resolution

When filming from the high-resolution 24 mm sensor in UHD, the iPhone not only scales down the 48 million photocells (aka Sensel), but also crops slightly from the 4032 horizontal pixels available per photo to 3840. So if Apple had only added a few more Sensel, the iPhone could even deliver the 4096 pixels of the DCI cinema format. There would be more than enough vertical pixels anyway. Other formats are possible with third-party apps; we will go into this in more detail in the respective apps. The same applies to the Ultra-WW and the telephoto lenses, which logically have less oversampling, but are also slightly cropped.

The downsampling of the 48 mpx at least offers the possibility of noise reduction by integrating the neighbouring pixels or a digital 2× zoom without loss of resolution. However, when zooming through to 5× telephoto, not only does the parallax error mentioned above occur, but the resolution also collapses beyond 2×. Up to 3× on the iPhone 15 Pro, these effects are correspondingly less noticeable. A 28 mm and a 35 mm are still simulated quite well by both iPhones. This is comparable to Sony’s digital zoom in the camera, which works with similarly good algorithms, but cannot deliver the full resolution beyond around 1.7.

The resolution of the iPhones is also reduced at the higher levels of stabilisation. “Standard” only uses optical stabilisation by mechanically tracking the sensor, while “Cinematic” and “Extreme” additionally track a reduced area of the sensor surface. Unfortunately, “Extreme” in particular also shows overshoots – or is this intended to simulate the inertia of a Steadicam? Be that as it may, a small gimbal can do this better. Another disadvantage of the two higher stabilisations are massive deviations in the frame rate in the first second; the iPhone is obviously “stressed” here (thanks to Kurt Friis Hansen for these measurements).

The other sensors with 12 mpx naturally also offer less resolution reserve when filming, but are completely sufficient for UHD. For comparison: On S-35, the 5× lens of the Pro Max would correspond to about 75 mm, the 3× to about 48 mm. Because a suitable prime lens was not available for the Sony, we used a very high-quality zoom lens. However, this actually put the A7IV at a slight disadvantage in terms of speed. In all shots, the film images of the iPhones on the test chart show slight moiré and some loss of resolution due to scaling; the Sony obviously has better downsampling. The differences are small at 24, 77 and 120 mm and the moiré can practically only be seen on the test chart. Other cameras only deliver better results with very good downsampling of images in 6K or more.
It is obvious that a lot of calculations are also carried out on the images in log, as the charts show no vignetting and hardly any distortion, just like in photography. This is not to be expected with such lenses without software correction. The very high-quality Zeiss C/Y zoom on the Sony shows more optical errors due to the lack of software correction. It should be understandable that a lens with a real focal length of just under 16 mm (the 5×) without software tricks does not offer such a differentiated depth of field as a real 120 mm for KB full frame (see above). All lenses definitely show some breathing during focus shifts – if Apple doesn’t simulate this as well ;-)

Film: Compression

Here, too, the comparison with the Sony A7IV, which only records 10 bit with 4:2:2 as H.265 for maximum quality, ProRes is not available without an external recorder. Our endurance test was a water surface in the rain, which can really torture any GOP codec (such as H.264/265). The iPhone only recorded a good 7 MB/s at 60 fps in UHD, while the same motif was recorded in ProRes 422 HQ at 213 MB/s. The Sony A7 IV records this codec at 50 fps with 25 MB/s. Nevertheless, the typical artefacts, such as block formation, can hardly be seen in the correctly exposed motif on the iPhone. However, this does not only speak in favour of the quality of the encoder alone, as the finest details are already reduced before compression.

This becomes clear with a shot of the same subject that is underexposed by just one f-stop and corrected in DR. Despite 10 bit and 4:2:2, the signal in H.265 already shows signs of banding and is overall much less “full” and more coarsely structured than the version in ProRes. The same applies to noise, which is also filtered more heavily before compression and then “muddied” by the codec. The noise remains much finer and more “organic” in ProRes. It is therefore less disturbing in itself and is also more suitable for careful filtering in post-production. Consequence: If you don’t have enough storage space on location, H.265 is perfectly usable in Log, but should be exposed as correctly as possible. ProRes is considerably more tolerant, while Cinema P3 can record better H.265 at higher data rates (see p. 128).

Film: Motion display

We can be brief here and take the liberty of quoting the values from CineD (is.gd/cined_test) because our reference fan was not available. For UHD, our colleagues measured 5.3 milliseconds for the sensor at 24 mm, and even 5 ms at 77 mm and 120 mm. Our subjective impression from our own tests agrees with this. These are excellent values, also in comparison to conventional film cameras. The jelly images of older iPhones are definitely a thing of the past and action is the order of the day.
However, the Bentley film mentioned at the beginning was still noticeable with the jerking of fast movements at only 24 fps. A look at the individual images shows that they lack any motion blur. Even these tiny sensors are too light-sensitive today to comply with the filmic rule for sufficient motion blur in daylight. After all, mobile phones primarily use the time for exposure control, because the aperture is fixed. Without an ND filter, the only option is to regulate the ISO value, which the iPhones also make intensive use of. But this has consequences for the usable contrast range.

Film: Dynamic range and colours

The HDR shots from an iPhone with the corresponding screen are very impressive at first glance, but on closer inspection the sharpening becomes unpleasant. Added to this is the local tone mapping, which is particularly noticeable with intensely coloured light sources and soft colour gradients in the moving image. Only recording in Apple Log avoids these annoyances, which is why we limited ourselves to it for dynamic measurement. Apple Log is excellently tuned, it does better justice to the iPhone than an A7 IV with its S-Log3, because even for 10 bit it is still very flat. Incidentally, in the current version 18.6.4, DR understands the Apple Log with the colours in Rec 2020 with automatic colour management.

The amazing night vision in photos ends for the iPhone when filming, as there is no time for the exposure tricks from photography. We also used the Sony A7 IV for comparison. It is not quite as sensitive to light as the A7S and also works with noise reduction in low light. Compared to the iPhone, however, it shows the richness of detail that a full-frame sensor can achieve when collecting light.

However, we came across an interesting phenomenon that suggests multiple exposures in the highlights. When shooting at 50 fps in Log with a longer exposure time of up to 1/80 second, the highlights are consistently limited to around 70 per cent. If you now go to at least 1/96, the values expand into the space above. Hardly any further information can be found about this function, only CinemaP3 refers to it as EDR (Enhanced Dynamic Range).

In the documentation for developers, the term is primarily used for playback on HDR displays. Red has been offering something similar for recording under the name “HDRx” for some time, but probably does not hold a patent on this (as with the compression of RAW in the camera). Obviously, two (perhaps even more) readouts of the sensor are combined here as soon as the time until the next single image is sufficient. 7.5 milliseconds is obviously not enough, but 10 ms is fine. This is less noticeable at 25 fps, as the usual exposure time of 1/50 with 20 ms is easily sufficient. Here the effect already starts at 1/40, at 1/30 the remaining time is still too short – which mathematically corresponds to the behaviour at 50 fps with just under 7 ms. The resulting distribution across the log curve can be easily controlled using ND and ISO.

At the other end of the scale, it is noticeable that there is practically no recognisable noise. You can simply cover the lens with manual exposure and the line drops to zero. So there is obviously a lot of filtering going on in the camera, because such a small sensor cannot be so low-noise despite all the technical progress. This becomes quite clear when shooting at high ISO values with short exposure times, as the lower mid-tones are already very noisy. Medium ISO with longer exposure times using ND looks much better.

So there is no “correct”, native ISO value that always fits. The iPhone makes too many adjustments for this, even with Log. It all depends on where the important details are: If you want to bring out the highlights, e.g. add structure to a cloudy sky, a higher ISO value is appropriate. EDR reduces the contrast in the highlights, but the details are there. If the shadow areas are the most important thing, on the other hand, you should go for a low ISO in order to provide the sensor with enough light, then the highlights will be compressed, but largely without clipping.

In our exposure series with EDR, 2 f-stops overexposure and 3 f-stops underexposure were still easily correctable, the colours become weaker, but do not derail. Incidentally, they are excellent: especially in the critical area between red and yellow and thus with the skin tones, the iPhone shows a precision landing. Noise is visible in dark areas, but is fine-grained in ProRes and can be controlled in post. We worked with DR’s colour management and only corrected brightness and contrast. We measured an extremely high-contrast motif with a cloudy sky and molleton in the shadowy foreground with 9.5 f-stops – this would still be usable in post (the blue tone on the blacks is scattered sky blue).

After all these observations, I must also note that Gerald Undone and Patrick Tommaso’s categorisation of ISO 1,100-1,400 as the native value should be treated with caution. The two did not explain whether they used ND filters or varied the exposure time(is.gd/undone_iphone). But DXOmark also assumes 1,250 to 1,480. I tend to favour ISO 200-800 for noise reduction and use EDR with sufficiently long exposure times. Of course, ND filters are the order of the day in bright light, otherwise the typical staccato films from action cams will result.

Film: Equipment

Basically, the only indispensable accessory for good pictures is an ND filter. But a variable ND consists of two polarising filters and has the corresponding side effects, from the infamous “X” to altered colours (warmer ones in our case). Conventional ND filters are better. We were unable to observe any noticeable IR contamination with an inexpensive set, even at 10 f-stops; Apple probably has this well under control. Filters can be attached with a simple clamp mount, but this should not cover too much of the interface on the side of the screen. In addition, such a mount does not fit well with the usual transparent silicone covers, as stray light can then enter from behind. Such covers are also not conducive to cooling in warm environments.

If it’s not too warm, a thin, black cover would be useful. If you want it more perfect, you’ll be back on the road to “Frankenrig” at some point, because the accessories industry has immediately adapted to this. But there are alternatives that can still be put in your pocket as a protective frame without all the accessories. The company Beastgrip has been involved in the development since the Bentley advert and also produced the universal cage that was used for Apple’s event. Their “Beastcage” will soon be released in specific versions for the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max and offers a very sophisticated system, including filters, macro lens and anamorphic lenses. Another provider is Freewell with the “Sherpa” – the name of course says it all, especially for the iPhone. It works with clever magnetic holders for filters or lenses.

Freewell not only offers filters, but also anamorphic lens attachments. These are available in both 1.33 and 1.55 and at Freewell optionally with streaks in classic blue as well as in “gold”, i.e. warm yellow. However, the streaks are very pronounced, including the typical side effects such as edge blurring and distortion. However, the 1.55s in particular offer much more horizontal image area, even if they are not easy to align. There is no gain in resolution associated with the anamorphic lenses in ProRes Log. When recording film, the full area of the 4:3 sensor can only be used with H.265 in 8-bit HDR or Rec 709 and then shows all the typical “blurring” effects.

Be careful if you want to use existing filters with a larger diameter via the step-up ring: the 24 mm main camera can then vignette. In addition, the stabilisation of the iPhone does not work with anamorphic lenses and sometimes the iPhone “sees” the adapter as an object and goes into macro mode. So is this more for wannabe Spielbergs? The only filters you really need are NDs and possibly a circular polarising filter, as neither of these can be replaced in post. There are excellent software solutions for everything else, such as “Scatter”.

Advantages and disadvantages

So where do we stand with such a powerful camera phone? Well, first of all, an “always with you” camera is definitely better than no camera at all. In low light, a good hybrid camera like the Sony A7 IV is still clearly superior and you have an almost infinite choice of lenses, but all of this is still much more expensive, even compared to Apple’s prices. If you know your camera really well, you can
blindly with the viewfinder and at the same time see the subject in isolation without distraction. Nowadays, the monitor can usually be swivelled and rotated, but the iPhone’s monitor is still visible even in sunlight.
But you don’t always have all those nice lenses with you. Dust on the sensor when changing lenses is also not an issue with mobile phones. The iPhone is even waterproof, where larger cameras can only withstand splashing water. And you hardly stand out with it, whereas a “real” camera with a longer lens might be eyed suspiciously or even rejected at the entrance. The iPhone 15 can achieve cinema quality in the documentary sector and would certainly have been a dream come true for authors such as Michael Winterbottom with “In This World” or Wim Wenders with “Buena Vista Social Club” – these films were released to the cinema in large parts by DV.

Commentary

Apple has managed an amazing balancing act with the iPhone 15 Pro: 99 per cent or more of users get nice pictures without any great expertise and professionals get a camera that, with the right app, can do far more than a conventional smartphone. The pig called “game changer” is driven through the digital village almost every day – mostly ephemeroptera (mayflies). But the Pro models of the iPhone 15 could actually signal a paradigm shift, similar to the Canon 5D Mark II 15 years ago. Just as that marked the beginning of hybrid photo/film cameras, the iPhone is now a working tool for professionals. And unlike a standard camera, you can even use it to make phone calls..

The post Film with a Phone? first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Uli Plank.

Non-linear video editing with computers (NLE for short) has given us enormous freedom. Not only the fiddling with adhesive presses and cotton gloves, synchronised tape machines or even toxic carbon tetrachloride in magnetic magnifiers from the early days of videotape are a thing of the past. today, “cuts” are non-destructive and can be altered at will (sometimes all too often). But the whole thing has one disadvantage: the individual components are actually scattered around on storage media and are only accessed at lightning speed. If the end product is to be passed on or archived, a final rendering must therefore be carried out. Depending on the complexity of the visual processing and the codec used, this can sometimes take longer.

However, customers sometimes (or usually) have last-minute change requests. We ourselves are not perfect and sometimes only discover errors shortly before delivery. Careful quality control under human eyes is essential in any case because of technical errors. These can range from faulty field sequences to the erratic rendering errors of overheated graphics cards (just think of the infamous D700 in the MacPro). Such errors are particularly time-consuming because they can occur in completely different places when rendering again. In the final check, the entire file must therefore be reviewed one-to-one, even if only a short section has been corrected – sometimes it’s just a single line in the credits.

Experienced specialists in the fields of 3D animation and VFX, where the final rendering can take an extremely long time and errors often occur in completely unexpected places, therefore generally use numbered image sequences instead of contiguous individual files. This allows faulty parts to be specifically recalculated and inserted. However, such sequences take up an enormous amount of space and require very fast storage media for smooth playback. Errors during copying would also easily lead to shifts in image and sound or separate alpha masks. Compared to DPX master files (Digital Picture Exchange), ProRes 444 or DNxHR can be up to a factor of 10 smaller. In the broadcast sector, individual files in high-quality codecs are therefore in demand today, which usually also include numerous audio tracks and subtitles due to the international evaluation. What if it were possible to correct a section or individual tracks without affecting the rest of the content?

Until now, people have said: “That’s not possible!” Charles D’Autremont from Cinedeck proudly explains (presumably with a twinkle in his eye): “But we didn’t know that, so we did it.” The company does indeed have a unique selling point with CineXtools, even though Avid has announced a similar function for its NLE. However, this is still in beta testing and will only work with the company’s own system in the OP1a container anyway, while CineXtools support the common intermediate and broadcast codecs in both popular containers. In addition, they have already proven themselves at several large production houses, which is the most important thing for such a tool. The whole thing is open-heart surgery, so to speak, because the target file is irretrievably changed in the process. If you cannot rely on the integrity of all other parts afterwards, the enormous time advantage of a targeted quality control of the corrected parts alone is lost.

Technical requirements

The central condition for such an operation is that the file structure allows the exchange of any image sequences, even with changing content. This not only rules out temporal compression methods, but also codecs with pure I-frames but variable bit rate (VBR) are unsuitable. After all, you cannot rely on the content of an image to be exchanged being compressible to the same extent as the original image. What is needed is a framework for the individual images that corresponds to the maximum expected image content. Only codecs with a constant bit rate (CBR) fulfil this requirement. Apple’s ProRes, Avid’s DNxHD/HR and, as optional upgrades, Sony’s AVC-Intra and XDCAM-HD are currently supported. For XDCAM, only the versions with CBR are permitted. In addition to MOV (Quicktime), both versions of MXF are also suitable as containers, depending on the codec. While DNxHD/HR theoretically also allows VBR, in practice it always occurs in CBR, ProRes is usually output as VBR.

DaVinci Resolve also supports ProRes in CBR as an option for output under MacOS, as do the video products from Autodesk. Plug-ins from Cinedeck are available for Adobe and Avid, which enable output in CBR. Alternatively, CineXtools also offer re-wrapping from ProRes to CBR. In this process, only the container is filled with empty data so that the maximum permitted data rate can be accommodated – this is also known as padding. This is not a transcoding of the image material, which remains completely untouched (even if the generation losses with ProRes would be very low anyway). Due to Apple’s licensing policy, however, some ProRes functions are only available for MacOS, while the other parts of the program are available for PC and Mac and a CineXtools licence can even be transferred between the two systems. The programme’s system requirements are modest: OS X 10.9 (Mavericks) is sufficient on the Mac, while we tested on High Sierra. On the PC, everything from Windows 7 (64 bit) with Service Pack 1 or newer is possible. The programme is also frugal when it comes to hardware, even if transcoding and copying processes are of course significantly faster on powerful machines. During re-wrapping, the metadata in the header is also cleaned up in such a way that it should pass a quality check for broadcast – unfortunately, this is not a given with every NLE system.

If CineXtools is primarily used for quick last-minute changes, it makes sense to output all master files in CBR, even if they take up a little more space. In the test, the CBR version of a professionally produced short film with low-noise image quality and typically easily compressible elements (such as opening and closing credits) was around a third larger than in VBR due to the padding. On the other hand, the new tools save the space that new full-length render files would take up during corrections. If ProRes is frequently delivered in VBR, the re-wrapping by the CineXtools is primarily dependent on the disc throughput. When reading and writing the material to a single USB 3 hard drive, you have to expect considerable waiting times, whereas padding is done very quickly with two separate SSDs or fast RAIDs. Our test film took almost seven minutes on such a single hard drive, while the process on an SSD RAID connected via USB-C took 45 seconds. A free tool for re-wrapping with automation via watch folder has also recently become available. For projects where the length and format have already been determined but most of the content still needs to be created, CineXtools can prepare a suitable blank file with all the desired additional tracks using “Create Insert Media”.

The above conditions apply to the full-length master file. The patches to be inserted (i.e. the corrected sections) may also be in VBR and even in another of the above codecs and containers, as they may be quickly converted during insert (this is then logically a real transcoding). JPEG2000 in YUV with 4:2:2 subsampling is also accepted as a .mov file for patches
for patches. Even the support of several formats for single image sequences such as .dpx, .tiff and OpenEXR is in the works: we have already been able to try it out with .dpx in 10 bit and .tiff in 16 bit. Even different colour depths or colour spaces are accepted for patches, but this can certainly lead to image jumps when inserting into parts of existing scenes. The responsibility for this therefore lies entirely with the user, who should select the same output format and the same software as the original file if possible. Logically, insertions in the appropriate format without recoding are the fastest. Changes to audio or subtitle tracks are possible without affecting the picture, even with files in VBR. The resolution can be over 16,000 pixels, but must be the same for the patch and target file, as must the frame rate and line structure (interlaced or progressive). Sound to be inserted from external files must be in .wav format with 24 bit and 48 kHz, .aac or even .mp3 are not accepted.

The tools

First and foremost is “Insert Edit”, i.e. the insertion of patches into a film file. The term is not used here in quite the same sense as in conventional NLEs, as the area is not inserted in the target file, but overwritten in the same length. This is more of an “overwrite” in the modern sense, but it was no different with tape machines. Because of the similarity to working with tape, the manufacturer also likes to use analogue terms such as the classic “Black Striped” for an empty file – many users are obviously still familiar with this. Video, audio and captions can be selected in any combination as content to be changed, the timecode (TC for short) can be rewritten for patch and target (“Restripe”) and the reel tape ID of the target file can be corrected.

For audio, there are also extensive options for reassigning up to 32 channels in patch panel style, adding external sound files and, if necessary, crossfades for critical connections of the sound content. The target file can be renamed, but editing is still a change that cannot be undone. If you have enough time for copying, it is therefore better to work with duplicates.
The actual insert cut is very simple: For example, you specify an entry point in both windows and an exit point in one of them, and the area to be replaced is marked in both windows (known as a 3-point cut). The convention of band cuts applies here, i.e. the out point corresponds to the first image that is not changed. If the TC matches, the cut points can also be conveniently copied to the other window. Finally, there is an opportunity for a preview or to trigger the hot cut, which does not take place without a warning that the file will inevitably be changed. Incidentally, unlike a rendering process, the file can already be checked in a player while a somewhat longer insert is running elsewhere. This means that another person can continue quality control under time pressure while corrections are still being made.

A further tab (Multiple-Source Single Target) allows a whole list of patches to be inserted into a target file, so basically not just batch processing, but almost a rudimentary editing function. The target file can of course also be a “Black Tape” generated in the programme with “Create Insert Media”. With “Extract Audio to File”, you can extract audio tracks from existing films and write them to separate files; you can also select a different track assignment. The “Rewrap & Audio Versioning” tab is also basically self-explanatory: In addition to the conversion from VBR to CBR, comprehensive reassignment and the addition of audio tracks are offered, whereby their starting point can be redefined in relation to the TC of the target file. If required by the customer, this tool can also convert a CBR file back to VBR after correction. Pure audio inserts are also possible with VBR or GOP codecs anyway.

Finally, the programme also offers the option of editing or adding subtitles: Corrections are written directly into the file here. Subtitles as .mcc and .scc files are supported directly, as is extraction to sidecar files. Subtitles (or closed captions) can be imported in .cap format (Cheetah International) or as .scc files (Sonic), unfortunately not in the popular .srt format. But there are plenty of tools for converting subtitles: free online services such as subtitleconverter.net, subconverter.rest7.com or rev.com/caption. Those who are reluctant to entrust their texts to a third-party website will find professional tools in Subbit’s Subtitler (PC and Mac) or Annotation Edit Suite (Mac). Another option is the editing of metadata in accordance with the British broadcast standard AS-11 DPP (Digital Production Partnership), which is increasingly gaining acceptance in North America and Scandinavia.

Getting to know

While the available Quick Start PDF still looks a little immature and some links are missing, the manufacturer provides easy-to-understand and detailed video tutorials(cinextools.com/video-tutorials). They all look like Mac, but apart from ProRes conversions, everything works exactly the same on a PC. There is also a freely available basic version, which is limited to formats up to 10-bit colour depth, maximum 2K resolution and master files with two audio tracks. If you would like to get to know the full version better, you can request a one-week trial licence. Incidentally, the licence is issued using the iLok system familiar from Avid. This is somewhat cumbersome, but does not require a constant Internet connection, as is often required for production machines. The licence can be transferred to a computer via a temporary online connection or written to a dongle for full mobility.
The user interface still lacks clarity, with hardly any visual differentiation between important and less important buttons and information. Our test version also showed some minor quirks when controlling the Playhead in some formats. However, these are blemishes, activated tooltips make the individual functions quickly understandable and the core functions ran smoothly with clean source files. Unfortunately, it should be noted that some software and hardware manufacturers only loosely adhere to the standards, and FGPA-based cameras and field recorders in particular are notorious for this. It is therefore essential to use the test version to check whether your own workflow works without any problems. In our test, for example, the mixed insert between XDCAM-HD material and DNxHR in the MXF wrapper from DaVinci Resolve did not work reliably, while there were no problems in combination with DNxHD/HR in the MOV wrapper. However, Cinedeck is known for dealing with such problems quickly – this was also the case in our test.

Comment

At a time when editing programmes – albeit sometimes of dubious reliability – are being given away, the price of CineXtools seems rather steep. However, this programme is not aimed at amateurs and semi-professional users, but at users who will quickly amortise the price through massive time savings. This ranges from quality control for last-minute corrections to the creation of different versions from partially identical material, right through to internationalisation and multiple evaluation with subtitles or varying audio tracks. In addition to Technicolor PostWorks and NBC Universal’s “The Voice”, even pure audio houses such as RH Factor are already using the software. Anyone in DACH who is interested in CineXtools can order it from DVEAS (www.dveas.com).

The post The virtual glue press:CineXtools from Cinedeck first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Uli Plank.