Personal View site logo
Make sure to join PV on Telegram or Facebook! Perfect to keep up with community on your smartphone.
Digital Bolex raw camera, no longer made
  • 1130 Replies sorted by
  • MikeLinnMikeLinn

  • MicahMicah

    I'm impressed! ...that this compares so poorly to my GX1!

  • CFreakCFreak

    Love that E-Cigarette in the candle light test. So filmic.

  • diggerdigger

    this is very underwhelming. perhaps it's the filmmaker, but all I saw was shaky handheld, nasty flicker, and egregious blown out highlights. And I like donuts.

    But when it comes down to it, I'm wondering what the point of critiquing this camera will be further. If you were to order this camera today for $3300, there is no telling when you would finally receive it. In the meantime, there are so many opportunities coming in the future camera-wise whether 4k or otherwise, so it makes more sense to wait and see.

  • vicharrisvicharris

    Not sure why the donut shop was so underexposed? Seems like an easy thing to adjust for or am I just used to used Black Magic Cameras and good glass?

  • maxrmaxr

    Just quick playing around with DNGs, think I went too far on some shadows and with greens. If 1:1 desired, click image =)

    Photo of Milford Sound in New Zealand!

  • MicahMicah

    I played with the DNGs as well. There's not a lot of latitude in there at all. The output is very similar to the raw files from a Pentax Q. While it's neat to be dealing with a "raw" file, a lack of latitude defeats the purpose.

    And moire is horrid on these! Oversampling appears to be the best solution for Bayer sensors. Even the BMPCC suffers this way. It only has a little more DR and costs way less. No reason to prefer this scammy seeming pipe dream camera. And yes, it's still a pipe dream, even if they're starting to deliver a product, since it doesn't appear to live up to the hype.

    Well, unless the hype was to create Super8 quality in the digital domain. In which case--mission accomplished!

  • vicharrisvicharris

    I don't get why the poster of that scouting video wouldn't pull back the highlights at all? I know it's just a location video but he's one of the few people that has one. I'd think one would want to show off their new toy a little better than that. It only opens you up as a target. This is why I haven't posted my SLR Anamorphic stuff......cause I screwed that up big time! :)

  • FilmingArtFilmingArt

    Donut shop video looks bad. Very poor video, please use tripod or shoulder rig. Highlights look blown out, not good at all.

  • caveportcaveport

    I have yet to see any compelling reason to get excited by this camera. Most samples look very ordinary in comparison to other cameras currently available. It'a shame as the concept is nice.

  • lunalobo75lunalobo75

    @caveport go here: https://vimeo.com/groups/digitalbolexuser or here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/digitalbolexuser/ and see if anythings interests you. Philip Bloom should be out with his review soon, and you can check out this preview here: http://philipbloom.net/2014/01/21/d16/ Salud

  • luekioluekio

    Read an informed opinion from someone who has actually used the camera and shoots for a living?

  • vicharrisvicharris

    All the footage from Ryan looks good on that vimeo site, the rest looks like shit. Though all the skin tones look too pink but I'm sure that's just a grading thing. Just like it took a little bit of time to not make the BM cameras look like a pile of brown mush.

  • lunalobo75lunalobo75

    PB shot some more footage:

  • kholikholi

    The footage from this camera's looking worse and worse... Sudden Blackmagic 4K Price drop just compounds things...

  • luekioluekio

    The footage looks great to me, very film like. Much better than the video look and moire/alaising/rolling shutter that plague bmpcc and 5dmkIII, which are the main alternatives.

  • inqb8trinqb8tr

    I don't know, it just fails to impress me, this particular video is somehow dull and bland. Storm coming on the beach in magic hour, it should pop, and author is not to blame here. I see some micro shake all the time, static shots are dancing all over. Most of the shots seem slightly underexposed, maybe the camera doesn't handle highlights too good, so he had to escape to the left. There is some ugly video noise evident in the clouds and sky. There is so much chromatic aberration and pro-mist, must be because of the lenses used. DR seems like forced out few stops with either washed out blacks or highlights lowered in mid-high range.

    This camera might be cool, sharpness is pleasant and colors might be ok, but I think it should not be pushed to capture some beautiful imagery, landscapes, oceans, etc. Old C lenses with their blown up prices just under-perform. Some Docu Verité scenarios might suit it better.

  • DrDaveDrDave

    Weird looking, fizzy grain, and dull sheen to the video. Fortunately BM4K just released. I agree something odd in the midrange but maybe that is the grade.

  • cantsincantsin

    Weird, the technical quality of this video is quite low. Lots of camera micro shake in the long shots, muted/greyish colors, unnatural looking (too clay-like brownish) skin tones, horrible CAs (from the cheap Computar lens?), low detail sharpness (grains of sand, leaves and other details blurred out), the orange sunset looks like a cheap video effect, sand in weird dark brown. Was the IR pollution on the sensor?

  • gabiloursongabilourson

    strangely ugly

  • DouglasHornDouglasHorn

    Yeah, it is troubling when a camera can't make a sunset look good.

  • markr041markr041

    Based on the BM videos and this new one, plus my own experience grading RAW, I have concluded that Philip Bloom is simply a really bad grader (I think he would not dispute this).

    You cannot judge any RAW video camera based on PB's edited videos; the bad stuff is mostly his grading choices/incompetence, as we have seen with the BM cameras.

  • maxrmaxr

    You can call me a clown, but I LOVE the look of those images =)

    Attention sharpen knifes' addicts, I'm not talking about future proofs, anal peeping, ISO or highlights... it's the feel of it I like; pseudo-arbitary rendition of colours (just invented, je je) creamous textures and lovely bokeh to point out some.

    One of major problems with footage from DB I find to be CA's. That, very disctincly showed on the DNGs I played with, even before the cam was out. But if one wants (and I always want) to be the devil's advocate, I've seen big budget, critique acclaimed movies with HUGE CA's... not in the 80's, very recently... i.e. The Master
    Da tha thats all fofolks

  • MicahMicah

    "Absolutely no moire or aliasing that I have seen. Zero, zlich."

    Eh...is he using the same camera? Many of the shots in this thread have horrid, horrid color moire.

  • matt_gh2matt_gh2

    I half agree with @maxr because the image can be nice, if the film calls for that type of image. I guess they said they were going for the 16mm film look, and I guess they got it. That can work for some films. I think other cameras can produce a variety of looks (such as GH2), such as modern cinematic look or more classical film look. I get the feeling that you won't be able to color correct/grade away the look of the Bolex, so if you like it, that's cool, but it seems to have a particular look to it that will always be there. (Of course this is all speculation from viewing footage, but seems to be the case.)

Add a Comment