Cutting Epic MX with Blackmagic 2.5K

[Vassili Spiropoulos]

Hello fellow redusers.

I have a quick question. I don't know if this is covered anywhere else in the forum, if it is, sorry for repeating the question. Next Tuesday I'm going to shoot a little commercial for a brand of kids clothing. I'm going to attempt shooting some of the footage on my epic and some on the Blackmagic. The Blackmagic is being used on the steadycam. The whole thing was decided because the production made arrangements with a local steadycam operator who has a steadycam that can't handle the weight of the Epic, (really small one I'm afraid). So as I was saying we were thinking to use the Blackmagic for the steadycam shots and the Epic for everything else. I haven't had the opportunity to perform a test so I'm a little insecure. Does anyone have any experience on this? Do they cut decently together?
The shoot is going to be all day exterior (seaside) the Blackmagic is the 2.5K, NOT the 4K, delivery of the project is going to be 1080p. Both cameras will use the same Canon L lenses. No lights, just reflection panels of various kinds, so only natural light. Is there something I should especially pay attention to? Thank you in advance for your info.

Vassili Spiropoulos

 

[Cory Harrison]

Watch out for the moire on the 2.5k. It'll get ya.

 

[Vassili Spiropoulos]

Thank you Cory, I'll have that in mind. Any other info on eventual peculiarities on how the Blackmagic handles color, contrast, image characteristics in general? I think they can cut well together, I just don't know if there's something I should particularly pay attention to, since I'm not familiar with what the Blackmagic does...

 

[Cory Harrison]

Another thing to note is the rolling shutter. Rolling shutter is pretty crazy on the bmcc which could create some problems using the steadicam. It really depends on how much motion and how fast you're going to be moving around.

 

[Brett Casadonte]

If you are using Resolve, you can mix the BMCC 2.5k footage and Epic footage very nicely in post. I own an Epic and 2 BMCC 2.5k cameras and use them together in almost all of my shoots. Please note, however, that I shoot mostly corporate work, so lots of interviews with the Epic as my 'A' camera and the BMCC 2.5k as my 'B' camera, and just about all of my b-roll is shot on the Epic.

For the best results, make sure that you shoot CinemaDNG raw on the BMCC (I'm sure that you knew that already), and make sure that you have gobs of hard drives and SSD storage for all the raw BMCC footage that you'll be capturing.

Also, as others have mentioned, do be aware of moire and rolling shutter with the BMCC, especially the moire. Sometimes you can address the moire in post by softening the afflicted area, but as always, its best to get it right in camera first.

PS: Other color grading solutions will likely work just as well, however, I personally have no experience with anything other than Resolve.