Blackmagic Debuts $30K 3D Camera for Capturing Video for Vision Pro

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Camera formats, openness, and codecs

  • Some welcome Blackmagic’s involvement but worry about proprietary formats and Apple lock‑in.
  • The camera uses a new “Blackmagic RAW Immersive” flavor of BRAW; people note BRAW is not very open, though footage can likely be exported per‑eye to other formats.
  • Debate over Blackmagic’s past removal of CinemaDNG: one side blames RED’s compressed RAW patents, another calls that a pretext to lock users into BRAW, pointing out CinemaDNG is uncompressed and predates REDCODE.
  • Apple’s Immersive Video format itself is seen as proprietary and poorly documented; support on non‑Apple headsets is currently unclear.

Editing workflow, storage, and bandwidth

  • 8TB for ~2 hours of 8K stereoscopic BRAW is considered huge but not unprecedented for high‑end RAW.
  • Suggested workflows: proxy editing (long‑standing film/TV practice), fast local NVMe or Thunderbolt RAID for ingest, NAS for backup; 10 Gbit Ethernet is “bare minimum”.
  • Blackmagic Cloud Store is clarified as an on‑set NAS that later syncs to cloud, not cloud‑only storage.

Vision Pro market viability and VR adoption

  • Strong split: some see AVP as an early, strategic platform with limited production constrained by Sony micro‑OLED supply; others call it a niche “dev kit” or even a flop given sub‑million sales and high price.
  • Disagreement over usage: some report heavy daily use and strong immersive impact; others say most headsets (AVP and Quest) quickly gather dust.
  • Many doubt mass‑market appetite for expensive headsets, drawing parallels to 3D TV; others argue we’re early, like pre‑iPhone smartphones or early PDAs.

Use cases and content ecosystem

  • Filmmakers are expected to rent the $30K camera; in a multi‑million‑dollar production it’s a small line item.
  • Some see a “once‑in‑a‑lifetime” opportunity: hundreds of thousands of AVP owners but only a few hours of immersive content.
  • Suggested strongest fits: nature docs, concerts, sports, live events, theme parks, and high‑end experiential content rather than traditional narrative cinema.

Comparisons to other gear and techniques

  • Compared with Canon’s dual fisheye + single‑sensor rigs and RED bodies, URSA Cine Immersive offers: higher per‑eye resolution (8K@90fps), wider inter‑pupillary distance, cine‑grade features, integrated 8TB media, and tight Resolve integration.
  • Many emphasize $30K is relatively cheap for serious cinema gear; some high‑end cameras cost 3–10× more.

Technical aspects of immersive/VR180 video

  • AVP “Immersive Video” is 180° stereo, not simple 3D “flat” video or passthrough; you can look around within a hemisphere.
  • Discussion of per‑eye resolution vs field of view: below ~8K per eye, fidelity degrades once video is mapped over 180°.
  • Apple’s projection is a custom fisheye‑like mapping optimized for horizon detail; compared with Google’s equi‑angular cubemap. Exact details remain partly reverse‑engineered and undocumented.