HyperDeck Shuttle from Blackmagic Design

[Allan Barnwell]

Blackmagic won't be selling the SSD drives from what they have told dealers like myself - although they will be offering plastic cases to hold them. No one wants to stock SSD in volume - they pricing is so volatile. While I'm tremendously excited to be a reseller for this, it is a product that will take off in a proportional trajectory to the cost of the SSDs. You are going to need to spend upwards of $850 for one hour of record time from what I'm finding online right now - and you need to be very careful to pick SSDs that have the necessary performance.

I plan to package these units with certified SSDs listing both the size and the record times. I'm still waiting for Blackmagic to release a list of drives they have tested.

We should see these units start arriving in the next few weeks.

Allan Barnwell
Omega Broadcast Group - Professional Video Sales, Rental & Services

[Sanjin Svajger]

I think one would have to consider a price of an external monitor along the starting price of 350$. Right? There is no way to monitor what's going on - or is there?

[Allan Barnwell]

Yes - if you need to monitor the signal, you'll want an external monitor to go with this.

You'd need to factor that into the price of a NanoFlash, Ki Pro, or Ki Pro min as well. But most of my customers who purchase or rent these units are using larger field monitors anyway.

Then again, it can be nice to have physical buttons to operate these units. Many of the units that have touch screens present field operation challenges as a trade off. I like the simplicity of the buttons on this unit.

Allan Barnwell
Omega Broadcast Group - Professional Video Sales, Rental & Services

[Sanjin Svajger]

Nano and Aja mini both have screens which show what's going on -> this HyperDeck Shuttle doesn't have a screen of any sort. That's what I meant with "needing a monitor" so you can see some basic info - I wasn't referring to monitoring your image... The fact that it doesn't have even the smallest of a screen would suggest that's it primary intent of purpose is for studio use maybe?

[Kenn Christenson]

Is there a way to trigger the unit via running timecode - like the NanoFlash? So, you're basically hitting the camera's record button and activating record on the HyperDeck.

[Denis Danatzko]

The Tech Specs at the BMD site claims "NO CAMERA CONTROL".
Should that be taken at face value, i.e. manual start/stop with control buttons?

[Steve Kalle]

It also says a computer is required to adjust settings.

Btw, there is a 'studio' version with dual record slots and is rack mounted for around $1000.

[Denis Danatzko]

Pardon my ignorance, but will this work with the HDMI out on a Panny HMC-150?
And, even though that cam has an HDMI out, would I still only get 8 bit color?

FOR THE PRICE, this seems like it might be well-suited for much of what I shoot, i.e. equestrian barrel racing - short (20 sec +/-) bursts of horses running at full-gallop, intended for web and DVD.

And with a 2nd unit, could I hook that up to a laptop and external monitor, and swap SSDs to show footage shot just moments earlier?

[Steve Kalle]

Yes, all HDMI outputs from cameras are only 8bit even though the HDMI 'standard' supports up to 12bit (aka Deep Color).

Normally, I would suggest the nanoFlash or Atomos, but horses racing is extremely hard on all codecs so using uncompressed would significantly increase the quality. Btw, in the Convergent Deisgn forum (makers of nanoFlash), there is a thread showing how well various codecs handled recording a horse race. The 280Mb I-frame Nanoflash was noticeably superior to the Pro Res HQ.

I just want to add something I forgot when discussing one recorder versus another: the Aja Ki Pro Mini formats its cards to HFS+ only which makes like difficult for Windows users. Just to read the CF card, you must purchase a program for each computer. Secondly, many clients who want the CF card at the end of a shoot won't have a Mac to access the files.

Which brings me to my next thought: what does the Atomos use? Just found that it uses FAT32 - much SMARTER than Aja.

[Nigel Barker]

Mac users of the Aja Ki Pro Mini of course will be pleased that the cards are formatted as HFS+ so as to avoid the 4GB file size limit of FAT32.

If they were formatted to NTFS then Windows users would be happy to escape the 4GB limit & Mac users would be happy too as Macs can read NTFS files without the purchase of additional software.

So I guess that both Mac & Windows users could be unhappy with the Atomos Ninja.

[David Stuart Shapton]

We currently use Fat 32 because it's the most compatible file system of all. The 4Gh chunks are not an issue because you can import whole folders and the chunks are laid out contiguously as if they were one clip. There's also a big advantage: if - for any reason - a recording stops (because of physical impact, or whatever) the MOST you're going to lose is 4GB - and not a whole hour-long clip.

We can do other file systems. It's just a firmware upgrade, but we'll stay with Fat 32 for now. We've had enough user feedback to know now that it's not a bit issue.

Dave Shapton
Atomos

[Kristian Lam]

Originally Posted by Ray Bell

Was hoping that BlackMagic would put up the manual for the shuttle today... didn't happen... but looking a the specs and looking at the input/outputs it looks like your going to need an extra card in your computer if your going to use the shuttle for off loading the files... it has a usb, but that looks to be for control/firmware upgrades... so the only other outputs are the HDMI and SDI ports... for HDMI I'm thinking you'll need the intensity pro card...??

Hi Ray,

You don't need to. The SSDs are HFS+ formatted and mount on your desktop just like a Mac volume. The files are standard Quicktime files you can simply drag and drop off the SSDs, or play them directly.

[Emmanuel Plakiotis]

The name of the device is very revealing. It is conceived more as a portable deck than a field recorder.

It can't control the camera, it is limited by its internal rechargeable battery (this could turn into major problem during a long shooting), it doesn't have readout screen, no latch for the SSD or mount options to be attached to a camera. Its more an expensive SSD deck, companion to a laptop, than a cheap field recorder. I think BM lost an opportunity to create a really breakthrough product with an amazing price, simply by positioning this product in the wrong segment.
I just hope to reconsider it soon, even if that means a price hike, because the idea of uncompressed field recording is ideal for a number of jobs, especially for budget feature films.

[Paul Cascio]

My guess is that we will see a "Deluxe" version in the near future.

[Kenn Christenson]

As the unit is able to be powered by a 12V transformer - wondering if external batteries would be an option - given the limitation of the internal battery.