When will the mini be available?
 

Hi, when will a production unit be on sale, I am interested in adapting it to use on a Polecam ( www.polecam.com )?

Yes I am also interested in the Mini.
I was talking to someone associated with the upcoming film CRANK and they were discribing the director using a stripped down camera (recording to a seperate system) to do some amazing stuff.
Mini (teathered to a laptop) will give you amazing flexability.
I would be tempted to forgo more res (rumors, I know) for this form factor
but...
---Then the only monitor is the laptop screen?
---Pricing/ availability
--- what type of lens mounts (no PL & no B4 ----I think I recall David Newman saying he bought an older 16mm on eBay)
---What are the other drawbacks of the mini V. full production model?

Thanks Jason,
-J

the full kit ...
 

My understanding is that the censor and lens on the full kit is the mini and can be detached.
Is that correct?

No, you can also have a touchscreen monitor, external LCD monitor, etc., and we're working on a viewfinder . . . all of those can be attatched to the video output of the laptop and just use a two-screen mode on the graphics chipset (like if you were using a video projector, etc.)

We're working on finalizing all that (since there are a lot of different configurations and packages you can get), but at NAB we mentioned $12.5K

You choice really . . . just no B4-mount since those lenses aren't designed for single-sensors. But so far we have a cheaper c-mount and PL-mount (David was using older, inexpensive c-mounts)

Mainly form-factor and the useability of that form-factor. While being tethered to a laptop via a gig-e cable is pretty cool, you're not as portable as with a fully mobile configuration like the full production body. But the mini head is removeable from the larger unit, so you're not loosing anything, just gaining.

Jason, that's great!
Will you be at NAB NY in Oct?
And the Full body that was shown at this past NAB was not the finalized one correct?
I wonder about the weight of it (for my glidecam set up...)

Sorry to pester you with so many questions, but I can't wait to see this and get my hands on it !

Thanks,
John

No, that wasn't the final body design at all, just a prototype . . . we're doing a complete re-design of that, and it's going to be a very sturdy/industrial-strength plastic construction (at least that's the plan right now, and we're not talking chinsy toy plastic, but Mil-spec stuff), so it should be very light.

So Jason, when do we get to see the new production design (and specs) ? and when does it become avalible for purchase - I know Sept was mentioned but as that is only a few days away I'm guessing that may not hapen.

cheers
Rohan

Can a B4 not be for?
 

Can someone help me understand the lens issues involved here? I don't quite understand how a lens can be "not designed for single sensors" instead of for imaging in general. It would seem that in order to focus an image, the lens must converge the image to a single plane, either the film plane/focusing screen/sensor or the plane of the prism block, which then separates the colors.

Vignetting aside, how can a lens not be designed for single sensors?

I'm certainly no expert on lens design however a lens for a 3CCD camera does not focus on the prism, it has to focus through the prism and onto the CCDs.
Also from my vague understanding of lens design issues, lenses designed to work through a prism make some correction for what happens to the light as it passes through the prism.
Hopefully someone better versed in the dark science of lens design will give a better and more detailed explaination.

:-o
 

Yes, focusing "through" the prism makes sense. Thanks.

B4 Lens
 

I have been using a Canon B4 zoom lens with a Optex B4 to PL adapter on an Anton A-Minima super 16 camera with good results. Have not noticed any focus or CA problems, although the image is not as sharp as using a prime lens.

Is this the Abakus adapter? They used to make them for Optex.

http://www.abakus-scientific.com/Format_Converters.htm

There's some optics in their adapter.

Yes, the Abakus adapter should work very nicely, and you will need something like that (with compesation optics), if you want to use 3-CCD lenses on film-style single-sensor cameras.

The Abakus adapter looks the same as the Optex that I have used although the Optex only seemed to have one lens and not "a system of high quality optics". The Optex lens widens out the image so it will cover the larger size of the super 16 frame, something that would not be needed with the SI camera - It may have done other things to the image as well, I don't know.

Unless you already own a Hi Def B4 lens I would just spend my hard earned cash on a good Super 16 zoom lens (or even a set of primes) as these adapters aren't that cheap.

To get back to the original post - I would love to see a SI camera on a Polecam - it would be an awesome story telling combination.

The Polecam should be easy to adapt to . . . simply run the head from the Polecam with gig-e to a recording box that you can sling over your shoulder like an audio recorder . . . that way you don't end up with a lot of weight on the end of the pole (the small heads are really light, like around 1lbs.)

The recording box can be really small too . . . like using a Mini-ITX with Merom or something of that nature.

A laptop could work nicely as well, although I'm not sure if there are issues when you close the lid on the laptop with it going to sleep.