Blackmagic Design has teased a new camera called URSA Cine Immersive. This new camera in currently still in development, and it is being designed to capture content for Apple Vision Pro with 8160 x 7200 resolution per eye, 16 stops of dynamic range for 90fps stereoscopic 3D immersive cinema content. At the WWDC, Apple also referred to the camera.
The camera is probably based on the Blackmagic URSA Cine 17K platform. You require at least 100 megapixels to create content for the Apple Vision Pro, and the URSA Cine Immersive will be capable of more than doubling that figure.
Key features
- Dual custom lens system for shooting Apple Immersive Video for Apple Vision Pro.
- 8K stereoscopic 3D immersive image capture.
- 8160 x 7200 resolution per eye with pixel level synchronization.
- Massive 16 stops of dynamic range.
- Lightweight, robust camera body with industry standard connections.
- Generation 5 Color Science with new film curve.
- Dual 90 fps capture to a single Blackmagic RAW file.
- Includes high performance Blackmagic Media Module 8TB for recording.
- High speed Wi-Fi, 10G Ethernet or mobile data for network connections.
- Optional Blackmagic URSA Cine EVF.
- Includes DaVinci Resolve Studio for post production.
The Blackmagic URSA Cine also features a custom lens system designed specifically for Blackmagic URSA Cine’s large format image sensors with extremely accurate positional data which is calibrated at the time of manufacturing. There is no current information about the focal length or T-stop of the lenses.
The camera captures content into a Blackmagic RAW Immersive file. The new Blackmagic RAW Immersive file format is an enhanced version of Blackmagic RAW that’s been designed to make immersive video simple to use through the post production workflow.
The immersive lens data is mapped, calibrated and stored per eye into the Blackmagic RAW file so it travels through the post production process in the Blackmagic RAW Immersive file itself. That eliminates the need for multiple files to capture an immersive scene.
This doesn’t come as a huge surprise given Blackmagic Design also announced DaVinci Resolve for immersive video today. Both products will enable users to create high resolution 3D content.
The new updates to DaVinci Resolve will make it the world’s first immersive video editor. There will be a lot of updates and changes to support immersive workflows including a new immersive video viewer which will let editors pan, tilt and roll clips for viewing on 2D monitors. But what’s most exciting is we can even allow clips to be adjusted and monitored on Apple Vision Pro itself for a complete immersive editing experience.
The URSA Cine 17K features a a whopping 65mm sensor, with a horizontal size of 50.80mm and a vertical size of 23.32mm. It has 15,520 x 8,040 pixels. The URSA Cine Immersive sensor is probably using a variant, or the exact same sensor. I wouldn’t imagine that Blackmagic have come up with a brand new sensor for this camera given how niche it is, but I could be wrong. Whether they are using a single sensor or they have found some way to split the sensor in half is still unknown.
Above you can see how much larger it is when compared to the URSA 12K.
The camera body is built with a robust magnesium alloy chassis and lightweight carbon fiber polycarbonate composite skin. Customers also get 12G‑SDI out, 10G Ethernet, and USB-C, XLR audio. The fold out monitor has a large 5″ HDR touchscreen on one side and an external color status LCD on the other. The right side of the camera features a dedicated assist station with a second 5″ HDR touchscreen that allows crew to work around the camera without needing external monitors.
An 8-pin Lemo power connector at the back of the camera works with 24V and 12V power supplies, making it easy to use the camera with existing power supplies, batteries, and accessories. Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive comes with a massive 250W power supply and B mount battery plate, so customers can use a wide range of high voltage batteries from manufacturers such as IDX, Blueshape, Core SWX, BEBOB, and more. Customers will also receive a top handle, antennas for high speed Wi-Fi, baseplate, 24V power supply and high voltage B mount battery plate for quick set up.
Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive comes with 8TB of high performance network storage built in, which records directly to the included Blackmagic Media Module, and can be synced to Blackmagic Cloud and DaVinci Resolve media bins in real time. This means customers can capture over 2 hours of Blackmagic RAW in 8K stereoscopic 3D immersive, and editors can work on shots from remote locations worldwide as the shoot is happening.
Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive is the first commercial, digital film camera with ultra fast high capability Cloud Store technology built in. The high speed storage lets customers record at the highest resolutions and frame rates for hours and access their files directly over high speed 10G Ethernet. The camera also supports creating a small H.264 proxy file, in addition to the camera original media when recording. This means the small proxy file can be uploaded to Blackmagic Cloud in seconds, so media is available back at the studio in real time.
Blackmagic Media Dock accelerates post production workflow by making it faster and simpler to start editing and performing color correction. Customers can mount up to three Blackmagic Media Modules for high speed access to media from multiple URSA Cine Immersive cameras all at the same time. The four high speed 10G Ethernet ports allow up to four separate edit workstations to connect directly and is extremely fast, even when a lot of users are connected at the same time.
There are no further details about the URSA Cine Immersive currently available, but the camera will be available later in 2024. This will be a pretty niche and specialized camera and I would imagine it will have a reasonably high price tag.
