In addition to announcing a ground-breaking sub-$1,000 4K/60 HDMI recorder called the Atomos Ninja Inferno, popular gear maker Atomos also announced the highly-anticipated CinemaDNG 4K Raw recording free firmware upgrade for their Shogun range.
From tomorrow, Monday March 27th 2017, CinemaDNG Raw recording for select Sony FS, Canon and Panasonic cameras will be made available on the Shogun Inferno, Shogun Flame and even the original Shogun recorder. This news will certainly make quite a few original Shogun owners happy, as they have been waiting for quite some time for this upgrade.
Of course, unlike competing products such as the Odyssey7Q+ from Convergent Design, the CinemaDNG Raw upgrade in all resolutions including 4K and 2K (camera dependant) for Atomos Shogun users is a free firmware upgrade, which is a big plus for those shooting on a budget.
CinemaDNG Raw is captured from a camera’s sensor as a sequence of individual frames rather than video, allowing users full control over white balance, noise reduction & de-bayering rather than relying on the camera’s real time processing. Unlike video, the Raw from each camera brand is different, offering different advantages to the user and requiring bespoke engineering for each Raw format in the recorder itself.
“We are very proud and excited to break yet another industry convention by offering Raw recording for free from our great partners Sony, Canon and Panasonic”, said Jeromy Young CEO and co-founder of Atomos.
“In true Atomos spirit we are unlocking advanced features and functionality from popular, affordable cameras. With Sony Raw we unlock 12bit 4K or high frame rate slow motion, from Canon we unlock 4K and likewise for Panasonic we unlock high quality 12bit 4K recording”.
For this firmware upgrade, Atomos have enabled Raw recording from the following popular cameras:
- Sony FS7, FS700 and FS5
- 4K DCI 24/25/30p
- 2K 24/25/30/50/60/100/120p
- Canon C300 Mark II and Canon C500
- 4K DCI and UHD 24/25/30p
- Panasonic Varicam LT
- 4K DCI and UHD 24/25/30p
The Raw signal from the Sony FS700, FS7 and Sony FS5 cameras is transported via a single 3G-SDI connection enabling 4K/30p and high-frame rate 2K/120 recording along with higher quality 12-bit 4:4:4 images from the sensor. In uncompressed 10-bit video over SDI the maximum frame rate in HD for all 3 cameras is capped at 60p, but the Raw output enables high frame rate slow motion 100/120/200/240p capture.
Canon’s Raw output is different to Sony’s, providing 10-bit images with a baked in Log and Gamut, so that is worth to keep in mind.
Panasonic Varicam LT’s Raw output enabled a 12bit 4K 30p recording. For this free firmware update, only CDNG Raw recording is available with the Raw to ProRes or DNxHR recording coming in a future firmware update.
Panasonic Raw recording was previously announced for the Shogun Inferno but as a free surprise for Shogun Flame and Shogun users it has also been added in this firmware update.
You can download the latest firmware for CinemaDNG here (when available): https://www.atomos.com/firmware
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