2019 Cinema Camera Test Results

So which camera did you guys pick as the winner of the cinema camera test I did recently?

I was very surprised with your votes which were based on my previous post where I only showed the final shots but not the camera names.

My personal favorites were, first place to the Arri Alexa Mini then the URSA Mini Pro, then the 6K and finally the Red Raven (of which I’ve never been a big fan of)

Here are the results based on your votes:

39 % for URSA Mini Pro
28 % for Pocket 6K camera
26 % for Arri Alexa Mini
7 % for Red Raven

This poll was based on all the votes that people cast on my previous YouTube video but also on my Facebook page, here on my website and on my Instagram. Together we had over 2000 votes. So thank you to everyone who voted. My vote was biased since I knew which camera was which. That is why I had you guys vote and not me. Personally I always viewed the Arri cameras as the gold standard when it comes to overall image quality. Maybe not the resolution but definitely I love the colors coming out of the Arri cameras. What did surprise me was that on a blind test most of you guys picked the two cheapest cameras from Blackmagic Design.

Another thing that really surprised me was the over and under exposure tests I did. Once again I knew that Arri would be at the top when it comes to the over exposure test. We all hear how great Arri cameras are at handling the highlights. What I did not know was how badly the Arri Alexa Mini performed in the under exposure tests. Once the shots were more than 2 stops under and then adjusted to correct exposure in post, the Arri Alexa Mini looked a lot more noisy and softer than all the other cameras. In that test I think the Pocket 6K performed the best and I attribute that mainly to the higher resolution which tends to hide fine noise better. This test just tells me that while the Arri can handle the highlights better than most cameras it can’t handle the shadows that well. Also the other cameras were not that much worse when it comes to recovering the highlights. I think they all did very well.

In the end I think overall these cameras are all great and will get the job done. Some of these camera manufacturers obviously have more years of service and experience in the film industry which is why they price their cameras a lot higher. So image quality alone is not the only important factor when choosing a camera for a project. Price is definitely up there but so is reliability. I personally haven’t had any problems with any of my Blackmagic cameras over the years except the very early Cinema Camera 2.5K which was fixed by Blackmagic very quickly.

Here are the different cameras and lenses I used for these tests.
URSA Mini Pro 4.6K with Xeen 50mm T1.5 lens
Pocket 6K camera with the Rokinon 50mm T1.5 lens
Arri Alexa Mini with the Zeiss 50mm CP.2 T2.1 lens
Red Raven with the Zeiss 50mm CP.2 T2.1 lens

Special thanks to AbelCine for letting us use their space. https://www.abelcine.com/

Also a big thank you to our two beautiful models:
Krisia Vaca https://www.instagram.com/krisia_vaca_antos/
Victoria Preston https://www.instagram.com/victoriapreston87/

And finally a shutout to my friends Ketak and Miguel for helping me with the tests. You can find them here:
Ketak Dhiman https://www.instagram.com/ketakdhiman/
Miguel Contla https://www.instagram.com/demonickiddo/

The cameras I used are sold online at these retailers:
➡Blackmagic Pocket 6K
Amazon https://amzn.to/2H3KijP
B&H https://bhpho.to/2KuPWh4
Adorama https://adorama.rfvk.net/055E3
eBay https://ebay.to/2N3AREL

➡Arri Alexa Mini
B&H https://bhpho.to/2JCedBd
eBay https://ebay.to/2KFeGmR

➡URSA Mini Pro G2
B&H https://bhpho.to/2IUQpdJ
Amazon https://amzn.to/2Z73QKp
Adorama https://adorama.rfvk.net/rqZER
eBay https://ebay.to/2MpO1fQ

➡RED Raven
B&H https://bhpho.to/30eIaND
Amazon https://amzn.to/2HeMm8y
eBay https://ebay.to/31VCQ2n

You can download RAW video files from the Pocket 6K plus this camera test HERE.

Below are the test shots. Click on each image to see it in high resolution.

URSA Mini Pro

Red Raven

Pocket 6K

Arri Alexa Mini

Red Raven

URSA Mini Pro

Arri Alexa Mini

Pocket 6K

5 thoughts on “2019 Cinema Camera Test Results”

  1. Hi Tom! Very surprising results to me. I liked C best, then A, then C, then D. Like the majority of voters. I was sure C has to be the Alexa Mini, and that the tinted images must come from the Blackmagic cameras. I was pleasantly surprised that it’s the other way around, because I own the Pocket 4k and the URSA G2. You should make it clear in your video that you used the URSA G1 not the G2, because you link to the G2 in the description below the video (G1 being discontinued of course). Anyways, thanks for sharing the test results! h

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