Blackmagic Design announced the new Blackmagic Camera App in September. In addition to great features for video capture, this app also lets you use Tentacle Sync E, Tentacle Sync E mkII, or Tentacle Sync Track E for timecode.
This is very useful if you want to timecode footage from your iPhone to match other cameras or audio recording devices.
So how do you set this up? It’s very simple.
The first step is to turn on Tentacle Sync and make sure its frame rate is the same as the one you use in the Blackmagic Camera app. In this example, it should be 23.98p.
With the Blackmagic Camera app,[è¨å®š]Go to the page and Time code display. By default, it is set as follows: Record execution.
If Tentacle Sync is turned on, you can go ahead and select it. Time code display menu.
If you have multiple Tentacle Syncs turned on, they all Time code display menu.
If you’re using multiple Tentacle Syncs, you’ll want to make sure they’re all set to the same setting (23.98p in this case). Then sync them all to one master device. In this case, it would be a device called AMIRA.
When you go to the main screen in the Blackmagic camera app, you’ll notice that timecode is displayed at the top of the screen. When not recording, individual frames are not displayed in the count. In my example, I set Tentacle Sync to the time, which is also used for the timecode in the Blackmagic Camera app.
When you click on the recording, you’ll notice that the timecode turns red and appears as expected on any camera.
When you stop recording, it returns to white.
I did a test to see how well everything was in sync and it worked fine. What’s a little weird is that a file that should be 23.98p is showing as 23.00fps.
I double checked this in another app and the file showed up as 23p.
What if I want to sync to Tentacle Sync Track E?
When using the standalone Tentacle Sync Track E, your only option is to set the wireless sync frame rate and time. Unfortunately, there is no option to just select the time from your iPhone.
What this ultimately means is that when you return to the Blackmagic Camera app, the timecode is not the time and is not the same as what your iPhone is displaying. Now, this is no big deal. As long as the timecode recorded in the iPhone and Track E files in the app are the same, there is no problem. If you’ve been using Track E with other regular Tentacle Syncs, we recommend syncing everything to one of them instead of Track E.
Using your iPhone with the Blackmagic Camera app and Tentacle Sync Track E is a great combination if you need to do things like small pickup interviews and don’t want to use a cage or attach too many accessories to your iPhone. iPhone. You can also connect a 3.5mm cable from the Track E headphone jack to his USB-C to 3.5mm adapter on your iPhone and not only match another 32-bit timecode, but also record the audio directly to the Blackmagic camera app. can. File is available. Of course you can’t monitor audio that way, but you can use a splitter cable if you want, but then things start to get a little confusing.
Notes?
Originally, when I tried to send a recorded ProRes 422HQ file from the Blackmagic Camera app to my Mac via AirDrop, the file sent was only H.264/MPEG4 and had no timecode. I don’t know the original cause of this problem, but it may have been a wrong configuration or a bug.
After restarting my phone and restarting the app, it worked and I was able to create AirDrop ProRes files without any issues.
thought
Being able to match timecode between footage recorded on your iPhone and other devices is extremely useful. With the video quality of the latest iPhones, you can easily use it for pick-up shots or as additional angles alongside other cameras. Granted, an iPhone may not be a replacement for a proper digital cinema camera or mirrorless hybrid in many cases, but it really depends on what you’re doing. Having timecode, LOG, and ProRes recording to integrate into more professional workflows is a big step in the right direction.
The great thing about all of this is that the functionality of using the Blackmagic Camera app and Tentacle Sync costs nothing.