BMD ATEM TV studio HD + Pocket 4/6K - CCU control? - Joel W Smith

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BMD ATEM TV studio HD + Pocket 4/6K - CCU control?

Isaacs

Hi,
Just wondered if CCU control is possible with the rack mounted Atem TV studio HD? I see you can make use of the Bi-directional SDI HDMI adaptor for similar workflows with other Atems just not sure if it possible with the studio HD?
Many thanks!

joelwsmith

Isaacs

Thanks for reaching out and welcome to the community!

Yes, camera control is possible with the ATEM Television Studio HD with some Blackmagic Design cameras.

You can control the Pocket Cinema Cameras by using a Blackmagic Design BiDirectional 3G Micro Converter and running 2 coax cables for SDI from the camera to the switcher. You will need these things to make it work:
- 1x HDMI cable (I recommend 10 ft or less for this situation) for the camera to the converter
- 1x Blackmagic Design BiDirectional 3G Micro Converter
- 2x RG-6 coax cables for SDI (my recommendations here).
  - One cable will run from the BiDirectional Converter SDI output to an input on the ATEM
  - One cable will run from a PGM SDI output (located above the SDI inputs) on the ATEM back to the SDI input on the BiDirectional Converter
You can control the URSA Camera and Studio Camera models through a SDI line from a PGM SDI output (located above the SDI inputs) on the ATEM back to the SDI input on the camera.

Hope this helps!

Isaacs

Thanks so much for clarifying!

sigir

We did exactly that what you described. This works, but only with one camera.

We have one BLACKMAGIC DESIGN ATEM TELEVISION STUDIO PRO 4K.
We use 3 cinema pocket 6k cameras , 3 BMD Micro Converter BiDirectional SDI/HDMI 3G and naturally 6 SDI cables and 3 HDMI cables.
The camera control works for camera 1. That's all.
Camera control never worked for CAM2 or 3.
Where is the trick to get working it?
We saw that the Converter has a programmed ID. This ID is always 1, so we programmed it to 2 and 3 and expected that camera control will start working. But without success.
Every hint is welcome.

joelwsmith

sigir

Have you tried switching around the cables or converters to see if it works in any of the ports? It could be that the ID setting didn't actually switch over to 2 and 3.

sigir

We changed the switches from CAM2 to CAM3 and also the cables to be sure, that all cables are working.
I can definitly say the cables are working, the convertes are also working.
We already checked the correct programming, the converter for CAM2 has ID 2 and the converter for CAM3 has ID3.

We tried also CAM5 and CAM7 port.
Always the same result.
The converters have already the latest firmware 7.5.3
SDI Camera control ID is 1 or 2 or 3
SDI Output Level B
HDMI Output (illegal levels (0-255))
Audio Mapping SMPTE standard

We have no further ideas at the moment.

joelwsmith

sigir

Do all of your HDMI cables support CEC?

Have you tried doing a factory reset on the converters?

sigir

BMD told us that the CEC commands are not used. We use HDMI 1.4 standard cables.

The factory was done on one of the two converters.
We will do it today on both converts and program two times die CAM ID 1 because the CAM1 and CAM2 connection are directly connected using the two converters. Perhaps this helps.
To be honest, I assume a wrong BMD software. But BMD support is slow and not the best, we known this already of our old incidients.

joelwsmith

sigir

Blackmagic said CEC is not used? That doesn't make sense at all. CEC is the only way the control and tally signals can go to the Pocket Cinema Cameras over HDMI.

sigir

Resonsible for the problem is the BMD Micro Converter BiDirectional. It depends on the serial number of the device.
I will ask BMD what they changed between devices with old serial numbers (not working) to the newer ones.
When I used one convert starting with serial 7xxxx no control was possible but the newer devices started with 85xxxx. Here everything works. It was a hint by the support engineer from BMD. He asked me for the serial number of all device. for I thought why, but now it's clear.

joelwsmith

sigir

Interesting. That's great to know, and I'm glad you figured it out. Thanks for the update!