Film camera

Table of Content

Switch a camera to Film and it stops talking like a stills body: apertures read as T-stops, a Framerate appears, and you set the exposure with a Shutter Angle the way you do on a cine camera. Everything else — sensor, format, lens, ISO, ND filter, white balance, focus — behaves exactly as described in The photo camera. If you are looking for the cinema camera, this is the page.

Applies to STUDIO, CINEMA · With a BASIC licence the Film button is switched off and the film bodies and film rigs are not offered in the pickers · You need: a camera in the set, selected, with its inspector open.

Where to find it

Select the camera and open the Settings group in the inspector. The first row is the Photo / Film pair.

The Photo / Film pair at the top of the camera's Settings group
The Photo / Film pair at the top of the camera’s Settings group

Picking a film body under Equipment → Camera gets you there in one step: choosing a body applies its type, its sensor and its format together.

The same row with a BASIC licence: the Film button is switched off
The same row with a BASIC licence: the Film button is switched off
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What changes in Film mode

Control Photo Film
Aperture f-stops, f/0.5 … f/32 the same 33 steps labelled as T-stops, T0.5 … T32
Anamorphic hidden Normal, 1.3x, 1.33x, 1.42x, 1.5x, 1.75x, 1.8x, 2x (default Normal)
Framerate hidden 19 steps, 16 fps … 2000 fps (default 30 fps)
Exposure Exposure Time only a pair of buttons chooses Exposure Time or Shutter Angle (Shutter Angle is preselected)
Shutter Angle hidden 19 steps, 5.0° … 360.0° (default 180.0°)

The aperture ladder itself does not change — f/2.8 and T2.8 are the same setting under two names. The three film-only dropdowns also appear in the camera bar above the preview, between the lens and the aperture.

Film mode on a Blackmagic URSA: Framerate 24 fps, Shutter Angle 180.0°, Anamorphic 2x, aperture T2.8
Film mode on a Blackmagic URSA: Framerate 24 fps, Shutter Angle 180.0°, Anamorphic 2x, aperture T2.8
The same inspector region in Photo and in Film — f/2.8 becomes T2.8
The same inspector region in Photo and in Film — f/2.8 becomes T2.8
The camera bar in Film mode: Anamorphic, Framerate and Shutter Angle sit between the lens and the aperture
The camera bar in Film mode: Anamorphic, Framerate and Shutter Angle sit between the lens and the aperture
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Framerate

Nineteen steps, from the silent-era rates to high speed:

16 fps · 16 2/3 fps · 18 fps · 20 fps · 23.98 fps · 24 fps · 25 fps · 29.97 fps · 30 fps · 48 fps · 50 fps · 59.94 fps · 60 fps · 120 fps · 240 fps · 400 fps · 800 fps · 1000 fps · 2000 fps

This Framerate belongs to the camera: it sets how long one film frame is exposed, and it is printed on the set plan. It does not decide how many frames per second an animation is played back or rendered at — that is a different field with the same name, in the animation editor, and it runs from 2 to 120 fps. See How animation works in a shot.

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Shutter angle or shutter time

The angle is the part of a full turn during which the shutter is open, so the exposure follows the framerate: 180.0° is half a turn, and half of 1/24 s is 1/48 s.

Shutter Angle at 24 fps at 25 fps at 30 fps
90.0° 1/96 s 1/100 s 1/120 s
180.0° 1/48 s 1/50 s 1/60 s
360.0° 1/24 s 1/25 s 1/30 s

The ladder is deliberately irregular, and six of its steps are the ones a cine shooter looks for: 45.0° and 90.0° for a crisp, staccato exposure, 172.8° as the flicker-free angle for 24 fps under 50 Hz light (it works out at exactly 1/50 s), 180.0° as the everyday standard, and 270.0° and 360.0° when a frame should be exposed for most or all of its own duration.

Below the angle, the Exposure Time row turns into a read-out, and it names the nearest step of the photographic shutter ladder rather than the time the camera uses: 180.0° at 24 fps is 1/48 s and is reported as 1/50 s. The preview and the render both expose for the calculated value. Nothing warns you when the two differ.

Shutter Angle 180.0° at 24 fps, with the derived Exposure Time read-out below it
Shutter Angle 180.0° at 24 fps, with the derived Exposure Time read-out below it

In practice that means: leave 180.0° on for the everyday 24 fps look, and switch to 172.8° when the room’s own practicals run on 50 Hz mains and you want the plan to match what the camera will do on the day.

Switch the pair to Exposure Time and you choose the time yourself. The camera then exposes for the shorter of the two values, your time or one whole frame: 1 s at 24 fps still exposes 1/24 s.

Studio flash is integrated over its own flash duration, so the shutter hardly changes it, while continuous light reacts to it directly — the details are in Set the exposure.

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Anamorphic

Anamorphic multiplies the frame’s aspect ratio: with 2x the camera frames twice as wide as the Format alone would. The camera preview, the final render, the frames of an exported video and the automatic focus all use that widened frame, and the PLANS pages print the factor next to the lens.

It changes the framing and nothing else. There is no squeezed image, no oval bokeh and no anamorphic flare, and the setting has no effect while the camera is in Photo mode.

Format 16:9 with Anamorphic Normal · 2x — same camera, same exposure
Format 16:9 with Anamorphic Normal · 2x — same camera, same exposure
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Film bodies and rigs

Four film bodies ship in the library, all of them with a full-frame recording area:

Body Sensor Format
Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Full Frame 3:2
Blackmagic URSA Full Frame 3:2
Film Camera Full Frame 16:9
RED KOMODO Full Frame 3:2

The film rigs are Film Tripod, Camera Crane, Dolly and Fisher 10; their axes and limits are listed in Camera rigs: axes and limits. You can add your own film bodies and mounts on top of them — see Set up your own camera kit.

All five bodies in the library, the Photo Camera included:

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Cameras

Name Type Key facts
Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Film Full frame sensor, 3:2 aspect ratio
Blackmagic URSA Film Full frame sensor, 3:2 aspect ratio
Film Camera Film Full frame sensor, 16:9 aspect ratio
Photo Camera Photo Full frame sensor, 3:2 aspect ratio
RED KOMODO Film Full frame sensor, 3:2 aspect ratio
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What you can animate

Framerate, Shutter Angle, the Exposure Time / Shutter Angle switch and Anamorphic all take keyframes (add-on: Animation Tool). The camera type itself does not, so a shot is either a photo camera or a film camera for its whole length.

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Tips & limits

  • Movement is not blurred. The angle changes the exposure, not the rendering of motion, so a 360.0° shutter comes out as sharp as a 5.0° one.
  • The ND Filter is available in both modes. It is the usual way to work at T2.0 under continuous light without blowing the image out.
  • On a set plan a film camera prints its shutter angle and its framerate instead of a shutter time, plus the anamorphic factor when one is set.
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Troubleshooting

  • The exposure time under my shutter angle looks wrong. It is the nearest step of the photographic ladder, not the value the render uses; the render uses the exact angle.
  • More symptoms, including the greyed-out Film button, are in Camera problems.
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Related

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