Blackmagic’s newest Video Assist 12G offers internal 4K60 12-Bit BRAW recording

The Blackmagic Video Assist range of monitors has been a popular choice for many camera operators since the first versions were released. Now, Blackmagic has updated the Video Assist, with internal 12-bit BRAW recording in both 7″ and 5″ sizes. We caught up with Blackmagic at IBC 2019 to find out more about the capabilities of the new monitors.

Both the 7 and 5-inch models have a pair of 12G SDI inputs to receive up to 4K DCI 60fps signals, as well as a pair of HDMI inputs also offering up to 4K/60p recording. They offer 2500 nits brightness, so they’ll look good even in bright outdoor conditions. The 5″ model offers a 16:9 screen resolution of 1920×1080 while the 7″ goes a little more desktop with a 16:10 ratio 1920×1200 resolution.

Both screens offer 2500 nit brightness, allowing you to easily see them even in bright sunny conditions, and offer a touchscreen user interface to let you quickly and easily change and adjust settings. As you’d expect, they come with the usual array of assist tools, including histogram, waveform, RGB parade, vectorscope, LUT support, focus peaking and “many more scopes and exposure tools”.

Recording is done to a pair (in the 7″) or a single (in the 5″) UHS-II sd card slots. But like the Pocket 4K, you can also hook an SSD up to the Type-C USB socket and record to that instead, allowing for much longer record times. The 7″ version also features two balanced 3-pin mini-XLR inputs with 48v phantom power, and both sizes allow you to record up to 16 channels of embedded 24-bit 48Khz audio.

Although the Blackmagic Video Assist 12G offers 12-Bit BRAW recording, it currently only supports it with a couple of cameras. Those are the Canon C300 Mark II and the Panasonic EVA1. But, like their predecessors, the new monitor recorders also offer 10-Bit 4:2:2 ProRes and DNx codec recording, too. These are just the first two, though. Support will be coming for more cameras in the future.

The Blackmagic Video Assist 7″ is available to pre-order now for $995, and the 5″ version is available to pre-order now for $795. They’re expected to start shipping in October.

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DIYP’s coverage of IBC2019 is sponsored by Syrp, Manfrotto, Zhiyun, and Spiffy Gear.