The Blackmagic Design Micro Cinema Camera (BMMCC) is an ultra-compact camera with pro-grade functionality. Key features include:

Ultra-Compact. The Micro Cinema Camera is just slightly larger and heavier than the popular GoPro action cameras, making it perfect for tight spaces and POV sequences.

Super 16mm Sensor. The BMMCC utilizes the same sensor size as the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera, so it supports 1080p video and 13 stops of dynamic range.

CinemaDNG RAW and ProRes. The BMMCC records a choice of high quality ProRes 422 (HQ) up to 60p and lossless compressed CinemaDNG RAW files up to 30p. Blackmagic Design’s free DaVinci Resolve Lite software allows you to color-correct the CinemaDNG RAW files and export them at their full 1,920 × 1,080 resolution.

Active Micro 4/3 Lens Mount. The BMMCC’s active Micro 4/3 lens mount enables electronic aperture control and the ability to manually focus using a variety of Micro 4/3 lenses (a list of supported lenses isn’t currently available). You can also use an MFT adapter to expand your selection of available lenses.

The Crop Factor. With the same sensor as the BMPCC comes the same x3.02 crop factor. Keep this in mind when planning your shoot, as there are very few wide-angle lens options for this camera, and using third-party adapters may affect infinity focus.

Just a Camera Head. While it offers lots of great features, you’ll need to rent several accessories to shoot in a traditional way. There’s no screen on this camera, so at the very least you’ll need an HDMI monitor to adjust camera settings. There are multiple 1/4"-20 mounting points for building it out, and the included breakout cable provides LANC control, power, genlock, and composite video output. The camera is powered via an included Canon LP-E6 battery for roughly 1.5 hours of runtime.

Please Note: The BMMCC records to widely available SDXC memory cards; however, this camera can be picky about which cards it will work with. At present, we can only recommend using UHS-I cards with a speed class lower than V30 such as the SanDisk SDXC 128GB Extreme Pro 170MB/s UHS-1 U3 or SanDisk SDXC 256GB Extreme Pro 170MB/s UHS-1 U3 with this camera.

Possible Alternatives. While this remains an attractive option for some niche uses, we believe Blackmagic has released better, more flexible products recently. Specifically, the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K has better recording specs, more reliable media, a wider accessory ecosystem, doesn’t require an external monitor to operate, but is a little more expensive. The Micro Studio Camera costs the same, has more inputs and outputs, and allows for 4K, but does require the use of an external recorder. Needing a monitor anyway, though, that might not be an issue for some workflows. The Z CAM E2C 4K Cinema Camera is an entry-level, budget-friendly option.