Menu and Settings
The camera is normally in Standby mode, ready to record. When in Standby, the settings menu lists image capture and camera settings at the top of the HDMI preview. Navigate the menu using the Scroll Wheel and Select Button. Hide the menu by clicking the Close Icon (×) in the top-left corner. Show the menu again by clicking the Select Button. Navigating the menu is disabled while recording.
Clicking Play Icon (►) in the menu will put the camera into Playback mode.
Most settings are preserved when the camera is powered down. A brief description of the individual settings follows:
Width and Height
Ember can shoot in a variety of resolutions and aspect ratios. The Width and Height of the frame are set independently. See Resolutions and Frame Rates for a list of Width and Height combinations matching standard aspect ratios. The selected Height also determines the maximum Frame Rate.
Frame Rate
This menu shows a list of available capture frame rates for the selected height and Project Frame Rate. The first menu item (USER) is a custom frame rate that can be adjusted in increments of 1 fps. The second menu item (MAX) automatically selects the highest available frame rate. The remaining items are whole number multiples of the Project Frame Rate, plus some other common frame rates.
When using an NTSC Project Frame Rate, the available capture frame rates are divided by 1.001 to be whole number multiples of the Project Frame Rate. This is indicated by the unit "fps/1.001" next to the selected frame rate. For example, with a Project Frame Rate of 23.976, 600fps becomes 600fps/1.001 = 599.4fps, exactly 25x the Project Frame Rate.
Shutter Angle
The shutter angle can be used to adjust exposure and motion blur. To convert from shutter angle to exposure time, use the following formula:
Iris (Active EF Mount)
For EF photo lenses, the lens aperture (f-stop) can be controlled with this setting. For EF cine lenses, the current T-stop is reported instead.
Gain
Three gain settings are available: ISO 100, 200, and 400. These can be used to adjust exposure. They are analog gains applied in the image sensor, not digital gains. Lower gains have slightly less noise in adequate lighting, but using ISO 400 is preferred over using a lower gain and pushing the shadows in post.
Ember ISO values are saturation-based; they do not depend on the OETF selected. For the same saturation-based ISO, the exposure level of middle gray still depends on the OETF selected, with HLG Beta exposing middle gray approximately one stop more than Rec. 709.
OETF
Ember supports two OETFs: Rec. 709 and HLG Beta. Only the tone curve is adjusted by the OETF setting. The color space is not transformed beyond white balance and will generally be undersaturated without further adjustment.
Rec. 709 uses the transfer curve of the Rec. 709 standard, which is a gamma of approximately 2.2 with a slope limit of 4.5x in shadows. HLG Beta is based on the Hybrid Log Gamma transfer curve, adapted to better fit this sensor. (Using a standard HLG LUT is not recommended). It boosts the shadows and flattens the highlights compared to Rec. 709, which helps preserve more dynamic range but may amplify shadow noise.
Color Temperature and Tint
Color temperatures ranging from 2000K to 9600K are available for white balance. Ember is calibrated at 3200K, 5600K and 8000K. Tint (green/magenta) can also be adjusted ±10%.
Project Frame Rate
The Project Frame Rate (Time Base) sets the playback speed of the recorded video, which gets encoded into the video file. Common project frame rates from from 23.976 to 120.000 are available, to simplify importing Ember videos into projects. The ratio of capture speed (Frame Rate) to playback speed (this setting) is the amount of slow motion applied. For example, a 600fps capture with a 24fps Project Frame Rate gives 600/24 = 25x slow motion.
Note: Changing Project Frame Rate may also change the HDMI output frame rate, which will cause monitors to resynchronize.
Pre-Record (w/ Supported SSDs)
When a compatible SSD is installed, this setting enables pre-record buffering of between 1s and 2hr, depending on capture settings and available disk space. The selected value is allocated as a circular buffer when the camera is armed and overwritten continuously until the camera is triggered, at which point post-trigger recording continues until stopped. See the Pre-Record feature description for more details on this mode of operation.
Disk
The active SSD can be formatted (erased) from this menu. This is the only method of deleting files from the camera. When formatting, the Camera Letter and Reel Number for the next job can be set. The word "Formatting" will appear in the status bar while formatting is in progress. Formatting may take up to 60 seconds. Do not power down the camera during this time.
When a Media Expander is attached, this menu can also be used to Mount or Eject the external disk and to set which disk is used by default on boot.
Display
Anamorphic Desqueeze can be applied to the preview image from this menu.
When the Media Expander is attached, this menu can also be used to select which display interface (HDMI, SDI) is configured as a Clean Feed.
Default
The camera settings can be restored to their default values from this menu.
Wi-Fi Settings
Wi-Fi can be turned on/off and set to a specific channel using these settings.
SSID / IP
This menu displays the Wi-Fi SSID and both the Wi-Fi and Ethernet IP addresses of the camera, used for connecting with the App.
GPIO Configuration
This menu configures the behavior of the camera's GPIO signals, which can be used for remote triggering or multi-camera synchronization. See Pinouts / Remote / Sync for more information.
Fan
The fan profile can be set to LOW, NORMAL, or HIGH based on preference. LOW can be used to keep the fan off for short clips or when in Standby. HIGH can be used to force the fans to maximum speed whenever recording is in progress. Regardless of the setting, the fans will turn on and adjust their speed when necessary to maintain system performance.
When a Media Expander is installed, its fan profile can be controlled with the "Backpack" setting in this menu with LOW, NORMAL, and HIGH options.
Power
This menu allows the warning and cutoff voltages to be adjusted. The defaults (12.0V warn, 10.0V cutoff) are set for typical 4-cell V-Mount batteries. When the voltage drops below the warning level, an orange "LOW" indication will flash in the status bar. When the voltage drops below the cutoff level for more than five seconds, the camera will close the in-progress clip and safely shut down, to prevent data loss.
Time/Date Set
Set the time and date to be used for file timestamping.
Last updated