3 SDI Cams into MacBook Pro

jakeswit

^{I need to find an elegant touring solution to bring 3 cameras into Isadora, and hopefully don't need to lug my tower around. The MBP is mid-2012 and therefore only has thunderbolt I, and the Sonnet Echo Express (with Blackmagic cards) only works on Thunderbolt II.}

^{Does anyone have experience with the BlackMagic ATEM Television Studio? Is the software controllable via Isadora? Then bring everything in via the UltraStudio (USB3).}

^{Any other solutions for bringing 3 Cameras into Izzy on a laptop that you've been happy with?}

The cams will all stay at 720p, with relatively little effects, so I'm sure the computer itself can handle the job.

Fred

Check this thread

http://troikatronix.com/troikatronixforum/discussion/2222/4-hdmi-sources-mbp#latest

the above thread and a few others have covered this topic already- you may find a lot of useful info from searching the existing posts.

The ATEM is a mixer and will let you have one source at a time (there are ways you can indirectly control it from Izzy)

jakeswit

thanks ... had seen that. Didn't know if people had experience with the ATEM mixer or other elegant solutions for a professional setting. This user seems to only want HDMI, but we run on SDI ... nevertheless, thanks for the response.

Fred

I have been using ATEM for a few years, great stuff, no scalers on inputs so all input resolutions and frame-rates must match- it still gives you one input at a time (if you use it to feed a capture card).

The USB 3 capture built in to the old 2/me is not worth using and the ATEM television studio USB 2 is h264 encoded and cant be used for capture.- you will need another capture device

There is a an ATEM osc bridge that works with late but not latest firmware versions, the atem is a mixer and will not get you 3 simultaneous cameras, the tv studio model also does not have aux outputs so if you use it as mixer for your outputs you have no aux feed for your capture box.

https://github.com/danielbuechele/atemOSC

Your original question asked about 3 cameras into izzy- this does not help for simultaneous capture you though so it is unclear what you are after. If you only need one camera at a time then you have lots of options and dont need 3 inputs just some kind of switcher- as in the other thread knowing if you have to have smooth transitions between cameras with effects changes the requirements.

For simultaneous inputs the other thread has some info, but there is nothing that will really work for gen 1 thunderbolt, apart from a quad split device running to an HD capture input. Your USB 3 is the only option to keep an output free for the projector.

The blackmagic clean switch router is another solution that can help you.

Depending on what you see in your future for hardware you may be better of looking at other solutions as the cost of all these little bits will add up.

Some more info about your use case can help.

Fred