Blackmagic Camera vs PocketMeter Pro
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Blackmagic Camera
Transform your iPhone or iPad into a professional digital film camera. Achieve a cinematic look with Hollywood-grade controls, including frame rate, shutter angle, and ISO adjustments. Record in industry-standard formats directly to cloud storage for seamless global collaboration.
- Digital film camera controls
- Cinematic 'look' for Hollywood films
- Adjust frame rate, shutter angle, white balance, ISO
- Record to Blackmagic Cloud
- Industry standard 10-bit Apple ProRes files up to 4K
- Interactive Heads Up Display (HUD)
- Professional audio options
Read full descriptionHide full description
Introducing Digital Film for iPhone and iPad! Blackmagic Camera unlocks the power of your iPhone and iPad by adding digital film camera controls and operating systems! Now you can create the same cinematic ‘look’ as Hollywood feature films. You get the same intuitive and user friendly interface as Blackmagic Design’s award winning cameras. So it’s just like using a professional digital film camera! This means you can adjust settings such as frame rate, shutter angle, white balance and ISO all in a single tap. Or record directly to Blackmagic Cloud in industry standard 10-bit Apple ProRes files up to 4K! Recording to Blackmagic Cloud Storage lets you collaborate on DaVinci Resolve projects with editors anywhere in the world, all at the same time! Get the "Hollywood Look" with Digital Film! Blackmagic Camera puts the professional features you need for feature film, television and documentaries in your pocket. Now you can create YouTube and TikTok content with a cinematic look, and broadcast quality ENG! Imagine having a run and gun camera on hand to capture breaking news whenever it happens! Or use Blackmagic Camera as a B Cam to capture angles that are difficult to reach with traditional cameras, while still retaining control of important settings. Best of all, recording to Blackmagic Cloud allows you to get your footage to the newsroom or post production studio in minutes. Interactive Controls for Fast Setup Blackmagic Camera has all the controls you need to quickly setup and start shooting! Everything is interactive, so you can tap any item and instantly change settings without searching through confusing menus! The HUD shows status and record parameters, histogram, focus peaking indicators, levels, frame guides and more. Show or hide the HUD by swiping up or down. You can auto focus by tapping the screen in the area you want to focus. You can shoot in 16:9 or vertical aspect ratios, plus you can shoot 16:9 while holding your phone vertically if you want to shoot unobtrusively. On Screen Heads Up Display The heads up display, or HUD, controls have the most important camera controls such as lens selection, frame rate, shutter angle, timecode, ISO, white balance, gain and audio levels. You can adjust settings such as exposure by touching the ISO indicator, or you can change the audio levels simply by touching the audio meters. Everything is interactive, so if you tap any item you can instantaneously change its settings without having to search through complex menus! Camera Setup Menus The settings tab unlocks the full power of your phone’s camera, with quick access to advanced settings such as monitoring, audio, camera setup, recording and more! The record tab gives you total control over video resolution and recording format including industry standard Apple ProRes or space efficient H.264 and H.265. Plus, you can set anamorphic de-squeeze and lens correction settings. Professional audio options include AAC and PCM format and VU or PPM audio metering. You can even add external microphones! Or add 3D LUTs to recreate film looks! Media The Blackmagic Camera media tab has all the controls you need to browse or scrub clips for quick review, search and sort and view the upload status of your media. Access your media from Blackmagic Camera’s all clips folder by choosing the Media button to see the thumbnails for each clip you have stored. Plus, you can save to the files folder on the phone, send it to Blackmagic Cloud Storage via Blackmagic Cloud or manually choose which clips to upload to a project library. You can even sync media from Blackmagic Camera directly into the DaVinci Resolve project so you’re ready to edit! Live Sync to Blackmagic Cloud Storage When shooting with Blackmagic Camera, the video you capture can be instantly uploaded as a proxy file, followed by the camera originals, and saved to Blackmagic Cloud Storage. This means you can start editing quickly using your proxies, speeding up your workflow.
PocketMeter Pro
This professional light meter app transforms your iPhone into a versatile tool for film photographers and cinematographers. It offers live exposure readings, tap-to-spot metering, and cinema-specific features like shutter angle and false color overlays.
- Live scene metering
- Tap-to-spot metering
- Lockable exposure dials
- Cinema mode with shutter angle
- False color exposure map
- LiDAR rangefinder (Pro models)
- Save exposure logs with metadata
Read full descriptionHide full description
PocketMeter Pro turns your iPhone into a professional light meter. Built for film photographers and cinematographers who think in stops, angles, and zones. Point it at a scene and get a live exposure reading, solved across real photographic stop tables. Lock any two of shutter, aperture, and ISO, and the third tracks the light in real time. Tap anywhere in the frame to spot-meter: the tapped area is placed at middle gray, exactly like a spot reading for shadows or skin. • Live scene metering read directly from the camera sensor • Tap-to-spot metering with one-tap return to full-scene evaluation • Lockable dials with a priority-aware exposure solver • Pop-up scrub wheels with haptic detents — it feels like a meter, not a form • Hold any reading while you work, then release to go live again • Over- and under-exposure warnings when a solve runs out of range CINEMA MODE • Shutter angle instead of shutter speed — 180° at 24 fps reads 1/48 • Frame rates from 23.976 to 60 • ND filters in cinema density notation (ND 0.3 to ND 1.8), right on the control deck — photo mode shows classic filter factors (ND2 to ND64) instead • False color, one tap from the viewfinder: an ARRI-style exposure map where green is middle gray, pink is skin key, and red is clipping — read relative to YOUR dialed settings, not the phone's auto-exposure ON SET, IN THE FIELD • LiDAR rangefinder: distance to your metering point in feet and inches (iPhone Pro models) • Live color-temperature readout in Kelvin from scene white balance • LOG: save a frame to Photos stamped with your full exposure — EV, shutter or angle, aperture, ISO, ND, white balance, distance — and geotagged, so you can swipe up later and see exactly where you metered it • Full portrait and landscape support with translucent controls that keep the viewfinder clear BUILT BY FILMMAKERS PocketMeter Pro comes from Studio C-41 and was built and field-tested alongside working cinematographers. Requires iOS 17 or later. Rangefinder requires a LiDAR-equipped iPhone (Pro models). Camera, Photos, and location permissions are used only for metering, saving your logs, and tagging them — nothing is collected or shared.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Blackmagic Camera at Free against PocketMeter Pro's $9.99. Blackmagic Camera also leads on ratings volume (25K vs 6) and chart position (#19 vs unranked). PocketMeter Pro's advantage is review sentiment (100% vs 68%). On rating, ads, in-app purchases and iOS requirement there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Blackmagic Camera is free to download; PocketMeter Pro costs $9.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
PocketMeter Pro holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.8. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Blackmagic Camera has 25K ratings behind it against 6, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 68% of Blackmagic Camera's written reviews are positive against 100% of PocketMeter Pro's.
| Parameter | Blackmagic Camera | PocketMeter Pro |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free — better | $9.99 |
| Rating | 4.8 (25K ratings) | 5.0 (6 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 68.2% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 25K — better | 6 |
| Update frequency | Monthly | — |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free — better | Paid |
| Best chart rank | #19 — better | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch — better | iPhone |
| Requires iOS | 18.0 | 17.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 203 MB | 1 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Blackmagic Design Inc | Studio C-41 Productions, LLC |
Customer experience
Blackmagic Camera
PocketMeter Pro
Bugs and requests
Blackmagic Camera
Reported bugs
5 issues- Stabilization issues in certain recording modes
- Exposure and focus settings not staying locked
- Timelapse mode not clearly indicated
- HDMI output not working reliably
- Audio source randomly switching to 'None'
Requested features
6 requests- Add log/flat color profiles
- Implement waveform and vectorscope monitors
- Allow locking shutter speed with auto ISO
- Provide preset options for common settings
- Add support for external accessories (e.g., gimbals)
Show 1 moreShow fewer
- Integrate Apple Watch remote control
PocketMeter Pro
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Blackmagic Camera
No in-app purchases
PocketMeter Pro
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Blackmagic Camera free?
Is PocketMeter Pro free?
Which has better reviews, Blackmagic Camera or PocketMeter Pro?
Do Blackmagic Camera or PocketMeter Pro have ads?
Other comparisons















