As I explained in my conversation with CineD, I'm rebuilding this camera for a simple reason: I love the way it renders, and I've never stopped regretting that it was discontinued.
The original Digital Bolex D16 was built around a Kodak KAI-05040 CCD, turned into a Super 16 camera. That part wasn't my idea, it was the work of Joe Rubinstein and his team, who I consider genuine pioneers of digital cinema. My contribution is different: to re-make a few units with today's technology, and to develop a proper cinema color science of my own, from the inside.
That color science is the heart of the project. I'm building a color matrix from side-by-side tests : the sensor filmed right next to real Kodak 500T and 250D stock, so the camera learns to render like the film beside it. This is the step I'm working on now, and it's the part that matters most.
Around it, the build is deliberately simple: a Raspberry Pi 5 at the core, firmware written in Python for now, a touchscreen for display and navigation, recording to SSD, and V-lock battery power.
I didn't get here alone. Csaba Nagy's open work on the CinePi is what pushed me to actually start. And both Csaba and Joe helped me along the way, each in their own manner, through the emails we exchanged. This project stands on their generosity.
It's still at the prototype stage. I'll be posting the first real results on my YouTube channel as they come, that's the best place to follow where this goes.