Well, if I had my username and password in time I would have.
Let's don't forget what the original Scarlet was all about. Four+ years ago, I saw a feature in Popular Science Mag introducing the Red Scarlet that was supposedly shipping in about 6 months. 3K, fixed zoom lens...useable for about $4,000. Pretty darn exciting..I sent the article to everyone with the subject line "my next camera!" I visited the the Red.com site all the time and got very excited about the whole Red 'thing'.
Now let's look at what Red has done since then: Shown a few photos of 'the scarlet'..even one where it was under glass like it was the friggin' Hope diamond, Released a very pretty clip of a lizard supposedly shot with it. Delayed the release virtually indefinitely. Released another 5 figure+ priced camera (the Epic) and moved their offices to Hollywood. All while continually yakking about the Scarlet and how it will be worth the wait.
Now that we've seen it and apparently can buy it...or at least put down a deposit...ooooh take my money please!!... we find that they've simply released yet another camera that's easily $12K if you want to actually use it rather than just stare at it and groove on owning it. 3 times the original projected price and NO LENS! Wow, a 14 MP still camera too... I sold one of those in 2003. I guarantee you all those magazine covers were only shot with a Red camera when someone from Red took the $50K Hasselblad still camera, that shoots 60MP files, out of the photographer's hand, and replaced it with the Red so he could pop off a few frames... probably reluctantly.
Don't get me wrong, Red makes great cameras and as a private company is entitled to run their biz any way they want, but you're crazy if you believe they haven't ridden this Scarlet thing and all the free publicity it came with all the way to the bank, then effectively giving the 'high hard one' to folks like us who actually expected something close to what they originally promoted. If I was REALLY conspiratorial, I might say they've had thousands of this camera sitting in boxes for 2 years just driving the anticipatory frenzy to a fever pitch, then announcing it to drive sales.
Last night Jim Jannard dramatically said that the Scarlet has 'grown up'... He should have said 'had to catch up' If they had done what they said, when they said, they would have sold millions and probably dealt the Canon 5D Mk II a death blow. But instead they've just built another rental camera AND gotten untold amounts of free publicity with their 4 year 'ad campaign'-this redefines guerrilla marketing.
Never has my 5D looked so nice.
Let's don't forget what the original Scarlet was all about. Four+ years ago, I saw a feature in Popular Science Mag introducing the Red Scarlet that was supposedly shipping in about 6 months. 3K, fixed zoom lens...useable for about $4,000. Pretty darn exciting..I sent the article to everyone with the subject line "my next camera!" I visited the the Red.com site all the time and got very excited about the whole Red 'thing'.
Now let's look at what Red has done since then: Shown a few photos of 'the scarlet'..even one where it was under glass like it was the friggin' Hope diamond, Released a very pretty clip of a lizard supposedly shot with it. Delayed the release virtually indefinitely. Released another 5 figure+ priced camera (the Epic) and moved their offices to Hollywood. All while continually yakking about the Scarlet and how it will be worth the wait.
Now that we've seen it and apparently can buy it...or at least put down a deposit...ooooh take my money please!!... we find that they've simply released yet another camera that's easily $12K if you want to actually use it rather than just stare at it and groove on owning it. 3 times the original projected price and NO LENS! Wow, a 14 MP still camera too... I sold one of those in 2003. I guarantee you all those magazine covers were only shot with a Red camera when someone from Red took the $50K Hasselblad still camera, that shoots 60MP files, out of the photographer's hand, and replaced it with the Red so he could pop off a few frames... probably reluctantly.
Don't get me wrong, Red makes great cameras and as a private company is entitled to run their biz any way they want, but you're crazy if you believe they haven't ridden this Scarlet thing and all the free publicity it came with all the way to the bank, then effectively giving the 'high hard one' to folks like us who actually expected something close to what they originally promoted. If I was REALLY conspiratorial, I might say they've had thousands of this camera sitting in boxes for 2 years just driving the anticipatory frenzy to a fever pitch, then announcing it to drive sales.
Last night Jim Jannard dramatically said that the Scarlet has 'grown up'... He should have said 'had to catch up' If they had done what they said, when they said, they would have sold millions and probably dealt the Canon 5D Mk II a death blow. But instead they've just built another rental camera AND gotten untold amounts of free publicity with their 4 year 'ad campaign'-this redefines guerrilla marketing.
Never has my 5D looked so nice.
