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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Everything changes... IMPORTANT post.

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Dear Jim/RED..

I think this is awesome news

Very comforting knowing the company you invest in cares, replies, offers firmware updates often, aware of problems, sorts them out, lowering the price of
their great cameras, list goes on.

But...haha
coming from a poor Red Scarlet owner
in the heat of competition, 4K cameras, frame rates etc

As much as I would love love love the EPIC at its new cost, even if there was a trade in Scarlet for EPIC plus dolla, I still wouldn't be able to afford the EPIC. haha

So I ask....for a nice firmware upgrade for us broke but absolutely loving Scarlet owners.. haha,
nothing too crazy.

I would like no crop in 3K
2K crop is fine as I mainly use 3K for slowmo
60fps in 3K ...but would love 120fps in 3k
THATS IT!

Otherwise Im super happy with my baby.. as if you want an EPIC, get an EPIC.

Thats just my 2 cents
Keep up the great work ;)
 
Terry VerHaar said:
Advice to all those who feel burned by this horrible thing that RED is doing:

WHENEVER you purchase a high tech business tool, write it off in the first year - as the IRS will allows most businesses to do for a purchase of this size. Then, assume that you must recoup the after tax value of the investment within ONE YEAR and behave accordingly. If you are successful at doing so, you win. If the asset is still producing value for you in the second year, you win big. If you don't recoup your investment within a year but your asset is still producing value, don't complain, just work harder to keep getting value from the asset and you'll probably do fine in the end. No matter what, ASSUME that there will be better tools at a lower price very soon after you make your investment and plan accordingly. Oh, and have fun - it's all just a big game.
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While I agree with you, I think that with the Epic price drop it will be harder to make a living if you are a DP/shooter/owner like myself. The day rates will drop and with the flood of green Epic owners, there will be some epic undercutting. We've seen it happen with Scarlet, it will only get worse with cheap Epic. I don't think this helps a professional user, especially those of us who had Epics for less than a year. It's weird that Red justified the higher price of Scarlet then originally stated with "we make cameras for professionals only". It's seems that they are entering the prosumer market now.

But hey, we can still let our images speak for themselves.

PS I think now would be a good time for Red to drop the "obsolescence obsolete" moto.
 
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Rob Ruffo said:
It was $27500 - with accessories around $38K all told (inc. media). I did not buy that camera as a stage 2. We also had a stage 2 that we shared with Van but sold our shares of that to him and got our own camera because he was too busy with it and we almost never had access.
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So Rob, at $950 a day, (your figures), you need 40 days at that rate to recoup your investment. Unless you only worked 20 days with your Epic in the 8 months since you got it you must be more than half way there....no?

I reckon if you sold it for 60% of what you paid you would still be quids in and could stop whining.
 
A little thought experiment, feel free to correct it if necessary. Just to think of the repercussions of a serious price change.

1. Scarlet price is reduced to 5000 USD.
2. Arri, Black Magic, Canon and Sony will not look like a good option for anyone, the digital cinema "market" will crash in favor of Red. (People will feel ripped off or stupid if they bought another camera).
3. Every single independent filmmaker serious enough to take their craft serious will buy this camera, rental is no longer a choice for longer productions and the relaxed sense of having time to experiment and get to know the camera is better.
4. The need for good post production solutions is higher, HDD's and RAID solutions will come out that set a "redray ready" stamp on it (or 4K red ready).
5. Post production computers at lower prices get a "Redy for Red" stamp.
6. The demand for 4K consumer viewing will get a slight increase and 4K will "arrive" sooner rather then later.
7. Most television stations will use Scarlet as their main camera for television programs, they might even use it for studio cameras, although they might not be practical.
8. Red makes a scarlet for television studio package, making Scarlet a practical option for studio work, enabling the first 4K studio camera solution that is both practical and inexpensive. A standard of "the coming codec for broadcasting 4K" will be enabled as a standard in Red television Scarlet with the capabilites of setting a look onto live broadcast feeds.
9. 4K television makes a grand debut.
10. Arri, Black Magic, sony and canon release a 4K capable camera at a seriously lower price to the rage of their own customers. Their argument is that the market demands it and that they have a super codec that makes their camera the best... all have their own codec and non is priced as low as Scarlet.
11. Scarlet price reduction once again. Epic is priced as Scarlet was when introduced. Red release a new camera capable of 8K with a splitmodule for filming 3D with only one camera, sensor is post dragon at 20 stops.
12. Scarlet is priced at 1000 USD and 2000 USD for full package.
13. People start shooting 4K at home with the newly released, stripped down "all in one"-Scarlet priced at 500 USD putting an end to 1080p. 4K is now a standard in television, film and homes.
14. 8K is the new 4K
15. Red announce "floating point resolution" (my own term, will trademark :P ) FPR. It is an organic representation of pixels making it adapt much like vector graphics and it does not hold a gridbased image, more an organic look like film all though digital.
16. Resolution becomes a thing of the past, a digital image is now virtually impossible to differentiate from the real world.
17. Red announce the virtual reality camera, a virtual production tool for productions made for the new symbiotic mediamerge between games and movies, making Red the leader in new entertainment technology.
18. Arri, Black Magic, Sony and Canon are now bankrupt, allthough black magic still holds a great deal of post production (which is now done on set or in virtual space).
19. Virtual Cinema is now indistinguishable from the real world, people get confused on what is real and what is not.
20. Red announce the A.I cinema production package. An A.I that creates stories by analyzing the internet for human stories. Human creativity takes a hit and the market demand more and more stories created by the A.I for it's "perfection in understanding human behavior".
21. The A.I becomes self aware.
22. Red announce that they might have made a mistake.
23. The Matrix


ok.... maybe I went a little too far, but I think a price change will have repercussions... :)
 
very very good news .

PS: for all those that are complaining forgetting that they are epic owners the for the only one reason that epic cosst (till today) 1/3 of what the market was suggesting prior the red revolution : it is very pathetic keep complaining without realizing that the market is changed (blackmagic design is another example) , and big money from camera rental is no longer a real business . so get creative and think about something else . instead of being selfish ignoring what is actually inevitable .
if RED does not lower the price of Epic : blackmagic , canon etc... will start eating pieces of a cake that red can still have (and hundreds of new potential owners (because seriously , huge budget national commercials has been even shot on 5D to save money on rental , so competition is out there , and if build an epic now cost way less , RED is smart enough to understand that is better be competitive price wise and have your cameras used at every level , rather than hope to make more money for each piece ( i guess sony learned that lesson )

Competition is good , for everybody , at avery level , who is scared by it , is not worth to be listened .
is not about the tool , is about your craft , that does not get cheaper .

great move Jim

g
 
Ivan McCullough said:
So Rob, at $950 a day, (your figures), you need 40 days at that rate to recoup your investment. Unless you only worked 20 days with your Epic in the 8 months since you got it you must be more than half way there....no?

I reckon if you sold it for 60% of what you paid you would still be quids in and could stop whining.
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The problem of a few is the money they won't earn anymore from October 31th on...

... that's the beef, no more free soup on pricey rentals ;-)
 
Peter Dmitriyev said:
why can't people realize that decisions like these affect some people more than others. There is no blanket black and white net result. People like Rob's business or whoever are decrying this decision might be very negatively affected, and other people I'm sure are running their business in such a way (or have a far larger business) where such a small thing won't be affecting them. Just respect your fellow man and acknowledge that this WILL absolutely hurt some people and it won't hurt many others, period. Nothing is black and white. Unfortunately nothing can be done about it, it's evolution and we must move forward so away we go and I praise Red for their bold decisions
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+1

Yes, absolutely.
 
Hey guys. I have resisted posting anything about this, but -

In my market a basic camera package goes for roughly $1200 a day. That includes lens, tripod, monitor, batteries, etc. If you break it down, the camera body goes for something like $450-500 a day, and you make the rest of the money on all the other stuff. I suspect that the price drop on epic will drop the price to what? $350-400 a day? Not the end of the world. I for one am not going to change my rental rates. I rarely rent my camera out without my self, and my clients expect to pay $1200 and up for a camera depending on AKS. Frankly a lot of places have been basically giving away the cameras to rent the lenses and other AKS for years. That's the nice thing about this stuff, is even if red came out with $20 camera tomorrow, it still needs $60k worth of other stuff to shoot, so you rent that stuff.

I just don't think it's going to be that big of a deal. In the long run, I think everybody wins. Volatility is tough to deal with, but I think the volatility Red has created in the market moved the whole industry 10 years forward in only a couple of years.

Just my 2 cents.

Nick
 
Zakaree Sandberg said:
time to buy a grip and lighting truck.. shit from the 80s is still renting today.
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Right. What an opportunity for an upstart company to come in and turn the grip and lighting world upside down! Can't wait.
 
To Long; Didn't Read version: RED is great.

First of all I want to take this thread as a chance to say thanks to you Jarred, Jim, and the whole RED team. Not only because of your products which have brought forth a revolution in the cinema world (and fashion), but because of your infectious passion for the art and for your product. This past Friday I had the honor to shoot a Halloween themed wedding, (something I though was very unique a freaking awesome!) I didn’t get paid for it, and I could have shot it with a Mark III to make it a bit easier on me, but why am I not going to use the very best of what I have to produce the very best I can? RED has made that possible time and time again, and I’m glad to have invested in a company that understands there are people like me who just have a passion to shoot, may not have the money to do it, but will want to do the very best, with the very best, any chance they get.

How I would have loved to be an R1 owner when they became available, I was just starting to get into cinema, and seeing that camera at a price that I could someday afford made me lust after it. Before RED, owning a camera of that caliber was close to impossible, unless you were a studio or a rental house. I remember the days where I began to save for the camera and thought to myself, "I can wait a few more years to buy a better car." You guys changed the game, and it's been a hell of a ride to witness it and somehow being a part of it. It's been an honor to meet with some you, seeing your love for what you do. Seeing you learn from your mistakes and grow. Finally, after years of saving, on Nov.3[SUP]rd[/SUP] I was able to purchase Elena, my faithful Scarlet, and call myself a REDUser, and though I haven’t had a chance to make as much money with it or even to produce more things than I would have liked so far, I love having access to something that lets my creativity fly at levels I never considered a possibility 7 years ago. These past few months I dream over and over again about producing a documentary about RED, because you guys have a great story to tell, and have been a source for other amazing stories to come out. It might take me another 5 years to afford an Epic, or whatever equipment you may have then. Who knows, all I know is that it's exciting to think about.

Rentals do have it rough. Like RED knows, there are people who won’t be happy about this and might even have a hard time, but I hope that those people understand that this is not RED screwing you over, it's this time of constant change, it's the technology and how fast it's all evolving, look back 7 years ago, dream of what it will be like 7 years from now,it's Insane! RED is just doing what they think is best for mostly everyone. They DO listen, this has been proved over and over again. Investments are never easy, the always pose a risk, and we can never know what tomorrow will bring. If you are going to invest in RED know you are investing a company of passionate people for the art, who want others to join in with them in their passion and make amazing art with them, with the best tool, at the best price possible. Obsolescence Obsolete.
 
Do the complainers remember when red offered its first camera at (that time) a fantastic price/performance compared to the competition? Remember when everyone was like "hell yeah, finally us Indy guys can own a real cinema camera!". So now the tables have turned and we want to bar the cost of entry to the next gen of Indy guys? Hypocritical. I'm pretty sure the epic no matter what the cost can still make you great images and money. If not, your doing something wrong.
 
You know, the same sort of ground shift happened in the Post world about 10-12 years ago. We all had AVIDs, Flints, Flames, Fires, Henrys, Harrys, Harriets, etc. We had paid huge bucks for them, and cursed those companies for their strangle hold on us, but were able to bill our clients even more per hour so we didn't care! And then Apple bought FCP, tweaked it a little and released a software-only editing solution that ran on a G4 for $1000. Add After Effects and Photoshop to that machine and you could do all the same things as our "big iron" for 1/20th the cost...yes it took longer, yes it was missing some features, yes rendering was a huge pain...but the barriers to entry were gone. All of a sudden, every kid out of school with some of Mom & Dad's bucks could be an editor, motion graphics artist or animator.

Fast forward 10 years, and we are all benefiting from those events (and take them totally for granted). We edit R3Ds natively on our MacBook Pros, we have tons of cheap, fast storage options with superfast connectivity, we have great software tools that do amazing things, and...we are all still in business. No one company has a monopoly on our tools or our creativity (just ask Apple how that FCP X launch went). We are free to vote with our wallets for the companies and products that serve us best.

We adapted, we learned, we changed, we grew...and we will through this shift in the world of cameras too!
 
Tom Greenberg said:
You know, the same sort of ground shift happened in the Post world about 10-12 years ago...We adapted, we learned, we changed, we grew...and we will through this shift in the world of cameras too!
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Went through that personally and watched SGI deteriorate quickly.
Those were tough times for a lot of us but we really didn't have anyone to complain too then since the internet wasn't as volatile as it is today.

Keep in mind that the past could have been blamed on Apple with their FCP eating into Avid and DVDSP eating into Sonic.
You can also add MS with Softimage eating almost all of SGI.

I am glad mavericks like RED are out there and telling us how it is.
We had to wait for months before we found out that our initial investment was deemed useless :P
 
Eric Santiago said:
Went through that personally and watched SGI deteriorate quickly.
Those were tough times for a lot of us but we really didn't have anyone to complain too then since the internet wasn't as volatile as it is today.
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I lived through it too, Eric...I still have an SGI Indigo2 Max Impact sitting in my basement that I bought in 1998...complete with a Discreet Flint license and Softimage on it. I probably paid over $125K for that system, and although it made me a fair amount of money, it's value rapidly plummeted as Apple, Adobe, Netpower and others got into the game and brought thousands of new users with them.

But my point was that as massive as that shift was, it was not fatal. And I don't think this one will be either. At the end of the day, they are just tools to unleash our inner creativity.
 
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