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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 :)

Cineform as a Tiered Partner

It is a matter of principle for us. We don't need the sales so much as to compromise our ethics. If that means we lose a sale (or 1000) to another company, so be it.

Jim

Bravo, man.
 
Cineform hacked Red's shi and in my book that's not cool. I see no reason for RED to ever trust a partner that has already proven their dishonesty. There are legitimate ways for companies to do business. Hacking is not a legitimate business practice. Anyone seeking to work with Cineform in future only needs to look at this as an example of very untrustworthy behavior. Could you even trust cineform to respect an NDA or with confidential information?

reality - ironically, most of your posts seem unreal - but this is a pretty good point you brought up -

I never thought of what cineform did as "hacking" until now - and it scares the bejesus out of me - I remember someone mentioning that Cineform and RED were talking along time ago, does anyone know if they signed an NDA? - if so, that would take this to a whole other level.
 
Assimilate is comming out with a "red-lite" app?? Great news!!
now it all makes sense...
 
reality - ironically, most of your posts seem unreal - but this is a pretty good point you brought up -

I never thought of what cineform did as "hacking" until now - and it scares the bejesus out of me - I remember someone mentioning that Cineform and RED were talking along time ago, does anyone know if they signed an NDA? - if so, that would take this to a whole other level.

Unreal? Ha. The legality of it is what scares me. Let's say Cineform hacks Reds format and releases tools that break the DCMA. That would imply the the users of the hacked cineform tools are complicit and breaking the DCMA laws also. In that vein I find it irresponsible for a US corporation to put themselves and their users at potential legal risk. I would hope they cleared this with their lawyers first.
 
In that vein I find it irresponsible for a US corporation to put themselves and their users at potential legal risk

- WOOOOAAAAHHHHH !!!! -

I did not know this - David - can you respond to this? - this is a pretty serious accusation - I think the customers need to know this.

- I better erase that off my hard drive -
 
Unreal? Ha. The legality of it is what scares me. Let's say Cineform hacks Reds format and releases tools that break the DCMA. That would imply the the users of the hacked cineform tools are complicit and breaking the DCMA laws also. In that vein I find it irresponsible for a US corporation to put themselves and their users at potential legal risk. I would hope they cleared this with their lawyers first.

I sincerely doubt that Red is the kind of company that would sue some guy because he wanted to use an unauthorized command-line tool to get his film into Premiere.

Reality, I think you have very little understanding of how the software world works.

Similar debate happened when Canon and Nikon encrypted parts of their RAW formats. Adobe, etc, complained, some people hacked the format, lots of excitement. NOBODY GOT SUED.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0504/05042701davecoffininterview.asp
http://www.news.com/Nikons-photo-encryption-reported-broken/2100-1030_3-5679848.html
http://www.engadget.com/2005/04/23/nikon-responds-to-raw-file-encryption-controversy/

excerpts from DPreview article:

"A firestorm of controversy recently erupted when Thomas Knoll of Adobe accused Nikon of encrypting the white balance data in the D2X and D2Hs cameras, thus preventing Adobe from fully supporting these cameras."

"10. Manufacturers (Canon for example) claim that only they know how to use the RAW data - along with their knowledge of the sensor's characteristics - to squeeze the best possible quality out of their cameras. Our tests indicate this often isn't the case, with 3-rd party converters often getting better results."

There are countless other examples of reverse-engineering. For example, SAMBA... without that reverse-engineering it'd be a lot harder for Linux and Mac users to work in a networked environment with Windows users.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samba_(software)

Do you really thing that you are going to get into trouble or that you are doing something wrong if you use this?

What CineForm was doing has many, many precedents and although it may not have been wise for them to release their stuff if Red was telling them not to, I'm sure everyone will get along.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com
 
Thanks Bruce - I thought nobody would get sued putting MP3's on Napster either - until little miss 14-year-old molly in arkansas went to jail.

- i think i will wait on anything Cineform does until Red says it's ok - Just because they might not sue me; that doesn't mean it's right -
 
Am I missing something? Or why is everyone making these completely boring comments, when Jay just dropped a bomb in this thread?
 
I sincerely doubt that Red is the kind of company that would sue some guy because he wanted to use an unauthorized command-line tool to get his film into Premiere.

I'd agree but I think less so about Apple or who knows who else has patents involving Red's processing in camera or in post. There are potential violations that if Red hasn't cleared to pass down to third parties could create a heap of mess for everyone involved.

Even if there wasn't a legal leg to stand on, getting into a lawsuit with any one with sufficient backing could an effort in legal futility.
 
Thanks Bruce - I thought nobody would get sued putting MP3's on Napster either - until little miss 14-year-old molly in arkansas went to jail.

- i think i will wait on anything Cineform does until Red says it's ok - Just because they might not sue me; that doesn't mean it's right -

Haha, yes, for the record although I always seem to take the "hackers' side", I also don't like the idea of doing something that upsets the people who worked so hard to make this camera. This is Red, they're super good people and they're on our side! If they ask us to not use something, let's do our best not to use it, even if we think it's a good piece of code.

If Steinway sold me a piano for $1000 with the proviso that I play something by Chopin every month on it, because he helped them out when they were building it, I would damn well do so. If Liszt tried to hook me up with his new piece on the condition I don't play any Chopin for a month, then I'd have to sadly say "no, not on this piano, dude, let me try to find a frikkin' Fazioli before we roll". If Rembrandt gives you a painting in exchange for a six-pack of beers and asks you not to crop it to fit your wall, you don't $%#ing crop it.

It's not like you're fighting Microsoft to get them to stop obfuscating their damn Microsoft Word file format. Red is the opposite of a monopoly. They're the crazy, talented, friendly, humble new company and we REALLY want them to succeed. Their success will drive innovation in digital cinema and will directly benefit filmmakers and audience.

It just makes me laugh to see people get all indignant about reverse-engineering though. I don't think they coded much themselves and I think they probably aren't aware of how much reverse-engineered code they use day-to-day. How do you think we quickly read the .doc format using Text Edit on a Mac? Remember when When we give someone a stack of .TGA files, do we think we are hurting the Truevision corporation (who invented the format specifically for their Targa graphics hardware)?

Two issues that go unnoticed while everyone freaks out about the wrong thing though:

1. CineForm is integrated into the RAW technology used in a competing camera (the Silicon Imaging camera). So if CineForm reverse-engineered Red's format, figured out some optimizations, and then used them to help a Red competitor, that would be shady. But also highly unlikely, since I think they're good people too.

2. CineForm recently became natively supported within SpeedGrade, so if there was an easy, Red-sanctioned way to go from Red -> Cineform RAW, you could finish in SpeedGrade far more easily. Obviously that could get in the way of any exclusivity agreement with Assimilate. If Assimilate offered to help out with RedCine and Red in turn offered to share info only with Assimilate with the implied promise that Assimilate would get a head start over rival finishing programs, then Red would obviously feel bad if other people figured out how to read their format ahead of time, and would possibly ask CineForm to pull their reader.

I don't want to know what all of these agreements are now (that's Red's private business), but in 20 years' time hopefully someone will write an (authorized ;) book about all of this craziness...

Personally although I think Red and Assimilate are wonderful, I hope everything gets opened up soon, because I think that historically it is almost inevitably good... but as a filmmaker I am firmly going under the "don't look a gift horse in the mouth" motto.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com
 
So what do you make of this bruce?

Actually, I have it on good authority that one of those companies IS going to offer a "RED" package that will be serious below normal cost.

When they are allow to support r3d

:)

Just thought I woudl share the good news.

Jay

He is talking about assimilate and apple... and had some phonecalls from offhollywood some days ago.... hmmm
 
until little miss 14-year-old molly in arkansas went to jail.

Are you talking about Brittany Chan, the 14-year-old the RIAA sued? If so, nobody went to "jail" in that, and as far as I can tell the case was dismissed.
 
Why not produce a post- workflow FAQ with all of the info

This is actually a very good idea. If I was a little more comfortable with how I was going to work with, my soon to arrive Red images, I would be more patient waiting for a more efficient workflow.

So, for those of us without much workflow knowledge. Some basic instruction on how to work with FCP, Avid, Adobe PP, Vegas etc might be helpful. Just tell up the best and fastest way to work with what we have now. We know it will all improve.

Call it Workflow for dummies, Tips for the clueless… whatever. Despite having made a living in production and post for the past three decades I feel lost regarding Red workflow. I don’t mind asking for directions. If I can plan workflow, until the SDK is released, I’d feel more comfortable (and bitch less ofter).

Just my 2 cents.

Frank
 
He is talking about assimilate and apple... and had some phonecalls from offhollywood some days ago.... hmmm

I don't know what's up - but I do think Scratch for R3D only that worked on a 8800GT (to whatever degree it could... perhaps 1K for RT playback only) for $1k would sell. I think if he gets up in $5k world he won't sell to the average shooter owner.

IF you look at the polls of who's buying RED it appears to be 80% shooters. These guys just need a way to process their own stuff. They aren't post houses who are doing film outs. Heck, he could cripple output to 1080P.

1000 units at $1k is a million dollars. I know what I'd do... maybe the number is $300 and literally every RED camera owner buys a copy.

But the day R3D is natively supported in a bunch of other apps is the day the window closes. People paying $50k for Scratch should be paying for speed at higher resolutions and access to more file formats IMHO.
 
If Steinway sold me a piano for $1000 with the proviso that I play something by Chopin every month on it, because he helped them out when they were building it, I would damn well do so. If Liszt tried to hook me up with his new piece on the condition I don't play any Chopin for a month, then I'd have to sadly say "no, not on this piano, dude, let me try to find a frikkin' Fazioli before we roll".http://www.boacinema.com

If you can find a Steinway for $1000, I need to spend more time hanging out with you. Maybe you can loan it to me while you deal with the Fazioli.

Lucas
-----
Piano Player
ASSIMILATE, Inc.
LA, CA, USA
 
Ok - this has been an interesting day -

What I have learned -

- Cineform allegedly did something illegal and pissed off RED -
- Jim said SDK will come after NAB so people don't need to do above anymore -
- Cineform is announcing really low pricing structure at NAB ($50?)-
- Adobe is talking to RED for RAW support sometime -
- RED won't sue us, but Apple might sue someone -
- Bruce writes realllllly long paragraphs :) -
- Salatar is back and still pissing people off -
- Reality pisses people off but makes some good points -
- That little girl didn't goto jail -
- People need to relax -
 
Ok - this has been an interesting day -

What I have learned -

- Cineform did something illegal and pissed off RED -
- Jim said SDK will come after NAB so people don't need to do above anymore -
- Cineform is announcing really low pricing structure at NAB ($50?)-
- Adobe is talking to RED for RAW support sometime -
- RED won't sue us, but Apple might sue someone -
- Bruce writes realllllly long paragraphs :) -
- Salatar is back and still pissing people off -
- Reality pisses people off but makes some good points -
- That little girl didn't goto jail -
- People need to relax -

I'm a nice guy in reality. y'all are a bunch of sissies.

WTF is a Salatar?
 
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