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Contemplating selling my red.

Ben Goldenberg

Ben Goldenberg

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I have a red (2339) eligible for epic upgrade. Wondering what someone would
be willing to pay for it? Haven't really been keeping my ear to the ground on the
whole re-sale thing.

I have a bunch of element technica accessories, two batteries, 5 inch monitor,
nikon mount, red drive, 2 8gb cards, element technica breakout box and
a 17 inch panasonic monitor that I would consider bundling -
also a redrock mattbox and follow focus.

Thanks guys,

P.S. Im in Toronto.
 
Hi Ben,
Please enlighten us as to your thought processes. Why are you thinking of selling your RED? What would you replace it with?
Thanks, I am really curious.
 
Hi George,
That's a good question - one I have been pondering since early in my ownership of the Red (I ordered my camera the DAY I first saw footage from a home user of his daughter trampolining in slow-motion). Many of my issues with being a red owner were brought on by my ignorance, so I have nobody else to blame. But some of my issues are towards Red as a company and others towards the camera itself. I'll share my feelings here, because you asked, but also because making my previous post (contemplating selling) was one of the most uncertain things I have ever
done (the opposite of when I first ordered the camera: I WAS 100% CERTAIN)

I had never really used a CINEMA camera before, besides some tests at film school - all my experience was with HDV, minidv and 16mm. I'm primarily a screenwriter but have spent the past 12 years shooting my own stuff, so I am also vicariously a producer, cinematographer
and Director (and dolly grip, wardrobe etc.. lol) To me the Red was nothing more than a perfect paintbrush (albeit a really damn expensive one). It was as if I was trying to paint the Sistine Chapel with a sledgehammer and then all of a sudden a paintbrush was handed to me
crafted with hairs plucked delicately from the nether-regions of the Swedish bikini team, the shaft formed from the ivory of the Last Unicorn and then dipped in liquidized unobtanium and hardened over the fiery flames of Mordor by Peter Jackson himself (his short film being, in fact, a selling point.) Suffice to say, over night, my paintings went from being obscene finger paintings to - well let's put it this way - the first film I ever shot with my red won second place in the world in YouTube's project direct and I went with it to Sundance... And for that unforgettable, blue-ball of an experience, I have to kindly thank Red. (no but really it was amazing and the camera did put us on top of the competition)

Anyways, the writer in me is getting a little excited so I'll get back to the question at hand. Why would I sell my red and better yet, What would I replace it with?

I am a starving artist and I have no job. I find out that this amazing technicolor dream camera is coming out and for the low price of 17,500 I can own this camera for myself and make the art I have always dreamed of. No processing, no developing - no waiting - no renting - just
Art and for the price of a honda. I order the camera. I wait - I think it was a year and a half - and my camera is coming in June. I decide to go to NAB in April and see if there's any accessories I can learn about to get with the camera. Nab costs me 3000 in travel. On the morning I arrive
Red releases the stats on their new camera's the Epic and the Red... apparently obsolescence was not so obsolete after-all. The scarlet starting at 3,000 and the epic at 28 or something. So I practically have a heart attack - I mean I've just signed the paper-work on the small
mortgage I've taken with the bank (the biggest debt I have ever had in my life) and for 3000 a newer smaller camera with several seemingly better features is about to come out. Red had promised to release some great new things that day. Here I am expecting some great new accessories like a bigger cf card, a new work-flow that didn't involve 10 trillion hours of rendering, a 4k monitor - yet no, red wasn't working on making the red better they were working on making it obsolete. I felt cheated before my camera even arrived. So I stormed over to the Red tent and spoke to several people trying to assure myself I wasn't being stupid - here's a snippit of the convo I had with one rep:

Ben: I'm a little confused - why am I going to wire you like 35,000 I don't have when the scarlet's gonna be almost as good or better for like 1 20th the price?
Red Rep: Scarlet is 3k red is 4k
Ben: I'm a low budget indie guy I think 3k is good enough for me considering Starwars was 1080p
Red Rep: Well Scarlet is 2/3 sensor red is super35
Ben: Battlestar Gallactica was shot on a 2/3 size sensor - certainly if its good enough for Starbuck...
Red Rep: Well - it's only gonna shoot for short amounts of time on cf cards and it probably wont come out for a long time.
Ben: FML!
 
Anyway I went with my gut and ordered the camera nevertheless.
Camera arrives - and here are the following surprises that someone, not so well versed in CINE camera's discovered.

1) The basic production package that cost me nearly 2000 had only one handle!!!!!! yes - it's in the picture but whose really paying attention, surely every damn person spending this kind of chedder needs two handles!
2) The redrock shouldermount and follow-focus I ordered for almost 1200 dollars don't work with the red - the follow focus needs 15mm rods (rods who knew) and the shoulder mount buckles under the weight of the camera. Several hundred more in adapters to utilize the follow focus.
3) There is no AC adapter. Sort of like buying a car without a key. You pay for the car and then they say oh and don't forget we need another $200 bucks to turn it on.
4) There was no manual, sorry let me rephrase - the manual was green. “To save the environment” they put it online.... Yet my 17,500 honda came with a leatherbound manual.
5) When I placed the RED on my manfrotto 503 tripod head it seemed to work... for about a week until I stripped all the gears - yes - the camera looked really small on the website, but alas - it is damn heavy - so all
of my support gear was rendered useless - my 503 was trashed, my jib arm was useless as well as my steadicam and my car mount etc... so I spend another 1600 and upgrade to the 526 (manfrotto claims it can handle
the red) my 526 is essentially the cheapest tripod that can hold the red, which it barely does, sort of iike a mini cooper pulling a trailer full of hummers (H1's). Nevertheless $1600 I never wanted or intended on spending.
6) Focus - my sony pd150 which lasted for ten years without a hitch (and came with a monitor, battery and AC ADAPTER) had led me to believe that everything I filmed that wasn't 16mm was easy to shoot. Basically – on the red sensor anything I shot required a camera assistant or ten times more FOCUS. Made my kind of guerilla shooting much more difficult. This isn’t red’s fault – it’s just an aspect of shooting on a big sensor which has made the camera great for some shoots and terrible for others.
7) My camera arrived and recorded the worst audio I had ever heard. I was told at this point – after asking, not ordering – that the audio boards were crap and were going to be replaced. In the order that we ordered the camera – in other words I had to wait for 2339 people to get served before me. And in Other words I just paid 17,000 for a Honda and it arrived with a broken sound system and instead of fixing it for me I had to wait for 2400 other people – then I need to send my camera back across the boarder to be repaired!!! I assure you, I never would have taken the camera if I knew about this problem.
8) CF Reader was essentially required – I had intended on recording to a red drive only – apparently this was necessary – another 500 bucks.
8) Rendering has been a nightmare – my red arrived and the 4000 dollar PowerPC mac I had purchased a year and a half earlier wouldn’t work with red software – cause red requires the intel processor to work – BAM – I spend another 5000 on a desktop and 2400 on a laptop. The early redcine is disgustingly unfinished – course it is, they were busy making other camera’s – but it does something unbelievable – Right on set I can do a one-light color correction with the footage PLAYING!!! Clients are blown away and so am I. But still a day of shooting takes a day to several days to render – eating away at my energy bill and time. Then to make things better some dude releases crimson workflow – a pathetically complicated, ugly and buggy way to offline edit and then render my footage afterwards – costs 300 bucks more – screws up two jobs. So, then red did something that blew my mind – they release the redrocket and redcine – x. The redrocket was a 5000 card promising to render lightning fast and redcine – x a complete upgrade. Well here’s the lowdown – redcine – x no longer grades with the footage playing! Further more, when I tried to re-install the old red-cine which I loved so dearly despite its bugs – the computer didn’t let me – Something, or someone, was keeping me from going back. So basically to get the same performance I would have to shell out another 5000 on a card. I was about to, until and editor friend of mine told me she had one at her office and the results were not impressive (although to be fair I’ve heard from others that it is great – again – it’s like being sold a Honda and then being told afterwards – hey you know how your car takes 200 hours to get you where your old car got you in real-time – pay us 1/3rd of the cost of your vehicle and we’ll give you a little boost that will make it run the way it is supposed to.
9) Proprietary Cords: Worst part of the red. Cords are made by red – cords are crappy and break all the time, as are the battery mounts – you cannot go to the store and buy new cords you must order them from RED and more often than not they are back-ordered. Does this sound conducive to the rigorous world of being on a set? I was forced to replace several cords, bars and handles – just to make the camera run – this cost me another, let’s say $4000 – including a “break-out-box” from element technica – which is basically a 700 plus duty and shipping accessory that allows you to plug in a monitor. So essentially, my Honda came with European plugs and then I had to purchase an adapted (after literally breaking 9 35 dollar monitor adapter cords that had to be purchased through red)
10) The iso was crap on the camera – virtually useless without lights – my sony pd150 could shoot in darker rooms.

Finally, Red offers an upgrade program – cause they are fulfilling their promise to keep obsolesce obsolete. I can basically pay 10,500 dollars more (plus duty and shipping and tax etc…) to get the epic. I think, great – I have to spend another 11,000 that I don’t have. I have to cause half of my rentals are being lost to mx-sensors and freaking Mark 2’s. So I figure screw it, I’m already hooked, I’ll do the upgrade. Then, my red drive starts acting wonky. I go online to see if there is any info on the problem I’m having – low and behold the reddrive has been discontinued. Conveniently replaced by ssd’s that require a new port on the camera and a reader for the computer – I priced the readers and two cards to cost about 6 grand…

So. If I upgrade to Epic I spend the following: 11,000 plus duty and shipping for the upgrade. 5-7 grand for the ssd’s and then, I should hazard a guess – another 4-10 grand for basic accessories and adapters just to make the camera work: Cheeseplates, cords, monitors, handles, rods, rod adapters etc.. so that would be in
A best case scenario another 20,000 and a worst case – 28,000 +

Let’s not forget my original loan for 35,000 ended up being about 60 with all the new tripod’s and computers and breakout boxes. (plus interest) So with another 20-28 (we’ll say 24) I’ve now spent 84,000. Let’s go back three years:

I’m unemployed. I’m a starving artists. A magical paintbrush is dangled in front of me – for the low price of 84,000 I can have it… This is my point. What started as a Honda has become a Porsche. In fact I saw an Astin Martin, slightly used last week for 50 g’s. So check this out.

Ben + Epic = 84,000 debt and basically the best camera in the world so all of my art is pretty.

Ben sells Red and buys Astin Martin = Ben is knee deep in tail until the car dies – In debt yes, but the tail makes it worthwhile.

Ben sells red buys Astin Martin for 50 and a sony super35mm camera for 5 grand. The camera works on his tripod – has a viewfinder AND a monitor built on – no proprietary parts. Accessories available locally – takes all his Nikon lenses with a cheap adapter. NO RENDERING. NO BS. Ben rents his package for 300-500 a day (same as he got for the red). Ben does not have the best camera in the world – but a damn awesome one – yet still gets the tail cause he purchased the Astin(This is metaphorical tail – just incase my wonderful girlfriend reads this lol).

Summary.
If you are very rich and money doesn’t matter but 2 epics and shoot a movie in 3d. If you are like most indie guys – The Epic is by far the best – but let me ask you something, considering that 99.98 percent of what we shoot ends up online or on dvd and not in the theatre? Do we really need 4k? and furthermore – if for the price of the stupid RED ROCKET I can purchase an entire camera package from sony that has a bigger sensor than Battlestar Gallactica had and the same resolution as Jar Jar Binks than why wouldn’t I sell my camera?

Red had me with the upgrade – they lost me with the SSD’s – The SSD’s reminded me that there is always a catch ordering something that I can’t play with or purchase locally… My indieslider claimed it could hold a ton – it flexes under my red $700 down the toilet. I think I’ll sell my red – get out of debt – purchase a sony for fun and then 5 years from now when the scarlet comes out – I’ll buy the cheapest one. Or, if the recent trends (sony, Panasonic 4/3’s, canon mark 2 etc) keep getting better, I’ll just stick with them… Oh and finally, let’s not forget that red must be doing something with all the Red One’s that are being upgraded – Can anyone say BATTLE TESTED – they’re gonna sell red ones for 5-9 grand on the website – Maybe if it’s not too outdated by then I’ll buy one.

Well, I hope that answered your question, it took me nearly 2 hours to write lol.
Cheers.
Let me know what you think?
 
LOL

It's allways problematic buying kit in a new division... And I can actually fully see how this would happen and turn some off, if this is not what you're expecting.
That said: I think you'll stand a good chance at recovering your investment, if you throw in the Epic upgrade to the bundle, as the Epic is truelly one sickening cool piece of kit (that still will need a lot of new accessories around it to be fully functional...)


Cheers!
 
Ben... I laughed and laughed and laughed... all the way through that.. Your a great writer, Seriously ... Man that was funny! I'm not joking, that was seriously funny.

All I can say, Is your lucky you didn't purchase an Arri 435 or Alexa or f35 or anything else that shoots RAW. Because they all have the same trappings. RED is still the cheapest form of RAW digital cinema out there... 4k, 2k.. what ever you want to shoot it at.. Buy a professional Sony camera and see how much it costs you and all you may get is a digibetacam, a Sony HD or XDCAM. The REDONE is still cheaper and RAW!
And it will probably be the cheapest 4k RAW camera for a very long time. The (cheap) price you pay to be at the forefront of technology is some times the things you went through. Honda have been building cars for 80 years, not 3 years.. I doubt if they started making cars now there would be shits loads of problems with them.

Your ignorance (and lack of education in the digital film world) as you said has screwed you over, not RED. But don't feel bad, as a couple of crazy things RED have done over the last couple of years has more than a few of us scratching our heads... But over all RED have done more good things than bad for the industry, so we all forgive them. Like suppling a 4k camera that is half the price as it's closest competitor. Even with all the extras you talk of.

Lots of things you speak of could have be avoided quite easily, works flows have been simple from day dot... I've never had any issues ever with post (unless it went through a post house in those early days),
It was always easier doing it yourself.
People just made it harder than it had to be.. in my first month of shooting a RED camera over 2.5 years ago, I shot in 5 countries in 12 days , edited everything in my laptop on the plane and airport lounges and spat out a Cinema ready master on arrival... all by using Proxies, Yes.. Proxies!. All in my laptop in HD.
http://www.zoomfilmtv.com.au/tvcs/griffith_global_a.html

There was know way I was going to get the quality I needed without using the RED. If I shot film in this case, I would have lost a week in Processing, one lights, blown the budget in Rentals, film and processing etc etc.. RED ONE was the only option. And it was fast, cheap and looked great! Everything you say it didnt do for you, it did for me easily. One camera, One lens, a drive and a few ND's.. very very simple.

After that I was transcoding days of shooting to LOG PRO RES on my laptop in my hotel room over night while I was asleep and woke in the morning to a feast of 2k files ready for real time editing and grading. Even now I shoot around the world with no RED ROCKET and never have any post issues at all.

Unfortunately you were never shown the easy way of doing things, and never looked deep enough into what you actually needed and what you didn't need... That's were it all went wrong for you.

You are destined to shoot your little Sony or a Canon 5d, drive your Aston Martin (which will break down and cost you tens of thousands to fix) but the tail... :) makes it all worth while.

Keep up the writing. Bloody fantastic read! I'm going to read it again.. I never laughed so much on a forum before.

Good Luck Ben. :) Sell the camera and move on. It was to much for you from the very start.

Take care
 
I loved it... all of it... but then just had to say:

"Didn't you research?"

-A simple google search of RED post workflow introduces you to the world of spending money!
 
Great writing all round.
As somebody who has graded hundreds of film rolls shot by Mr Toia, I can say that if the Red hadn't been right he wouldn't have stuck with it.

woz
Unemployed Telecine operator.........Happy Digital Colorist.
@warreneagles
 
Ben,

sorry to hear your disappointments, most of them which could have been avoided if you were well informed before making the purchase in my opinion,
but its nice to see that some one can find the spirit to do such creative and well executed writing about it he he.

Wish you best of luck on the sale, if you need help, we are Red gear brokers and will be more then glad to insure you get a good price for your gear and the stage 3 upgrade.
 
As one who can rationalize myself into or out of just about anything.... The only advice I can give is this.... Do what makes you happy.

The camera is only a camera.... but the emotional intelligence it takes to write a good story is much harder to acquire. Their are plenty of us shooters out here looking for a good story and standing by our kit twiddling our thumbs waiting for some good, solid, thought through content to work with. Your lucky you have that gift.... use it!

If using a camera ( lighting, composing, lensing, color grading ) does not turn you on... does not feel right..... does not make you wish it's something you want to be doing all the time..... then move on and get back to writing.

Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.
-- Wilde
 
Ben Goldenberg said:
4) There was no manual, sorry let me rephrase - the manual was green. “To save the environment” they put it online.... Yet my 17,500 honda came with a leatherbound manual.
Click to expand...

For $17,500 I'll have the RED manual bound in leather and delivered to you overnight.

This is why everyone should always to a cost/benefit analysis before buying kit. Every manufacturer posts their specs online so knowing how much the camera body + lenses & accessories weigh should tell you whether any given set of sticks and tripod head can handle what you are throwing at it.

Since you are looking at buying a 35mm camera and are completely set on being able to get everything locally (or in non-proprietary forms) I can only assume that you have a full film lab in your basement in which case you can do far better than renting your camera kit out for $500 a day…
 
Tobias Roediger said:
Since you are looking at buying a 35mm camera and are completely set on being able to get everything locally (or in non-proprietary forms) I can only assume that you have a full film lab in your basement in which case you can do far better than renting your camera kit out for $500 a day…
Click to expand...

I think he was meaning the Sony FS-100 (the new $5K camera with the same Super35mm sensor used on the F3 - although it's an 8-bit AVCHD signal path rather than the F3's upgradable S-log option) :001_smile:
 
Hey Ben, can I have the contact info for your banker? Mine limited me to only one $5,000 Stage 2 deposit for my two R-1s. Sure, it turns out he was probably right, all things considered. But I'm not looking for a banker who's right... I want one who is easy.
 
I totally felt that pain Ben. I can't tell you how many indi film makers I've talked to over the last 15 years that are willing to go down the same slippery path. I think I successfully saved 50 percent of them from what you experienced. That said, I think your calling is definitely in writing! Follow your passion and team up with a good cinematographer.
 
Ben, I loved your story. I've got an Epic X coming, so I feel your pain. The good news is, its looking like the Epic S will have 95% of the features of the Epic X but at less than half the price. The Scarlet 8x is awesome and I plan to get one or two, but I feel like there's room for an even more basic model. It'd be nice to generate r3d footage from an even smaller platform than the Scarlet 8x.
 
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