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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 :)

Dragon Scarlet upgrade what is your best guess?

BrendanLeahy said:
I know it's hard to place a value on used Scarlet-Xs, but I also have mixed feelings on the cost of the upgrade now.

The easiest way to think of this is in terms of what upgrade paths were offered:

-NEW Epic-X
-Scarlet-D (old body, a lot of new internal parts)


Now, let's say RED valued your Scarlet-X body at full retail value (unlikely) - that would be $7,950.00
Pay for the upgrade to Epic-X, and the total value of that new Epic-X is $17,450.00 - $50 cheaper than what the camera retails for brand new in the store

Here's where it gets tricky...

With that same thought process, your upgraded Scarlet-Dragon camera is now worth $17,450.00
The biggest issue? A brand new, fresh out-of-the-box Scarlet-Dragon with a clean slate inside and out is selling for $14,500.00

It almost feels like you're paying an extra $2,950.00 just to keep your old body.

Again, though - Jarred has pointed out that squeezing Dragon into Scarlet has been a bit of a challenge, so I'm not sure what costs actually look like on their end. Additionally, RED doesn't value your Scarlet-Xs at full retail value, but either way you look at it, it seems that buying a brand new Scarlet-Dragon or upgrading to the Epic-X would be better.

I'd love to hear more thoughts on this, though - I seem to be stuck on this and welcome other points of view to understand the situation better!
Click to expand...

I'm wondering too. I was excited to upgrade my scarlet to dragon but it seems it's not really the best deal. Red is giving full value for our used scarlets when upgrading to epic.
 
Terry VerHaar said:
And as much as I'd love that, I would never expect it. I think the options for Scarlet owners are nothing but great. It is a very difficult decision at this point.
Click to expand...

To Epic or not to Epic: that is the question.
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to accept
The color and DR of outrageous quality,
Or to take arms with M-X and its high FPS,
And maybe never dragonize? To decide: to sleep;
 
+1 on options...i like options! very happy epic owner here... idk about the math behind the decision on whats better for other guys on the fence, that wasn't a factor for me, its too complicated to really bother...you can't compare nominal figures year to year, or month to month really, and running the real inflation adjusted figures is wayy to hard for me to bother.. so i like to think i went with it cuz I'm a over cranking junkie
 
Probably they had to lower the Scarlet-D retail price to have an aggressively priced entry point for the RED Dragon ecosystem...so I understand that...

BUT

I think that they have to either:

A) lower the price of the upgrade to Scarlet-D to $6550 to make everyone happy...
if not there will be literally a FLOOD of used Scarlets giving the impression that everyone is quitting RED
to join the 4K party elsewhere now that every major camera manufacturer has a 4K solution

OR

B) give Scarlets-MX 5K @ 24/25fps
this would make current Scarlet owners happy and then RED would have a full range of cams all @ minimum 5K

C) BOTH A+B for insane COOLNESS ! ! !
 
Tommaso Alvisi said:
B) give Scarlets-MX 5K @ 24/25fps
this would make current Scarlet owners happy and then RED would have a full range of cams all @ minimum 5K!
Click to expand...

Why is this always phrased, by everyone, as if Red is a mother telling a child "No you can't have a cookie right now. Because I said so."

The Scarlet was designed to hit 4K acquisition, at the lowest price point possible to do so reliably. Because Red wanted to find a way to let as many people into the Red ecosystem while still refusing to sacrifice what they deemed as the minimum acceptable shooting specs (this is why the unreleased 3K fixed-lens Scarlet died in order to give us what eventually came to be Scarlet-MX). Shooting 5K is a minimum of a sustained 25% increase in data input, data compression, and data output versus 4K.

25% is not trivial. When the prossessor inside the Scarlet is an ASIC, as in "Application Specific Integrated Circuit", as in "Chip designed specifically for a specific set of algorithms", there isn't really any magic left to work. It's not like wrangling OpenCL into RedCine-X, where CPUs and GPUs are much more general, and smart coding can sometimes work its way around a specific technical bottleneck.

There is no more cookie. You have your cookie. If you want more cookie, then there is a cookie over there, and it's called Epic.
 
Jarred Land said:
Or neither...
Click to expand...


Ha!

Reminds me of when my son is trying to make a deal for both candy and ice-cream instead of dinner. A firm and often sarcastic NO is in order. HA
 
Interesting read through on this thread.

I think one point that is being overlooked right now in regards to the Dragon upgrade is that currently Dragon is the best sensor, color, and resolution on the market. Heck that was from other camera manufacturers mouths at NAB even. You will all have to decide what that is worth to you.

Just remember that when comparing it to other cameras that have different tech all together. Two of which are using the same tech even.
 
Phil Holland said:
Interesting read through on this thread.

I think one point that is being overlooked right now in regards to the Dragon upgrade is that currently Dragon is the best sensor, color, and resolution on the market. Heck that was from other camera manufacturers mouths at NAB even. You will all have to decide what that is worth to you.

Just remember that when comparing it to other cameras that have different tech all together. Two of which are using the same tech even.
Click to expand...

Phil, right now my perfect upgrade path would be: scarlet dragon - then epic dragon.
I would always want to go epic but right now the funding would only be for either dragon or epic.
Since we were told there is no upgrade path after scarlet dragon, I'm having trouble deciding on that path.
 
Patrick Grossien said:
Phil, right now my perfect upgrade path would be: scarlet dragon - then epic dragon.
I would always want to go epic but right now the funding would only be for either dragon or epic.
Since we were told there is no upgrade path after scarlet dragon, I'm having trouble deciding on that path.
Click to expand...

Tricky decision in reality. One that I faced. Actually, one of the side benefits of Dragon taking a "heartbeat" to come to market was allowing me to get my ducks in a row to afford the beast.

Personally my love for larger formats and the aspect of my business plan that require high resolution image acquisition really made the Epic Dragon more ideal. The frame rates are a big deal for me as well. I'm finding I'm shooting a lot of 6K 60 and 72 fps content. 96 fps at 6K WS too.

So really for me your decision based on the cash available is going to be Epic M-X today or Scarlet Dragon tomorrow. One of those paths allows you to go to Epic Dragon down the line if things work out that way for you later.

Hard decisions to make, but in reality at least you have those decisions!


If you want my utterly and personal opinion. I'm real into the Dragon sensor. The color, dynamic range, highlight roll-off, etc... I really loved Mysterium-X and there's been plenty of quality productions shot on it, but I'm a color nut and Dragon's got that little bit extra that makes it more appealing to me.
 
Man there is some weird maths going down here.....upgrade should be this ......trade in prices should be that.... all speculation.

Get over it.... the price IS what the price IS...............take it or leave it is as simple as that.

P.S. I think a big question for upgraders is how much is a used Scarlet worth on the open market right now and just how far that distance is from a new SD ?
 
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Jarred Land said:
Or neither...
Click to expand...

HA! Even though I would love to see my Scarlet-X get 5k 24/25fps I'm not holding my breath, that being said I'm glad you guys found the time and worked out the say to shoehorn dragon into a scarlet! And I'm more then happy to pay the price you've set to upgrade it. Probably won't happen for a while still but I'm planning on Scarlet Dragon as my upgrade path!
 
Thank you Phil! I give a big deal on your personal opinion :) so thank you.
It doesn't make the decision a lot easier. ;) But the scarlet dragon offer is so good it's hard to ignore.
Other thing is that getting Epic MX would leave me pushing for more to get to Dragon. ;)
Off to more pondering. :)
 
Tommaso Alvisi said:
Probably they had to lower the Scarlet-D retail price to have an aggressively priced entry point for the RED Dragon ecosystem...so I understand that...

BUT

I think that they have to either:

A) lower the price of the upgrade to Scarlet-D to $6550 to make everyone happy...
if not there will be literally a FLOOD of used Scarlets giving the impression that everyone is quitting RED
to join the 4K party elsewhere now that every major camera manufacturer has a 4K solution

OR

B) give Scarlets-MX 5K @ 24/25fps
this would make current Scarlet owners happy and then RED would have a full range of cams all @ minimum 5K

C) BOTH A+B for insane COOLNESS ! ! !
Click to expand...

Or D) Add 4.5k for some real 4k and better FOV, be on par with the Red One. Making things easier for scarlet users facing many people in the industry who think that the scarlet is a crippled red camera.
 
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