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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 :)

Epic Timeline

James McLellan

James McLellan

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I just happened to look at the Red history page. I remember the first musings of a great mythical camera back in 2005. Was this Jim Jannard really serious? It sure seems like a long time ago but that was only five years ago. Five years!

As we all wait patiently for Epic to arrive I have to reflect that given Epic's likely arrival in 2011 from start to delivery that will be six years and two wildly industry changing cameras. Some people lament that it seems like it's taking forever but just six years ago I recall thinking that I would likely never posses a 35mm camera, digital or not. The P+S 2/3" adapter was $20,000. Now 35mm cameras are everywhere. It's crazy.

Kudos go to (I'm betraying my loyalties here & I'm sure I'm missing some critical developments. Others feel free to fill in the blanks.):

Canon and the XL1 for starting the movement.
Panasonic and the DVX100 For kicking it up a notch.
Panasonic for stepping up with solid state.
Red & Jim for the no compromise attitude.

It's been a crazy six years. Epic even.
 
It's been a hell of a ride.

You forgot the PD150, though.

Looking back at the things I've done with the different cams you mention, PD150 is still my first love.
 
VX1000 definitely started it all. 3CCD digital, amazing!

Still on my shelf museum, along with the XL-1.
 
Johnny & Jason -- both the VX1000 & the TRV900 were huge for me, an old film guy. Now, at last the promise they launched comes to ultimate fruition with Red/Epic.

When was the VX1000 (I've still got mine in the personal museum) -- 1996?-- less than 15 years ago. Truly amazing times.

Yet for all the tools, alas, it seems like the level of cinematic discovery is not generally up to the technological grace and ease of acquiring moving imagery.
 
rod bradley said:
Johnny & Jason -- both the VX1000 & the TRV900 were huge for me, an old film guy. Now, at last the promise they launched comes to ultimate fruition with Red/Epic.

When was the VX1000 (I've still got mine in the personal museum) -- 1996?-- less than 15 years ago. Truly amazing times.

Yet for all the tools, alas, it seems like the level of cinematic discovery is not generally up to the technological grace and ease of acquiring moving imagery.
Click to expand...

ha, i went through multiple vx1000's, great camera. what was it before that, the vx3000, hi8.
 
jimhare said:
VX1000 definitely started it all. 3CCD digital, amazing!

Still on my shelf museum, along with the XL-1.
Click to expand...

I still use my Canon XL1 :blush:
 
Johnny Friday said:
VX1000: Game Changer in digital acquisition for the little guy.
Click to expand...

rod bradley said:
Johnny & Jason -- both the VX1000 & the TRV900 were huge for me, an old film guy. ...
When was the VX1000 (I've still got mine in the personal museum) -- 1996?-- less than 15 years ago. Truly amazing times.
Click to expand...

I was building housings for Panasonic in the summer of '95 (months before the VX1000) and happened to see the EZ1/PVDV1000 3 chip miniDV on the gadget guru on NBC - called my product manager and said "you've got to get me that camera" I'm doing an underwater shoot for ABC20/20 and it will be a first!" He said I have to do demos all next week and there's only one of them, but he overnighted it to me on that Friday, I built a housing over the weekend and shipped it back on Monday. Got it back on that Friday and shot a long segment with lots of underwater with Hugh Downs and Dr. Sylvia Earle in and around NOAA's Odyssey underwater habitat. Shot both Betacam and MiniDV and we were all blown away by the quality of the DV - you could easily see that it was sharper and the colors (even though it was only 4,2,0) were excellent without the smeary of the Hi8, SVHS and 3/4".

Pretty sure that was the first US (maybe worldwide) broadcast of MiniDV footage. In a lot of ways I liked the picture of that camera better than the VX1000 but they made a fatal mistake and didn't put a firewire port on it. They sold quite a few but the VX1000, with the firewire, was a runaway winner. I could tell that digital direct to the computer for editing was the wave of the future and put my Media 100 up for sale.

We thought it was a major breakthrough when we could buy an 18gig raid for $2500 (can't even remember what the AVID 9 gig drives cost). Now my iphone has 32gigs.
 
One noteworthy milestone for me personally was Sony's HVR-Z1. I even shot some stuff that ended up to 35mm printout with it... including some SFX elements for a feature film.

But mostly, it was an excellent camera for SD television output - better than 2/3" digibetas etc. for greenscreen work... after de-interlacing and properly processing the chroma, the image was / is pretty close to 4:4:4 (naturally only when downscaled to SD).

And then there's HV20 - the little consumer HDV cam that produces surprisingly nice images in right hands - i still use it for "real" work occasionally.
 
jimhare said:
VX1000 definitely started it all. 3CCD digital, amazing!

Still on my shelf museum, along with the XL-1.
Click to expand...


I am still using 3 x VX2000 and DSR 500 Sony for live event. HD is not as good when the light are very low. That was my last Sony contribution.

Now I run JVC and i want Epic/Scarlett
 
Carl Weston said:
The Sony VX1000 really did start the movement.
Click to expand...

You can see their popularity is still high by doing a quick search on Ebay. They are still going for $700.00+ which I think is amazing considering that they came out in what, 1996?!:ohmy:
 
Martin Weiss said:
PD100 came before the PD100 - it was the first miniDVcam camcorder to be accepted by the BBC for ENG work.

Ours still works today :)
Click to expand...

Is that:

"PD100 came before PD150/VX1000" -:) ?

I never got friendly with the 100, even though I really know trhat it was the turningpoint.

PD150 is the most robust cam I have ever thrown half a carcass on... -:)
Or run/stumbled/crashed into concrete or anything else brutal.

I know the HVX was a step foreward as to resolution and features, but in hindsight I actually care more for my older PD150 productions. Less pretentious and much more ballanced system all in all -:)

Fortunatelly I could sidestep HDV alltogether due to this colored company we are all talking about... -:)

And here's some nostalgia... :
http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=004pq2
 
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