How is it possible that RED build cameras into so small housings?

[Peter Stadelmann]

Yesterday, i was on a set with an Arri Alexa. I was shocked...that thing is so big, heavy and ugly:nono:

How can it be, that RED build the better camera ((Epic)my opinion) in a much smaller housing???

I mean, what must be in, must be in...

 

[noah newtown]

mmm... 66% of the Arri Alexa is only for the fan and if you want i/o´s on the epic you need the i/o module they are both great cameras!!

 

[Erich Roland]

Small is one line item Red must have had near ts top of the lists of goals (and Red delivered in spades). Epic is amazingly small and incredibly capable camera product that can grow with needs.

I'm guessing that Arri wasn't too interested in a small size. Many AC's prefer a larger size camera to hang all the stuff they need to hang off a camera. Also the size of many lenses, and accessories are based off a larger (and older) film camera system. Mounting the Epic off the back of a 12x Optimo is absolutely do-able, but the Arri seems to fit the scale of "industry standard" configurations a bit better in general.

It will be interesting to see how the industry catch's up as size scales down, with new smaller products.

 

[Peter Stadelmann]

mmm... 66% of the Arri Alexa is only for the fan and if you want i/o´s on the epic you need the i/o module they are both great cameras!!

The i/o module makes the Epic bigger, but there is still the much better form factor and weight.

 

[noah newtown]

i/o module + the Prores donwconverter module....hehe just joking=)

 

[Peter Stadelmann]

It will be interesting to see how the industry catch's up as size scales down, with new smaller products.

Absolutely! It is interesting, that a "small company" like RED, the large companys shows like it goes..again and again...

 

[noah newtown]

the "success" of the alexa and sony is only design and formfactor imagine a RED model in that formfactorstyle with 2k 300fps, 4k-5k 120fps, RAW, and HDRx...for the half price

 

[Leo Baker]

The Red cameras have the beautiful design and form factor. It's down to the components and the Arri are going for the more traditional weight and size of a movie camera. It will be interesting to see the competitions next models.

 

[Vance Colvig]

I think the folks at Red look at the circuit boards through a reversed telescope, then use tweezers to place them in the Epic body. How else could it be?

 

[Josh Snyder]

the "success" of the alexa and sony is only design and formfactor imagine a RED model in that formfactorstyle with 2k 300fps, 4k-5k 120fps, RAW, and HDRx...for the half price

EPIC-X with same features as basic Alexa model costs 46,000$ (pricing starting january 1st). I lived in the impression that EPIC-X would cost 1/3 the price of Alexa until I counted all the pieces you need for turning it on, to be able to record, to be able to see what you record (EVF) etc.

 

[Gunleik Groven]

EPIC-X with same features that basic Alexa model has costs 46,000$ (pricing starting january 1st). I lived in the impression that EPIC-X would cost 1/3 the price of Alexa until I counted all the pieces you need for turning it on, to be able to record, to be able to see what you record (EVF) etc.

That depends a bit. Alexa prores is not really a comparison to the Epic files...
Add RAW to alexa and then start comparing price.

I do agree though, that the price comparisons are a bit skewed. The ALexa comes ready to go out of the box. Mount a battery and insert a card and you are ready to shoot handheld, sticks or shoulder.
That is not the case with the Epic.

It is fun to have to first remove the fan-protection to get mounting places and so forth.

But when it comes to the files recorded, there is really no comparison between the ALexa prores and Epic.
Epic is by far the superior camera.

Looking foreward to running te F65 through its paces later... But I think the Epic and the F65 are the real 2nd gen Digital Cinema cameras. RED1 and D21 is the 1st. ALexa and R1 MX is kinda 1,5 generation cameras.

But If you compare price and features, you have to equalize them as much as possible.

The Alexa prores (or uncompressed SR) files have so many downsides, that I find the comparison seriously flawed. THEN add price.

So. Tis is drifting OT. SRY.

Just my 2.5 half qualified cents...

 

[John Allardice]

The Alexa is a great camera, probably the best straight-to-HD camera out there, and the single step to post workflow is the main reason it's made so much headway in hourlongs this year, ( much prefer watching it to Genesis, which has some terrible motion artifacting) but its basically a speedbump in the road, a shelf life of a couple of years at the most. The studios are waking up to the fact that in 8-10 years time they're gonna be able to sell us their whole back catalogue all over again in UHD, for which they'll need masters a hell of a lot better than 1080.
Epic -and the monstro upgrade, will bring them much closer to that goal...shoot as hi res as possible, post in HD proxys for current broadcast, store the selects, and in a decades time just re-conform with your 5, 6, or 7k files.
Ironically, most tv shot before the early 80's will be ok ( cut on film) but there's a 25 year clump of Beta SP & Digi Beta mastered stuff that really narrows your viewing options. Everyone thought they'd be safe moving to HD for a while, but then Moores law (& Jim) rear their heads and now we've got another 5 years of stuff that's gonna take some serious work to be UHD presentable.
And of course there's no way the theaters will let TV out-res them, so look for the chains to be moving up to UHD

Sony have already caught onto this, and I think the next few years Pilot seasons will be split between the F65 & Epic/monstro...Arri better have the Alexa's kid brother on the testbench already.

Of course if Jim & Co get some studios to sign onto the whole RedRay idea, we can move this whole timeline up by a good few years

 

[Gunleik Groven]

Red Ray is the next major key after Red RAW.

It's been ready for years, methinks - they just wanna launch it with a proper infrastructure. Either with cinemas or home distribution or festivals or all the three of them. That encryption has been included gives a nice little hunch as to what to come.

As to the Alexa... It is a operators wet dream by far.
It operates the way you want in most traditional DP/AC setups straight out of the box.
I just cannot get to be very happy with the files she gives me...
And how it overexposes
Or underexposes
Or handles ISO

But it it is a nice intermediate cam, for sure.

 

[Joe D'Arcy]

Yesterday, i was on a set with an Arri Alexa. I was shocked...that thing is so big, heavy and ugly:nono:

How can it be, that RED build the better camera ((Epic)my opinion) in a much smaller housing???

I mean, what must be in, must be in...

Graeme, Jarred, Deanan, Stuart, Rob and the rest of the team are aliens and they have brought their technology with them. Jim starred in 'Dances with Aliens' and the rest is history.

Reason for Edit: To include more aliens. (apologies).

 

[Deanan]

Graeme, Deanan, Stuart and the rest of the team are aliens and they have brought their technology with them. Jim starred in 'Dances with Aliens' and the rest is history.

Technically we are aliens. Including Jarred and Rob also.

 

[Patrick Tresch]

Easy for normal aliens that have Unobtanium to work with.
They had to perform this master piece without it!

Chapeau!

Pat

 

[Mark Toia]

mmm... 66% of the Arri Alexa is only for the fan and if you want i/o´s on the epic you need the i/o module they are both great cameras!!

I knew! Its a HD video head with a PRO RES module shoved down the back... What a rip off. hahahahahha... makes me laugh.

 

[Lauri Kettunen]

What comes to Peter's original question of size and weight, one important issue is the ASIC. Designing a processor to a specific need easily replaces a lot of other components. But the fixed costs of developing and manufacturing ASICs and especially of complicated ACISs like those in Epic cameras is very high. Therefore long production series is a must to retain the cost per unit on a reasonable level.

I'm not aware of all the details related to Arri Alexa, but if got it right from this forum, there's a pretty small number of the cameras around the world. If my memory serves well, Jim or Jarred said at some point the number was in hundreds. If so, investing in an ASIC for such an amount of cameras does not sound like the most wise business decisions, and that explained quite a lot of the size and weight already.