Is RED every going to try at making a cell phone again?

[Mike Krumlauf]

I'd honestly love at the very least if they partnered with Apple and put camera tech into the iPhone.. an iOS powered RED phone with REDCODE would be badass, just sayin... i know it wont happen.

 

[Bob Gundu]

Highly doubt it.

 

[Remington Chase]

Ahh no. It was one of the worst received roll outs of any tech ever and except for one Shill universally panned. Red lost a lot of credibility on that one.

 

[Dan Kanes]

I hope for Red’s sake they don’t.

Here’s what I would recommend if they wanted to do a consumer product though:

Large sensor thin “board camera” or camera+lens array “board camera” which clips to the back of any cell phone via a changeable rubber/plastic case accessory.

The board camera should shoot raw video and stills and connect to the phone by Thunderbolt 4 connectivity with a little loop cable.

This would be sort of the proto-proto version of this :

https://amzn.to/3gV2iit

 

[Aaron Lochert]

Anyone who actually owned one knows how fucking incredible it was.

Can't say I agree. And I have two. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[Dan Kanes]

Yeah. Sorry. Love Jim. Love Red.

Absolutely do not love Hydrogen.

If it did one thing : shoot R3D raw video and stills it would have been unique and different enough to be useful to me.

As it is, that screen technology just ain’t it chief.

180 degrees from my iPhone 12 Pro Max I’m holding in my hand now.

I use this camera and phone daily for all manner of things and I just love it.

I’m not deluded that this didn’t take BILLIONS in development and more than 12 generations (by the way - like yearly generational turnover) to get to this product - but damn it this is a VERY satisfying customer experience.

 

[Phil Holland]

Funny thing.

I'd absolutely take the latest iPhone, Samsung, or Google smartphone and put it into the Al or Ti body of Hydrogen. Material-wise, still the best phone to hit the market in that regard.

I enjoyed the grip, ruggedness, and feel. Didn't mind the heft personally. At the time, Hydrogen had a massive battery too, which now has become a trend on the premium smartphones.

Swap it out with the current state of the art 2D screen tech and say a triple camera setup, the release and general concept would have been different.

Hard to really know the whole story behind the Hydrogen response. It certainly hit the hands of reviewers a little early, like the updates within 2 months later made it a better user experience. Beyond that though it was just a decent Android phone that lacked the latest most powerful processor. That critique was valid, but it makes sense. H4V was also interesting as there's still people using that and passionate about 3D/H4V imaging. That technology exists still do this day in other devices now. Though I will say when it comes to a mass market consumer device, likely too big of an idea.

We'll have to see what the insane influx of 1-1+ inch sensors yields, we already have a couple of those now. Interestingly there's a host of new MFT sensors coming and I do wonder if we'll see something of that size coming to a mobile device sans external accessory.

USB camera modules are an interesting direction. Thermals, power, processing, and data rates are still a factor there. Objectively we might see more smartphones as a camera "head" and control interface. Komodo really inspires that concept as is.

The moxie and big mindset of launching a phone in a face of multi-generational refinements from giant companies really is something I admire a great deal. Looking at Hydrogen's pros versus cons showed more that could have been build on. We'll just have to wonder what that could have been.

 

[Karim D. Ghantous]

I think Jim had to step back because of health issues. He certainly wanted to make a successor. Android is terrible but that is not Jim's fault.

The biggest mistake was not the processor but the sensors. The 20Mpx units are terrible. Even today, Apple has stuck with 12Mpx. That has nothing to do with memory or throughput.

Stereophotography is cool, but loses its utility the further away the subject is and the longer the focal length. Even so, viewing stereo imagery is just fantastic.

 

[Michael Tiemann]

Anyone who actually owned one knows how fucking incredible it was.

Youtube reviewers and online nobodies panned it just like red is panned at first.

Red the company caved to these small minded losers and publicly shamed Jims idea.

Jim had to step back.

Real shame. Fucking incredible product and vision.

I bought three, not because I wanted three phones, but because I bought into the idea of an enhanced monitor for my three RED cameras using some sort of pogo attachment. It was fucking incredible (in the literal sense of not being believable) that one of the most touted features was completely unrealized. Showing up ready to fight is moxie. Folding at the first punch...I won't say the word, but it's not favorable.

 

[Robert Hofmeyr]

I bought three, not because I wanted three phones, but because I bought into the idea of an enhanced monitor for my three RED cameras using some sort of pogo attachment. It was fucking incredible (in the literal sense of not being believable) that one of the most touted features was completely unrealized. Showing up ready to fight is moxie. Folding at the first punch...I won't say the word, but it's not favorable.

I totally agree with this. Loved the idea of a backup monitor I would always have on me. The worst part of the whole thing was how they strung everyone along and never really admitted that things had been cancelled. Even when it was obvious to some that development had stopped, there were still die-hards on the forum hanging in for updates, modules, etc. And then the modules somehow became the Komodo, with a phone cradle, that then became a rather expensive USB-C port . Plus the promise of a separate queue for Hydrogen owners (to many more valuable than the discount) just disappeared without comment from Red.

I remember early Hydrogen adopters going on about how incredible the phones speakers were, but I found them to be absolutely useless. Similarly, the wifi video feed from Komodo to smartphone was meant to be near perfect, but for me at least, it is unusable. So a lesson was learned and some trust was lost, but I must say that the $1000 discount on Komodo was a decent move - not sure if that came from Red or Red Hydrogen, but it certainly helped restore my faith in the brand.

 

[Vincent Stekelenburg]

I sure hope not. Hydrogen was the definition of red koolaid. Lots of hype, epicly underwhelming. Along with failing to deliver the hyped 2/3 camera reds worst failure.

 

[Les Hillis]

I doubt RED or Jim are interested in making another phone.

I myself had and have minimal to no interest in smart-phones in general, so was a little disappointed from the outset when the new mystery project from Jim turned out to be a phone. From there it was a series of 'okay, whatever' moments from me as I found out what the Hydrogen could and couldn't do and would and wouldn't be. I'm still using mine every day though, so I don't feel it was as much as a failure or rip-off as most people do.

I still think it's cool that Jim managed to make a phone for himself. I don't think he was just making excuses either when he said the project became unworkable due to the tenuous nature of the partnerships you have to form to get a smartphone made at all.

With hindsight, they might have been better off making a small-form-factor modular camera/monitor with smart-phone functionality, rather than trying to make a smart-phone with added-on camera/monitor functionality.

It might even be possible to still do that with DSMC3.

 

[Michael Hastings]

I was more disappointed in the RED response after its introduction than the phone itself. It's an ok phone with a good grip and battery life, an ok closeup 3D camera and and ok novelty 3D screen - disappointing but not as horrible as it was made out to be. But the abandonment of software upgrades and software to play/edit the footage was very disappointing. Then the "It's not us" attitude of RED Digital was the most disappointing. I'm not going to try to sort through all of the RED corporate and LLC machinations - but it sure seemed to me that when I placed first day order it was with the same RED Digital that I bought half dozen cameras from and I have multiple emails regarding my hydrogen order closing with "Sincerely, Red Digital Cinema" and from Hydrogen@red.com - so something funky happened there.

Then when Red sold something like 1000 stormtrooper Komodos without offering first dibs to the Hydrogen people (the $1000 "discount" could have applied to the higher stormtrooper price) when Komodo was sort of supposed to be the evolution of the Hydrogen camera module - that was the last straw for me.

I ordered my REDONE SN206 the second morning of NAB 2006 (would have been probably in first 50 at 10AM on first day but had a meeting to get to and Ted had to go give his spiel). And I have been a purchaser of Epic-M, Epic-X, Dragon Upgrade, Scarlet-W, Epic-w pretty much as soon as they could be ordered.

I have to agree with Michael that it was pretty disappointing to see the company with the tough guy attitude "fold at the first punch" and this whole experience has made me question Red's direction and future viability. Red already has some great cameras and is a top dog as far as pure image quality, but there are numerous big and small dogs nipping at their heels with IQ that's probably "close enough" and superior tech in terms of AI, autofocus, stills capability and price points. I sold my Epic-W in anticipation of Komodo but have given up on Komodo just due to unavailability for so long. Bought an R5 last August and have seen how powerful some of the other tech is.

Honestly, DSMC3 is going to have to be pretty amazing in all respects to prompt another leap into the RED waters but still rooting for them and looking forward to see what they come up with.

 

[Dan Kanes]

Anyone have a SIM card tray for my Red Hydrogen One ?

Can’t find mine…

 

[Karim D. Ghantous]

Dan, the price of the phone has come down a lot recently. It might be worth buying an entire phone and keeping one of them as a back-up.

 

[Brian F Kobylarz]

I also wish that RED had sent the entire Hydrogen user base an email stating that the 1K discount on Komodo had opened, then closed.

Or did I miss it entirely? It was on REDUser - but I was out of commission for quite a long time.

I was recovering from open heart surgery ( 5 bypasses ) and did not know it happened before it was over.

As far as Hydrogen itself - still using it to this day.

My only complaints are:
1. It is now totally out of date (Android OS)
(Yes, I do realize JJ got hosed by that vendor)

and

2. I had hoped H4V could be monetized with large displays at trade shows.

Imagine a 3D H4V look inside a submarine control room, a M1 Tank or a Littoral Combat Ship.

Needed at least a 42" screen for that to be effective.