KOMODO....

[David Rasberry]

For being an action cam it does lack slo-mo. Maybe it’s just what it is - a Komodo.

GoPro Hero 9 only does 60fps @4k, 120fps @ 2.7K

 

[Nick Morrison]

Found a category for the Komodo (based on the reason for this camera being born): Action Cinema camera. If GoPro is action camera, then Komodo would be Action Cinema Camera.
https://ymcinema.com/2020/06/08/reds-baby-dragon-komodo-an-action-cinema-camera/

I doubt Netflix will list Komodo as an action cam. It has matching specs to numerous approved REDS. It's a perfectly viable A cam on projects (docs, indies). And also a viable B or C-Cam on larger projects where it's small profile is helpful.

Komodo is a RED camera, it just happens to ALSO be small.

 

[Denis Murin]

Can I order Komodo? I can't find it on red.com. I would love to use it for our virtual production studio!

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Can I order Komodo? I can't find it on red.com. I would love to use it for our virtual production studio!

Soon. The ones out there are pre-release cameras. There will be a first wave of “storm trooper” white cameras before the official mass-production black models. There has been some talk of other colors later on.

The crazy color pre-release cameras are very hard to get. You can email Jarred to get on “the list” with the other million people who think they want one. Then when he is prepping the next batch of like 8 cameras, you can try to respond to his bulk email faster than all those other million people on the list.

I know this is a long thread, but the search function is your friend.

 

[Gregory Karydis]

Well said Jeff!
Also, keep in mind that feedback to the RED Team would be appreciated by everyone, as it helps iron out potential bugs and you may have to send in that Pre-Release camera for upgrades. Additionally, features are implemented continuously as we near the regular production (black) Komodos. So features like AF will show up (and improve) gradually as lenses are mapped and the PDAF gets fine tuned.
Keep these in mind when signing up!


EDIT: A suggestion for the RED Development Team. Even though I don't have a Crazy Coloured one in my hands just yet...
I know I mentioned it somewhere before, but I cannot remember where exactly, so here I go again.
Seeing as Komodo is intended for a rather specific use case, how about an option to rotate the entire top display contents by 90 degree increments? That way, no matter how and where you position it, you always get to see what's what.
Obviously, for some cases RED Control may be better suited, but I like my options hard-wired.

 

[Bastien Tribalat]

Well said Jeff!
Also, keep in mind that feedback to the RED Team would be appreciated by everyone, as it helps iron out potential bugs and you may have to send in that Pre-Release camera for upgrades. Additionally, features are implemented continuously as we near the regular production (black) Komodos. So features like AF will show up (and improve) gradually as lenses are mapped and the PDAF gets fine tuned.
Keep these in mind when signing up!


EDIT: A suggestion for the RED Development Team. Even though I don't have a Crazy Coloured one in my hands just yet...
I know I mentioned it somewhere before, but I cannot remember where exactly, so here I go again.
Seeing as Komodo is intended for a rather specific use case, how about an option to rotate the entire top display contents by 90 degree increments? That way, no matter how and where you position it, you always get to see what's what.
Obviously, for some cases RED Control may be better suited, but I like my options hard-wired.

I obvisouly am not working for Red BUT i do believe that the screen isn't perfectly square so 90 degree increments might not be doable (but 180 degree rotation maybe ?)

 

[Gregory Karydis]

I obvisouly am not working for Red BUT i do believe that the screen isn't perfectly square so 90 degree increments might not be doable (but 180 degree rotation maybe ?)

The dimensional drawings show the display window being orthogonal but not square, but from what we've seen so far, it appears to be 1:1.
If not, then let's stick to your 180 degree suggestion.

 

[Alex Lubensky]

In fairness, you don't always shoot action stuff in slomo. I mean there's a lot of fast paced action sequences in movies that can benefit from the compact package of the Komodo and its global shutter sensor. And not just movies : I can easily imagine a commercial for an MMA or Boxing club/champion (because there's a bunch of that when you type "X camera name footage" on Vimeo or YouTube ) where you can go really close on the ring with the athletes to film the fight.

Action, not fiction movie action. For any sports footage slo-mo is beneficially crucial. It ends up in real-time 90% of the time, but always shot at various off-speed rates, for those little “more punch in the moment” things. I can’t imagine skateboarding, snowboarding, mountain biking, surfing - all shot in real time. Sure most of the projects will use up to 60fps or less, but those best ones always go 150fps.

As of GoPro speed - it doesn’t loose in FOV in HD or 2,7K, which is crucial for a fish-eye camera.

Sure you can do lots of things. To me the size of a Komodo, and the power consumption made it just OK for a one man band backpacking in the mountains camera. At last you can just do it without a hassle. You can go walking backcountry and actually ENJOYING it, instead of sweating it)

It’s a crash cam, an a-cam, b-cam, one man band cam. Just not an action cam imho.

 

[Andreas Eymannsberger]

Don't mix up action cams and D/crash-cams or narrative/fiction films. They are there because they are small, not because they shoot HFR most of the time. This is what Jarred seemingly discussed with Netflix, that there was a 'misuse' of GoPros of these productions because of the form factor.
Sports are another thing and probably a very specialized (I wouldn't call it niche though) and I agree on HFR capabilities but ones need of hfr and another ones need of image quality in a tiny form factor are not something that necessarily go well together of are even within one camera.

 

[Christopher A. Bell]

This is probably a RED 101 question, but...

When shooting/recording a lower resolution than the sensor natively is, is the sensor being windowed to that resolution or is it just an option to window it? For example, with my F55, when I shoot 4K/UHD, the full sensor is being used to create the image, obviously. And when I shoot HD/2K, that image is being created from the whole sensor, as well(there is an option to window/crop), but just recorded as HD/2K(maintaining original/full FoV for the lenses/sensor being used). So with the Komodo(RED in general), if I'm shooting HD to hand off an HD file out of the camera(which would be more than likely with most of my clients) would the image created be HD that is derived from the full size of the 6K sensor or would it be from only a windowed portion of the sensor?

 

[Bob Gundu]

This is probably a RED 101 question, but...

When shooting/recording a lower resolution than the sensor natively is, is the sensor being windowed to that resolution or is it just an option to window it? For example, with my F55, when I shoot 4K/UHD, the full sensor is being used to create the image, obviously. And when I shoot HD/2K, that image is being created from the whole sensor, as well(there is an option to window/crop), but just recorded as HD/2K(maintaining original/full FoV for the lenses/sensor being used). So with the Komodo(RED in general), if I'm shooting HD to hand off an HD file out of the camera(which would be more than likely with most of my clients) would the image created be HD that is derived from the full size of the 6K sensor or would it be from only a windowed portion of the sensor?

If shooting R3D Raw, the sensor will be cropped to recorded resolution. ProRes on the other hand is scaled. Its just how RAW works.

 

[Gregory Karydis]

If shooting R3D Raw, the sensor will be cropped to recorded resolution. ProRes on the other hand is scaled. Its just how RAW works.

Correct.
Most camera systems that allow lower res from the full sensor width, and it’s actual RAW, then they are binning every other pixel. And they do so at the expense of artefacts, like aliasing, moiré, etc.
If someone tells you that their camera can record at a scaled lower resolution by sampling the entire width of the sensor without binning, then it’s not raw. It is for all intents a processed (even slightly) image from the raw sensor readout.
That’s how we can have 4K and 2K ProRes from the entire sensor on the Komodo.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

I’ve seen a lot of people asking the same question here and elsewhere about 2K and cropping. Yes, shooting lower resolutions than native are a cropped window of the sensor. If the image were to be recorded of the full sensor, then processed and scaled to the lower resolution, it would no longer be RAW.

For those not familiar with the RED ecosystem, the reasons you would want to shoot windowed to a lower resolution is usually based on frame rate. Sometimes it’s to save space or to simplify accommodating a different lens that would not provide full lens coverage. If you’re looking to shoot 2K/HD so you can deliver footage in that resolution, then you’re going about it wrong. That’s not what those modes are for in a specific sense and you will always get the best image by scaling down a larger frame, taking advantage of the oversampling of pixels.

Higher frame rates require windowing down on the sensor due to how much I/O bandwidth is available for the the sensor package as well as the camera’s ability to process and record that information. On these cameras, the highest frame rate is not always determined by processing ability, but how fast the sensor itself can be cycled. We don’t know the technical specifics of Komodo just yet. Perhaps 120Hz is as fast as the sensor can cycle. Or perhaps it could cycle faster, but I personally would not want to window down any further to get more. That 2K frame is only 9mm wide on the sensor.

 

[Blair Thornton]

Revolva RF/PL for Komodo is now available to order. Combining behind the lens ND and RF/PL adapter into one neat solution.

https://www.kippertie.com/kt/product/revolva-rf-pl/

 

[Christopher A. Bell]

If shooting R3D Raw, the sensor will be cropped to recorded resolution. ProRes on the other hand is scaled. Its just how RAW works.

Correct.
Most camera systems that allow lower res from the full sensor width, and it’s actual RAW, then they are binning every other pixel. And they do so at the expense of artefacts, like aliasing, moiré, etc.
If someone tells you that their camera can record at a scaled lower resolution by sampling the entire width of the sensor without binning, then it’s not raw. It is for all intents a processed (even slightly) image from the raw sensor readout.
That’s how we can have 4K and 2K ProRes from the entire sensor on the Komodo.

I’ve seen a lot of people asking the same question here and elsewhere about 2K and cropping. Yes, shooting lower resolutions than native are a cropped window of the sensor. If the image were to be recorded of the full sensor, then processed and scaled to the lower resolution, it would no longer be RAW.

For those not familiar with the RED ecosystem, the reasons you would want to shoot windowed to a lower resolution is usually based on frame rate. Sometimes it’s to save space or to simplify accommodating a different lens that would not provide full lens coverage. If you’re looking to shoot 2K/HD so you can deliver footage in that resolution, then you’re going about it wrong. That’s not what those modes are for in a specific sense and you will always get the best image by scaling down a larger frame, taking advantage of the oversampling of pixels.

Higher frame rates require windowing down on the sensor due to how much I/O bandwidth is available for the the sensor package as well as the camera’s ability to process and record that information. On these cameras, the highest frame rate is not always determined by processing ability, but how fast the sensor itself can be cycled. We don’t know the technical specifics of Komodo just yet. Perhaps 120Hz is as fast as the sensor can cycle. Or perhaps it could cycle faster, but I personally would not want to window down any further to get more. That 2K frame is only 9mm wide on the sensor.

Got it. That's the way I thought I understood it to work, but just wanted to make sure since I've never owned a RED camera and am seriously contemplating the Komodo. I have a lot of network/broadcast clients that usually want something like an XAVC or ProRes file that is ready to edit/air with minimal fuss. But I also do some work with some guys that will also edit a lot of the pieces we shoot for them and they just got a Gemini a few months ago, so they know how to handle the RAW files.

 

[Greg M]

At this point, with all these third party raw formats, couldn’t red do a full sensor readout line skipped or otherwise? Since a TON of cameras do this? I understand the mission was to never downsample but MANY things have changed over the years, and it IS. A new era. Especially with Komodo.

why?

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

why?

+1. Can't think of any reason I would want this.

 

[Karim D. Ghantous]

At this point, with all these third party raw formats, couldn’t red do a full sensor readout line skipped or otherwise? Since a TON of cameras do this? I understand the mission was to never downsample but MANY things have changed over the years, and it IS. A new era. Especially with Komodo.

Are you suggesting that Red should have a downsampled RAW format? If so, that's a no from me, dawg. Nobody should have a downsampled RAW format. And I don't agree with line skipping either.

 

[Ryan Genova]

At this point, with all these third party raw formats, couldn’t red do a full sensor readout line skipped or otherwise? Since a TON of cameras do this? I understand the mission was to never downsample but MANY things have changed over the years, and it IS. A new era. Especially with Komodo.

Line skipping is what several other brands have been criticized for quite a bit. A ton of cameras do in fact do this, but it’s never been seen as something that’s desirable.

 

[M Harvey]

why?

Well, one reason would be to maintain a specific angle of view at a higher frame rate or lower resolution. (Though the latter issue is solved by ProRes in DSMC2, I guess.)

If that's not a trade-off you'd want to make, that's cool. But there are times when it'd be nice to be able to switch to a high frame rate without switching lenses or significantly reframing.