KOMODO....

[Michael Hastings]

Because the discount is for production models, not beta ones I think.

Which doesn't really make sense.

 

[Kemalettin Sert]

Because the discount is for production models, not beta ones I think.

When people bought those phones they were also in beta phase.

 

[Christopher A. Bell]

Why we couldnt buy Komodo ST and apply that $1000 off from the phone purchase?

I believe it was stated, months ago, that RED was actually losing money on each colored and storm trooper Komodo sold, despite their higher price vs. the upcoming production versions.

 

[Andrew Kommers]

I think with them having so many manufacturing moves and delays due to Covid I think they did amazingly well keeping the costs from transferring to the production models all things considered.
Limited runs will always cost more per unit especially when they had to pull in their own in house staff to build them and they even included the Ef to RF adapter, which is kinda hard to find now so really the ST is $900 over retail. Not sure if the ST model was done this way but for a while there Jarred was power coating these things in his garage lol #angrywife

Thanks, Christopher for the heads up on Abel, I was able to snag the last of the six ST models they had reserved and got the DZO 20-55 to go along with it.

 

[Greg M]

Why we couldnt buy Komodo ST and apply that $1000 off from the phone purchase?

because the ST's cost more than $7000 to produce...they are selling them at a loss. Frankly, this has been beat to death...we are getting a $1000 discount for a $1100 purchase, lets not get greedy.

 

[rand thompson]

The Decommissioning | A Red Komodo Test Film



By Reach Films

Red Komodo

 

[Glen Powell]

Why we couldnt buy Komodo ST and apply that $1000 off from the phone purchase?

Because Red didn’t have to give you a discount at all... but they are, so they can also set the terms of the discount.

Why can’t you just be patient and grateful that you’re getting a discount at all?

 

[Christoffer Glans]

Why can’t you just be patient and grateful that you’re getting a discount at all?

I rather wait for the real production model and get the discount off that. Not only because it's the best deal you can get with Komodo, but also the level of Beta data and fixes to the camera that it's gotten from the ST run. I wonder sometimes why people are so impatient to get this camera now now now? What projects are in dire need of it at this time? Both in regards to the pandemic, but also, what cameras can't be rented for projects that needs to be done now? It feels like the "dogs-wives-charts"-filmmakers really need this camera asap, or they have a project that really needs the Komodo, but in that case, there should be budget enough to cover the additional cost of the ST program.

Or it's just people who want their new toy, without any intelligent spending of investment into buying equipment. If you needed the camera right now, the ST program was open for you, if you don't need it now, but instead are just impatient to get a new toy, that, in my opinion, is not a very professional attitude towards investing in tech.

Just wait for the production models. The most important thing is that, as Glen says, we get a discount at all. There was no reason to give us that because Hydrogen had basically nothing to do with the camera side of the business and certainly nothing to do with Komodo. I was pissed about how things went with Hydrogen, as the hype machine marketing was such hyperbole. But getting the discount was such a good apology to all of those who invested in Hydrogen that I cannot grasp how spoiled some people behave around this discount deal. You seriously get a camera with a discount around the cost of the phone. So you have a phone basically for free, which you can use as a monitor for your camera so you don't need to use your iPhone or whatever.

Red should sell chill pills for all the impatient tech toy junkies, should be a great source of revenue.

 

[Hugues Dagallier]

I rather wait for the real production model and get the discount off that. Not only because it's the best deal you can get with Komodo, but also the level of Beta data and fixes to the camera that it's gotten from the ST run. I wonder sometimes why people are so impatient to get this camera now now now? What projects are in dire need of it at this time? Both in regards to the pandemic, but also, what cameras can't be rented for projects that needs to be done now? It feels like the "dogs-wives-charts"-filmmakers really need this camera asap, or they have a project that really needs the Komodo, but in that case, there should be budget enough to cover the additional cost of the ST program.

Or it's just people who want their new toy, without any intelligent spending of investment into buying equipment. If you needed the camera right now, the ST program was open for you, if you don't need it now, but instead are just impatient to get a new toy, that, in my opinion, is not a very professional attitude towards investing in tech.

Just wait for the production models. The most important thing is that, as Glen says, we get a discount at all. There was no reason to give us that because Hydrogen had basically nothing to do with the camera side of the business and certainly nothing to do with Komodo. I was pissed about how things went with Hydrogen, as the hype machine marketing was such hyperbole. But getting the discount was such a good apology to all of those who invested in Hydrogen that I cannot grasp how spoiled some people behave around this discount deal. You seriously get a camera with a discount around the cost of the phone. So you have a phone basically for free, which you can use as a monitor for your camera so you don't need to use your iPhone or whatever.

Red should sell chill pills for all the impatient tech toy junkies, should be a great source of revenue.

Exactly. It's not as if there aren't very good cameras available at every price point.

 

[Bastien Tribalat]

I rather wait for the real production model and get the discount off that. Not only because it's the best deal you can get with Komodo, but also the level of Beta data and fixes to the camera that it's gotten from the ST run. I wonder sometimes why people are so impatient to get this camera now now now? What projects are in dire need of it at this time? Both in regards to the pandemic, but also, what cameras can't be rented for projects that needs to be done now? It feels like the "dogs-wives-charts"-filmmakers really need this camera asap, or they have a project that really needs the Komodo, but in that case, there should be budget enough to cover the additional cost of the ST program.

Or it's just people who want their new toy, without any intelligent spending of investment into buying equipment. If you needed the camera right now, the ST program was open for you, if you don't need it now, but instead are just impatient to get a new toy, that, in my opinion, is not a very professional attitude towards investing in tech.

Just wait for the production models. The most important thing is that, as Glen says, we get a discount at all. There was no reason to give us that because Hydrogen had basically nothing to do with the camera side of the business and certainly nothing to do with Komodo. I was pissed about how things went with Hydrogen, as the hype machine marketing was such hyperbole. But getting the discount was such a good apology to all of those who invested in Hydrogen that I cannot grasp how spoiled some people behave around this discount deal. You seriously get a camera with a discount around the cost of the phone. So you have a phone basically for free, which you can use as a monitor for your camera so you don't need to use your iPhone or whatever.

Red should sell chill pills for all the impatient tech toy junkies, should be a great source of revenue.

Agreed.

 

[William Long]

Ha ha... "dogs-wives-charts"-filmmakers !!

You're on fire Christoffer ! )

 

[Andrew Kommers]

I'm a proud (tech toy junkie) ...... Probably also the reason i'm not married lol.
Love the rant Christoffer, I agree.
I went for the ST model because that White is what I wanted for a personal camera. Beyond that I totally agree that the smart investment is always to wait for the price to fall in your favor.

 

[Jordan Anthony Dudek]

I do completely agree that those who purchased a Hydrogen should be grateful that they are getting a discount on the Komodo. Apart from that, I can see where some eagerness can arise surrounding this camera. For better or for worse, the RED team has been one of the most transparent companies when designing and manufacturing something so ground breaking as this camera. So I get why people are tired of hearing about it and just wanting to get it in their hands. I was in a unique situation in that a lot of cool spec (free) work has popped up recently. In that, renting wasn't really so much an option as there wasn't really a budget either. However, we obviously wanted to produce a high quality image, and we figured that RED would give us what we needed. With all of the uncertainty with covid, there's no guarantee for when the Komodo's would reach their black production status. I knew we were eventually going to buy a Komodo anyway, so we had to jump on the ST program. It's also unique that this will be my first RED purchase, so I am wondering how many people that purchased a Hydrogen also currently have a RED in their arsenal, which should make the waiting a bit more manageable.

 

[Michael Hastings]

Because Red didn’t have to give you a discount at all... but they are, so they can also set the terms of the discount.

Why can’t you just be patient and grateful that you’re getting a discount at all?

because the ST's cost more than $7000 to produce...they are selling them at a loss.

First of all, how do you know that?

I suspect you don't. There are a lot of accounting ways to assign "cost". Certainly if you assign all of the development costs of sensor, ASICs, etc. and the overhead during a pandemic shutdown to the first few cameras it's easy to make that case - but normally you assign those to the minimum expected sales.

But since we are both probably throwing out impressions that we can't substantiate, I would suspect that the direct costs (i.e reasonable amortization on developed parts plus other OTS parts, plus direct labor) are no more than $2000. I understand about overhead, but during difficult times (like a pandemic) normal accounting says if you are covering the variable costs (those things I just mentioned) it's worthwhile.

Frankly, this has been beat to death...we are getting a $1000 discount for a $1100 purchase, lets not get greedy.

We are getting a discount to help defray the bad taste we got from the Hydrogen - only if we wait a couple years and buy another product after seemingly 1000+ (someone else's speculation) other people can get one first. And I strongly suspect that B&h and the others selling STs are getting a least a $1000 discount, so why couldn't the Hydrogen people get that instead by selling direct to them?

I think some of you are a bit too dismissive of the Hydrogen situation. It was promoted by RED and Reduser, then became labeled as the "worst tech product of the year", then we were told cool stuff was coming that would make it all worthwhile, and then was basically abandoned - and we were told it was a different company - even though it says RED all over it - and it seems that RED has done a variety of shuffling of corporate and LLC identities - so it's hard to know what to think.

I'm a longtime RED owner (R1 SN206, Epic-x, Dragon, scarlet-w, Epic-W, and Hydrogen) and I'm not calling RED out specifically on anything.

I'm calling out a lot of REDusers that seem to think RED is doing us a huge favor - even though we have to spend another $5000 to get the "discount" - and we should be happy with whatever we get. (Maybe it would be better to give a $1000 store credit toward whatever we want? Typically these types of products have about a 4x markup so it would mean a direct or marginal cost of about $250)

------

FYI IIRC when Sony sold the very high priced F65 and then very quickly superseded it with the much less expensive F55 - they offered the F65 buyers (when some of them got together) a choice of either (I don’t remember the numbers exactly) something like $30,000 refund or Sony would put $50,000 toward a production using the camera. So that sort of thing isn’t unheard of in our industry.

I've made some mistakes in my 40 year manufacturing history too (thankfully fairly few) that I couldn't necessarily fix the way I would have wanted, but I wasn't selling $100s of millions either (between 1 to 2 million was a pretty good year)

Ultimately, you try to do the best you can, but it might be worthwhile to rethink the Hydrogen strategy.

 

[Christopher A. Bell]

First of all, how do you know that?

I suspect you don't. There are a lot of accounting ways to assign "cost". Certainly if you assign all of the development costs of sensor, ASICs, etc. and the overhead during a pandemic shutdown to the first few cameras it's easy to make that case - but normally you assign those to the minimum expected sales.

Isn't Jarred on the record, either on here or one of the Zoom/YouTube streams, as saying they were losing money on each custom color and storm trooper version sold?

 

[Michael Hastings]

Isn't Jarred on the record, either on here or one of the Zoom/YouTube streams, as saying they were losing money on each custom color and storm trooper version sold?

I'm definitely not accusing anyone of lying - but maybe of exaggerating the idea that they are losing money by probably adding in a lot of costs that aren't normally associated with that particular product unit - i.e. I suspect they are losing money overall - as are an awful lot of companies right now - not to mention they probably aren't selling a lot of the other cameras right now during the pandemic production slowdown - so assigning the overall loss to those cameras they actually are selling could be reasonable, but I also suspect they are doing a bit of "puffery" (RED has been known for a little bit of hyping over the years - even Mr. Glans talks of some hype just a few posts ago "I was pissed about how things went with Hydrogen, as the hype machine marketing was such hyperbole." ), and I don't think it's unreasonable for people to be a bit confused or annoyed over the whole "Hydrogen was a separate company" thing because that isn't the impression we were given when we ordered it day one.

"Puffing generally is defined as “exaggerated, vague, or loosely optimistic statements about a company that are deemed so immaterial and unworthy of reliance that they cannot serve as the basis for liability. The difference between a statement of fact and mere puffery rests in the specificity or generality of the claim." Phoenix Payment Solutions, Inc. v. Towner, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 91978 (D. Ariz. Oct. 2, 2009)"

So the claim of loss fits the generality concept, and I don't have any problem with it if RED/Jarred may be "puffing" a bit - it's a part of almost every company in America's (including mine) marketing.

But it seems like a lot of REDusers have little awareness of how the "cost" of manufacturing relates to the selling price, but it is pretty well known (hint 3-4 times those direct costs for this type of product - and that's not me making it up - it is the formula that was given to me many years ago by a SCORE representative - (SCORE is a "resource partner of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA)") The formula can be different for products that sell in the millions of units, but it generally holds true for items sold in the hundreds or thousands of units. There's nothing wrong with it - it has been proven over a long time that you need those kinds of gross margins to be profitable at the end of the year.


--

ps I really wasn't trying to make it about the cost - my basic point was why not offer the ST "loss leader" units to the Hydrogen people with the $1000 or maybe even a little less discount rather than give that discount to B&H et al.

And to give some question to how great a "discount" is after three years and the fact you have to spend $5000 on something you may or may not want to get it. And suggesting that there might be another possibly better strategy - in part since there seems to be a lot of confusion of how and when one might get the Hydrogen "discount".

Rant over - go HEAT. :smiley:

 

[rand thompson]

Squeezie ft. Gambi - Servis (Clip Officiel)


By
SQUEEZIE

Leitz cine summilux-c/Kowa anamorphic/ Red Gemini/Red Komodo

 

[David Rasberry]

I'm definitely not accusing anyone of lying - but maybe of exaggerating the idea that they are losing money by probably adding in a lot of costs that aren't normally associated with that particular product unit - i.e. I suspect they are losing money overall - as are an awful lot of companies right now - not to mention they probably aren't selling a lot of the other cameras right now during the pandemic production slowdown - so assigning the overall loss to those cameras they actually are selling could be reasonable, but I also suspect they are doing a bit of "puffery" (RED has been known for a little bit of hyping over the years - even Mr. Glans talks of some hype just a few posts ago "I was pissed about how things went with Hydrogen, as the hype machine marketing was such hyperbole." ), and I don't think it's unreasonable for people to be a bit confused or annoyed over the whole "Hydrogen was a separate company" thing because that isn't the impression we were given when we ordered it day one.

"Puffing generally is defined as “exaggerated, vague, or loosely optimistic statements about a company that are deemed so immaterial and unworthy of reliance that they cannot serve as the basis for liability. The difference between a statement of fact and mere puffery rests in the specificity or generality of the claim." Phoenix Payment Solutions, Inc. v. Towner, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 91978 (D. Ariz. Oct. 2, 2009)"

So the claim of loss fits the generality concept, and I don't have any problem with it if RED/Jarred may be "puffing" a bit - it's a part of almost every company in America's (including mine) marketing.

But it seems like a lot of REDusers have little awareness of how the "cost" of manufacturing relates to the selling price, but it is pretty well known (hint 3-4 times those direct costs for this type of product - and that's not me making it up - it is the formula that was given to me many years ago by a SCORE representative - (SCORE is a "resource partner of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA)") The formula can be different for products that sell in the millions of units, but it generally holds true for items sold in the hundreds or thousands of units. There's nothing wrong with it - it has been proven over a long time that you need those kinds of gross margins to be profitable at the end of the year.


--

ps I really wasn't trying to make it about the cost - my basic point was why not offer the ST "loss leader" units to the Hydrogen people with the $1000 or maybe even a little less discount rather than give that discount to B&H et al.

And to give some question to how great a "discount" is after three years and the fact you have to spend $5000 on something you may or may not want to get it. And suggesting that there might be another possibly better strategy - in part since there seems to be a lot of confusion of how and when one might get the Hydrogen "discount".

Rant over - go HEAT. :smiley:

I think Jarred mentioned the losses associated with the Beta and early ST cameras were the result of paying engineers to hand assemble and QC them. Compared to normal assembly line costs, labor for each unit was much higher. Rush production of short runs of components from suppliers not shut down during the pandemic could have had some impact too.

 

[Uros Zuraj]

Who in Europe (specially around Austria, Slovenia, Croatia) has one for rent?

 

[Andreas Eymannsberger]

Who in Europe (specially around Austria, Slovenia, Croatia) has one for rent?

Don't know of a single one in Austria yet. That's just me, there's lots of things I don't know, but Austria is kinda small so you usually hear about things often (e.g. first set of Atlas Orions, etc.)...