Nikon to Acquire US Cinema Camera Manufacturer RED.com, LLC

[Phil Holland]

Nikon owns Red 100%. It's not Red being helped by Nikon, it's Nikon being helped by Red. This isn't a partnership or merger, it's a full on acquisition, that's the reason for the worried voices.

Correct, but it seems that people don't understand what wholly-owned subsidiary means. And we have zero idea about any terms that are hinted at.

It's um... in Nikon's best interests to keep RED growing as well. From a market point of view, RED had 4 of their biggest years likely majorly fueled by Komodos mainly and certainly Raptor playing a big role.

I'm sticking by the obvious. Nikon gains a lot of tech. RED gains a lot of resources. Nikon is who owns all of that not. RED as a subsidiary just got access to so much it's freaky.

I'll just put one crazy thought out there. RED hasn't implemented H.265 in cameras mainly due to licensing costs (ironical), but Nikon being big has put that in their cameras. So for those that want that, I think that's now possible financially speaking.

 

[TYLER STOOKSBURY]

What information are you seeing outside of carefully put together copy in press releases? Many of us have been with Red since it was just a rudimentary 3D render of some building block and a sensor strapped to a computer by some newcomers no one believed in. The reason for the reactions is basically because it's been a beloved company for a long time. And the reason for all the doom and gloom is basically due to how every other acquisition of the same kind within the world of business and capitalism usually leads down those same roads. How many times have we seen press releases by companies who acquire some other company about how nothing is gonna change and everything will get better, only for the core and soul of the acquired company to be stripped away in a death of a thousand needles. Why would this be different?



Nikon owns Red 100%. It's not Red being helped by Nikon, it's Nikon being helped by Red. This isn't a partnership or merger, it's a full on acquisition, that's the reason for the worried voices.

You’re making a lot of assumptions. That is not always how these things go. That happens sometimes. But if you stop and think about the Tech in the current lineup of RED cameras. Nobody else is even in the ballpark with Global Shutter. Even with Sony’s new GS camera, there are some serious issues. The core technology that nikon now has could lead some incredible cinema cameras. It could be completely rebranded or maybe it won't. But the nikon money being thrown at REDs sensor tech isn't going to make anything worse.

We need to wait before we start crying too hard over it.

 

[Joe Minuni]

MAN....the end of an era. Many saw this coming however as it very transparent that RED didn't have the foothold that they used to in the heyday where camera tech was moving at such a blistering speed. What would you say the golden age was 2006-2014 or so? I felt it too, as what camera I was using seemed to diminish in importance aside from how it was going be rigged because images all converged on being beautiful no matter what we were using.
If this acquisition goes the way of many I'm sure we'll see the red moniker killed off with time but Nikon is going to have some great offerings because of it.

Hits me in the feels lol.

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

Nikon has the infrastructure to make new school cinema lenses with internal motors and decent margins. RED provides a tech forward platform that could leverage a number of AI driven features at a higher level. The obvious low hanging fruit is an auto focus system purpose designed for motion that taps into the processing power in the RED camera brain.

From a business perspective, Nikon needed to to do something or risk slow death. Acquiring RED gives them a beachhead in a potentially high margin sector of the biz. They will likely make other moves in the near future. IMO, standing pat is not an option for them.

Cheers - #19

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

I think the compressed raw patent and a few others in RED's portfolio were very attractive to Nikon. Jim's lawyers are legendary, full respect. That said, Nikon's resources might provide legal muscle to defend patents at a different scale. The value of any patent is a matrix of the actual technical details and the ability to defend it, I can see Nikon leveraging that.

Cheers - #19

 

[Han Vogen]

I think it’s clear why Red would’ve been purchased by Nikon. First internal raw… clearly they’ll be in control of that patent giving them a distinct advantage over all of the other camera manufacturers. Secondly, for the global shutter technology, that has Red has pioneered.

Sadly, I don’t believe that technology will play well in a mirrorless, body because of power requirements. I feel Sony might have the edge in this regard. Additionally, given the read out speed and the fact that Sony has already stated that they’ll be a firmware update coming to the A9III to enable a mode whereby multiple exposures are combined in camera in an instantaneous manner to create higher dynamic range images… it’s just a matter of time before this feature makes its way to the video side. The A9iii has battery life similar to the other alpha models… which is to say quite good. Nikon made this move, because they needed these technologies to stay competitive. It’s well known that both Canon and Sony now have Global shutter sensors, with Sony, taking the lead with the introduction of their A9III.

It’s hard to say this early on what this means for Red shooters. But I for one would not be surprised to see the Red brand morph into a Nikon branded cinema camera. Remember at present Nikon makes no cinema cameras. This seems a natural Segway into that market. Furthermore, having purchased Red will give Nikon mirrorless bodies genuine credibility in the eyes of many video shooters.

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

I would be curious to know more about how newer sensor tech, like in Raptor-X, that implements an electronic global shutter might be further developed. In theory, sensor level sensitivity control could make ND by a filter in the optical path obsolete. A matte box with filters will still be useful for a lot of shooting scenarios, but if you didn't need a physical ND solution then you wouldn't have to try and design a behind the lens solution in that short FFD (RF, E, Z mounts).

IMO, the future will include sensor level ISO control and purpose built motion lenses with internal motors suitable for slow pulls, repeatable racks, etc. This would seem like a nice dovetail for Nikon since they already have extensive manufacturing capacity and acumen in making lenses. I am not privy to Nikon's sales numbers, but with the popularity of cell phone cameras across an ever larger cohort, how many upmarket lens buyers are there who don't already have most of what they want in their bag?

Combine Nikon's sophisticated optical formulae and existing AF development with RED's internal processing muscle and you've got an AI platform with legs.

Cheers - #19

 

[TYLER STOOKSBURY]

I think it’s clear why Red would’ve been purchased by Nikon. First internal raw… clearly they’ll be in control of that patent giving them a distinct advantage over all of the other camera manufacturers. Secondly, for the global shutter technology, that has Red has pioneered.

Sadly, I don’t believe that technology will play well in a mirrorless, body because of power requirements. I feel Sony might have the edge in this regard. Additionally, given the read out speed and the fact that Sony has already stated that they’ll be a firmware update coming to the A9III to enable a mode whereby multiple exposures are combined in camera in an instantaneous manner to create higher dynamic range images… it’s just a matter of time before this feature makes its way to the video side. The A9iii has battery life similar to the other alpha models… which is to say quite good. Nikon made this move, because they needed these technologies to stay competitive. It’s well known that both Canon and Sony now have Global shutter sensors, with Sony, taking the lead with the introduction of their A9III.

It’s hard to say this early on what this means for Red shooters. But I for one would not be surprised to see the Red brand morph into a Nikon branded cinema camera. Remember at present Nikon makes no cinema cameras. This seems a natural Segway into that market. Furthermore, having purchased Red will give Nikon mirrorless bodies genuine credibility in the eyes of many video shooters.

100% - Who know's how Nikon is going to handle the brand. That's somewhat irrelevant as far as the end product is concerned. Though I do really like the RED aesthetic as a brand. The products ARE really cool to hold and use.

But right now if you're a Nikon guy or gal getting into video, you don't have a lot of attractive options. It's really easy to jump ship and go to Sony or Canon. That's exactly what hurt Nikon over the past decade. When people would graduate from a DSLR to a proper cine cam, they went to canon or sony. A few went to other companies too.

The tech that can trickle down to the stills/hybird cameras will but i think Nikon knows they need options for pro level video to keep people in their ecosystem. They could rebrand RED or leave it the same. I don't think it matters as long as there is a respected pro level cine cam out there with a Z mount on it.

 

[Zack Birlew]

While I didn’t expect RED to be acquired by Nikon, I have been on these forums talking about the major potential benefits of the Nikon Z mount for RED and the praises for the cost to performance ratio of the Z9 and now Z8 on top of that for a long time now. Whether I had any influence on this decision or not, the reality is that this does open up those benefits to bring in not only Nikon users but by adapters they can also bring in Sony E and Fuji X users as well.

What is becoming clear with this deal is that Canon has been dropping the ball majorly for a long time now. They played the “18mp forever” game on their entry DSLRs, they started the RF line with a subpar HD camera, they slow walked into 4K, they overpriced their cinema lines, they quickly dumped their cinema lines, they failed to release new RF cinema cameras, they allowed overheating shenanigans on the R5, they cut off third-party lens support, they have constantly delayed or canceled their highest end competitive bodies to go up against the Nikon Z8/Z9, Sony, and Fuji offerings, and now they let RED get away from them. Not very inspiring but they have made some very nice lenses and if they could just get with it and get out of their own way and actually look ahead and compete they could do some really great things.

The only thing we have to do now is wait and see what this means for the future of RED. I have also talked about future options for RED, particularly in medium format and even large format and even though Nikon has experience in those realms with some VERY nice lenses to go with them, I’m not sure either RED or Nikon have plans to move down those paths digitally or at least not anytime soon. RED alone had the flexibility to experiment so that’s why I was pushing for those ideas but under Nikon there may have to be more focus on current trends with less time to experiment. However, I could be wrong and it’s absolutely the opposite and we see some new industry shaking digital medium format and large format tech come out of nowhere from this acquisition, who knows? The only thing that is certain for me at least is that I’m now looking even harder at that Sony E to Nikon Z adapter and a set of super nice Sony G Master lenses to go with it.

 

[harjotsingh]

This marks the start of the end for red as a company we love. Japan is going thru a historically tough time, this seems like Nikons attempts to stay alive, but might cause red to not exist in a few years, and causing cinema to take huge leaps back into the dark ages of the BIG camera companies owning everything. Sad news, if canon bought red, or if Sony did i wouldnt feel like this.

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

Another motivator for Nikon could be the interest rate climate in Japan finally recovering. Virtually zero interest credit terms will likely start tracking to the global average over the next few years. Might be savvy to buy now when money is cheap.

Cheers - #19

 

[M Harvey]

Many of us have been with Red since it was just a rudimentary 3D render of some building block and a sensor strapped to a computer by some newcomers no one believed in. The reason for the reactions is basically because it's been a beloved company for a long time.

I totally understand your reaction. I guess we'll have to wait and see.

Red is Dead, Long Live Red!

 

[Maz Mawlawi]

I think this will benefit RED. They will finally be able to implement some innovations the right away. I jumped on the RED bandwagon in 2007 because they were very innovative and disruptive but over the years they fell drastically behind in implementing new technology properly. I eventually left the RED ecosystem after the Epic-W and never looked back because everything they released was always just implemented half ass and reliability just wasn't there anymore. But now with the Nikon acquisition it makes me want to revisit RED cameras in the future. This is exciting news!!!! (It also means we may finally get reliable autofocus lol)

 

[Björn Benckert]

But that's what I meant, that's a minority stake, not a total takeover. Hasselblad is also such a quality brand that it would be suicide to dismantle it in any way. DJI need them to keep doing what they're doing while they take advantage of some of the patents.

This, however, is a total takeover by Nikon, and Red doesn't hold the brand value like Hasselblad. I think it's essentially due to this little thing:
https://petapixel.com/2023/04/27/re...kon-dismissed-z9-gets-to-keep-compressed-raw/



Losing the grip on R3D is a huge loss for Red and setting a precedent that the patent validity isn't as strong as they thought. If others start using the same kind of compression, it would essentially put an end to the reason of using Red cameras, since the R3D format is a major key reason why the quality and workflow is so good.

At the moment, the only way to shoot RAW with off the shelf cameras is to use the HDMI tap. But shooting compressed RAW to the cards in the camera means that the problem with shooting compressed H265 files are essentially gone and you have something just as effective as a Red camera in its workflow. If you can get something like a FX3 and also internal compressed RAW, why would you buy a much more expensive full frame Red camera when it covers 90% of the needs?

Losing R3D would kill Red and they lost it to Nikon. Therefore, exiting before shit hits the fan seems the most reasonable outcome.

There is only a few more years on the patent. I think it runs out 2028. Sony Venice raw, DJI raw and r3d... The difference in work flow, convenience, picture quality etc is what? I don't see any major differences.

 

[Maurice Wright]

Embrace change we have no control over RED and its owners!! Life is METAL and will go on!!!! Also, you might want to spend less time complaining and buy some stock in Nikon!! Symbol: NINOY shares are at $10.63. Let the good times roll!!

 

[Emanuel A.]

MAN....the end of an era. Many saw this coming however as it very transparent that RED didn't have the foothold that they used to in the heyday where camera tech was moving at such a blistering speed. What would you say the golden age was 2006-2014 or so? I felt it too, as what camera I was using seemed to diminish in importance aside from how it was going be rigged because images all converged on being beautiful no matter what we were using.

Exactly my feelings : ) This is now Jarred's achievement anyway :- )

 

[Paulo Emílio]

Until yesterday, Red was a bold, disruptive, and creative company. It's the people involved in it, committed to it, that make a company's reputation. Today, that company has been sold, and soon those creative leaders committed to making the best cinema cameras will be no more. It's a sad day, but that's life. I've had Red cameras since Red One, and I'm very grateful for these amazing tools I've had, but at the moment, I can't imagine the future. Good luck, everyone. I hope this future is bright for everyone.

 

[Alex Wengert]

Anyone know if Red Studios was part of the deal?

 

[Han Vogen]

I am dissapointed. As Red Komodo user, I had to pay 6k for this camera.( for global shutter, Redcode RAW, color science) I don't want to see Nikon mirrorless (Z6 IV, Z8 II, Z9 II) with Red technology for 3-4K. I hope, that this doesn't happen. Why to buy RED, if this happens.

Glad we didn’t spring for that Raptor X.

 

[cogmission]

I don't understand the "sky is falling" chatter on this one.
I have an old Dragon 6K with a ton of RED eco gear.
Still works after all these years.
I work with colleagues that own new Komodo/Raptors and they will still be working years after this is blows over.

Just keep shooting folks

We need to consider the offers made to the key engineers? Are they staying on?

Also, there is the expectation of firmware releases and improvements to the new "X" cameras?