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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Playing with the Forged Carbon Fiber Weapon and it's AWESOME!

Peter Lyons Collister said:
I think we should say thank you for trying to give us "something" in the way of comparison. But I think at this point we should drop this discussion and wait for more comparisons. No offense but this was never meant to be directed as much as it is being done.
We are all chomping at the bit for comparison r3ds but perhaps we just need to wait another week or so.
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It's nice that there is a Weapon R3D in the wild. Would I base anything on these R3D's? no.

It would be nice if you were able to do a test similar to the one you did with Dragon. While the Weapon is "cleaner", looking at the blacks and shadows, while "cleaner" in the deepest areas seems just kinda smudged, like perceived detail because of less color noise, but not real detail. Looking at both desaturated tells a nice story too.

It will be nice to see some tests when the firmware, refresh rate, color science and all that stuff is locked down.

Try 12800 ISO, 5000kelvin and zero saturation. Interesting. Looks like it's another step forward.
 
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So if you missed the NAB trade up deal, do you wait until next year, after the first wave is shipped hoping for a new deal, or is there still some form of current Dragon to Weapon path that includes a pre-release discount to make it a worthwhile expense in 2015?
 
Zeb B said:
So if you missed the NAB trade up deal, do you wait until next year, after the first wave is shipped hoping for a new deal, or is there still some form of current Dragon to Weapon path that includes a pre-release discount to make it a worthwhile expense in 2015?
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With Weapon being marketed as "for the big guys at the top," I'm under the assumption we'll see some different upgrade choices come either NAB '16 or beyond. It's been said that Dragon still has an upgrade path.
 
Anthony Berenato Jr said:
With Weapon being marketed as "for the big guys at the top," I'm under the assumption we'll see some different upgrade choices come either NAB '16 or beyond. It's been said that Dragon still has an upgrade path.
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Last I heard, if you want a new sensor, you need to upgrade to Weapon first. So the upgrade path would cost both for the weapon upgrade, then for the next gen sensor. So around $24000 for such an upgrade. I know that it's based on things like a new board and more power to be able to harness the next gen sensor, but it feels a bit like catch-22; we who don't upgrade do it mainly because we cannot afford it, but we are still on the "upgrade path", it's just that our upgrade to a new sensor will cost a lot more than for those who could afford weapon now. So even if the new sensor arrives and we have the ability to upgrade, I don't think many will be able to. I rather stay with my Epic Dragon and have a new sensor, I don't really need Weapon other than for keeping on the market competition.
 
Christoffer Glans said:
Last I heard, if you want a new sensor, you need to upgrade to Weapon first. So the upgrade path would cost both for the weapon upgrade, then for the next gen sensor. So around $24000 for such an upgrade. I know that it's based on things like a new board and more power to be able to harness the next gen sensor, but it feels a bit like catch-22; we who don't upgrade do it mainly because we cannot afford it, but we are still on the "upgrade path", it's just that our upgrade to a new sensor will cost a lot more than for those who could afford weapon now. So even if the new sensor arrives and we have the ability to upgrade, I don't think many will be able to. I rather stay with my Epic Dragon and have a new sensor, I don't really need Weapon other than for keeping on the market competition.
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Time and market forces will tell what we non-early adopters will have to pay to remain on the RED Bus. Hard to believe it will be $24K+ this time next year when NAB 2016 is between here and there. Lots to look at for $24K in 2016 for the smaller Indie owner/op. That's why RED moved out of that space and into the big dog rental and deep pockets market. For me currently Dragon is 95% of Weapon function and performance. Others value different features and incremental performance gains higher than I. Then there's always the bragging rights of having the newest camera and certainly the first 8K camera on the block. Everyone has dreams of being the next Vincent LaForet with his career making weekend via the beta 5DII.

That all said, funny to see Michael Bay's Vic Secret ad series posted in glorious 720P after all that acquisition gear to shoot it in 6K. Could have used a RED One Mate since the world it still barely HD!
 
I think the main differences for me between R1 and Dragon (outside stills) is practically not resolution dependant.
Dragon is a much better camera. AND it has higher resolution.

I do see good reasons to go 8k, though. And will try to get there when time comes.

Funny thing is that my work-scenarios are developing in two distinct directions (from a more general film-workflow approach), to really quick turnaround on the one hand and into really complex workflows on the other. And I do see Weapon ticking a lot of those new requirements. So... you never know about tomorrow.
 
Thought I'd pop in as we wrap this location while I think about Weapon.

One thing that is very important to remember is how to get the best quality footage out of RED cameras. For instance, if we just take REDCODE RAW Compression Ratios into account. The achieve the "highest quality footage" you ideally would like to shoot at the lowest possible REDCODE RAW Compression Ratio. For most features and episodics that's traditionally been in the realm of 5:1-8:1 REDCODE Compression. However, there's been a growing trend towards higher data rates on higher end productions. 4:1 has been used more and more. Especially for anamorphic projects.

Given that, if we just consider standard 5K FF filming on Carbon Fiber Weapon 6K Dragon with a frame rate of 24-96fps you are looking at a REDCODE Compression Ratio range of 2:1 through 8:1 if you are using the 512GB or 1TB MINI-MAGs. At 6K FF in the range of 24-75fps? 3:1 through 9:1.

For my money 2:1 and pretty much 3:1 is visually lossless in quality. Yes, it's at the cost of larger files and less record time, but on projects where quality is the #1 precedent (literally like the job I'm on at the moment) this is a welcomed feature.

Thinking beyond 6K and up to 8K, from what I recall I believe the 8K sensor hit 24fps at 5:1 REDCODE RAW. Though I have no clue if that was finalized.

To me this sort of explains what the combination of Weapon + the MINI-MAGs can provide. At least some of what it can provide. I see Weapon more as the "do all" camera when used properly. If you want the highest quality footage, it's there. If you need a REDCODE RAW + ProRes workflow (or *gasp* just a ProRes workflow), it's there. If you have use for 3D LUTs internally, you got it. WiFi on board, it's in there. Smaller and lighter camera body/brain, yep. Quick to shoot bolt on gear with literally no cables, there if you want it.

That plus some of the convenient things like the electronic detectable OLPFs, Scratch Mics, new Ventilation System, and the quality advancements of gaining that 1/2 stop improvement in the shadows is going to be real nice. And I'm sure there's "more to come".

I have a feeling that if a few of those things I've listed have been wants or needs, like 2 or more of them, Weapon makes a lot more sense. It is a high end camera basically improving on RED Epic Dragon in a whole bunch of ways. Which I imagine is what led to the new line of Weapon camera bodies.
 
I know this is for weapon, but is there no possibility to have proxy-recording to mini-mags on the Epic Dragon? Maybe coding ProRes is too heavy, but why don't we have fullHD proxies like on the old Red One? I mean, it's overkill to go Weapon just to get proxy recording to make editorial easier. I use R3Ds for everything, but it's a hassle, especially on an independent feature film to transcode hours and hours of R3D in order to begin editorial. Is it technically impossible to create proxies on the Epic Dragon? Or create like a DNxHD 36 MXF wrapper for Avid? I'm not talking about full blown ProRes for delivery, but editorial files.

It would soften the blow on the upgrade price to weapon for us who can't afford :beer:
 
Christoffer Glans said:
I know this is for weapon, but is there no possibility to have proxy-recording to mini-mags on the Epic Dragon? Maybe coding ProRes is too heavy, but why don't we have fullHD proxies like on the old Red One? I mean, it's overkill to go Weapon just to get proxy recording to make editorial easier. I use R3Ds for everything, but it's a hassle, especially on an independent feature film to transcode hours and hours of R3D in order to begin editorial. Is it technically impossible to create proxies on the Epic Dragon? Or create like a DNxHD 36 MXF wrapper for Avid? I'm not talking about full blown ProRes for delivery, but editorial files.
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I'm pretty sure that current Epic Dragon hardware is capable of recording 4K ProRes up to 4444 XQ in all different framerates (in ProRes only mode, not R3D+ProRes), since R3D is a heavier format than ProRes and it's already recording them with zero problems. Proxies are possible too for sure, imo.

The thing is, I'm no expert, but from what I heard, ProRes is a licensing pain in the ass and you have to get Apple's approval for every product that uses it and pay Apple fees and some restrictions apply etc. So, to enable ProRes in current Dragon it may pose too much of a licensing hassle for RED since it is not a new camera. That's just a guess though.

Plus, RED is a business and they have a marketing component. No matter how client oriented they are, it's just makes more sense from a marketing standpoint to differentiate between product lines and enable a desired function in more expensive models to boost sales. For instance, magnesium and carbon Weapons are marketing in its' purest form. They could've just made a single camera from the same material that Epic Dragon is made of with a Carbon Weapon internals and sell it for a price somewhere between Mag and CF.
 
Christoffer Glans said:
, but why don't we have fullHD proxies like on the old Red One? I mean, it's overkill to go Weapon just to get proxy recording to make editorial easier.
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There were no full proxies on the redone. The redone generated QT pointer files after recording a clip. On long clips this was a drag because you'd have to wait for a clip to post or to write to the drive. What this did was write a series of files to instruct the r3d file to be played back through QuickTime at a specific resolution. This no longer happens in camera BUT,

guess what?

you can generate these proxies in RCX now. Select all the r3ds , use a generate QT proxies and you can look at your files via qt player by clicking on the qT proxie file in the r3d folder.

or import those files into an editor or compressor or whatever.
 
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Christoffer Glans said:
I know this is for weapon, but is there no possibility to have proxy-recording to mini-mags on the Epic Dragon?
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The larger issues are:
- No built in hardware encoder
- Data Bandwidth Limits
- General processing power
- No internal hardware support for multiple "streams"

Weapon has been designed from the ground up to do these things. The hardware, bandwidth, and processing power are all in Weapon. Not in Epic or Scarlet bodies.
 
Thought so :undecided:


David Battistella said:
guess what?

you can generate these proxies in RCX now. Select all the r3ds , use a generate QT proxies and you can look at your files via qt player by clicking on the qT proxie file in the r3d folder.

or import those files into an editor or compressor or whatever.
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I actually didn't know this :smiley: But would it be faster to pull out proxies, then transcode them to DNxHD with metadata retained instead of transcoding to MXF files in Redcine-X? Is there any improvement in time to use the proxy route from Redcine?
 
You should test it. I have not used that workflow since 2007.
 
Found it!

It was long ago I used them, but remind me again why this codec wasn't released for PC? I would really like to use this QT codec for PC in order to use my workstation. My laptop isn't really the best workhorse for this kind of transcoding.
 
Zeb B said:
Time and market forces will tell what we non-early adopters will have to pay to remain on the RED Bus. Hard to believe it will be $24K+ this time next year when NAB 2016 is between here and there. Lots to look at for $24K in 2016 for the smaller Indie owner/op. That's why RED moved out of that space and into the big dog rental and deep pockets market. For me currently Dragon is 95% of Weapon function and performance. Others value different features and incremental performance gains higher than I. Then there's always the bragging rights of having the newest camera and certainly the first 8K camera on the block. Everyone has dreams of being the next Vincent LaForet with his career making weekend via the beta 5DII.

That all said, funny to see Michael Bay's Vic Secret ad series posted in glorious 720P after all that acquisition gear to shoot it in 6K. Could have used a RED One Mate since the world it still barely HD!
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surprised bay didn't want Arri skin tones on that lol!
 
Brian Merlen said:
surprised bay didn't want Arri skin tones on that lol!
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Was unimpressed with the VS spots. Nothing that is awesome about Bay is within the art direction or camera movements - could have been anyone of 100 current fashion DP's shooting that ad.
 
Agree, super nice and fantastic spot, but no Bay-ness that is obvious
 
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