Pretty easy to understand...

[Paul Nordin]

Every set Im on that is worth anything has a Red..

I appreciate your enthusiasm. But your assessment of what makes a set worth something is perhaps a bit naieve. I love my Epic-M. Its an amazing workhorse of advanced technology. But, there are still gorgeous multi-million dollar films being made with other technology...even film!

 

[Jean Bernard]

Granted C300/C500, Alexa, F65 would no have been invented today if it wasn't for red who challenged the previous thinking. But lets accept that each camera, red included, has its merits, flows & target customer and lets respect its fellow user. As much as I love my Epic & Scarlet its not the only camera I'll ever use, not yet at least. For instance, I am on a waiting list for Nikon D800 so I can use it for things Epic & Scarlet is not giving me yet or other applications. And I still have to fight for my epic to commercial producers as they want that quick turnaround or their in house post doesn't like working with r3d, not everyone is in the wagon, maybe they will be after NAB

Think of it as like buying a Car! Moden cars are slick, faster, safer with lots of options than before but not everyone can afford an Audi R8, not is it practical for everyday use and others who can afford it may want a different car. All comes to choice...

The idea of the world in 4K is revolutionary, sadly it will be a while for broadcasters to adapt it, internet to stream it, in the meantime people shooting 1080P and delivering non archival content are still in business! I know eventually I would have a 4K consumer TV in my livingroom, watching my favorite show or movie in 4K and hopefully avoiding the kardashians in 4K ;-) And will be back on this forum or another talking about 10K!

 

[Jon MIchael Puntervold]

Alexa has a pretty image, but it's not a real alternative to Red due to the price of a bundle with Raw-recorder... BUT, about listening... Red should not underestimate the factor of taste and nuances. Red footage looks great, but in terms of natural look and feeling on highlights and skin-tones, film still has an edge in my opinion. A film like Drive looks amazing, shot on Alexa with HDcam deck. The Last Circus - shot on F35 also has an incredible look: http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/independent/thelastcircus/

Anyhow, I hope Dragon will bring an even more natural looking and pleasant image to the eyes. This is so much more important than more resolution and a larger sensor in my opinion.

 

[Steven Veldkamp]

Sometimes more isn't better. I guess it's one of those American things... and numbers sell?
One of the things that's been irking me about HD (let alone 4k and beyond) is how bad it makes CGI look. Even the big studios are struggling to produce believable CGI effects in HD.

 

[Patrick Grossien]

Everyone gets to do whatever they want. But there are some things to consider.

IMHO... a Pro should shoot the best original he/she can afford to shoot. It never hurts.

Shooting RAW is infinitely better than shooting an RGB codec. For a million reasons.

Upgrading a camera is cheaper than buying new cameras... over and over.

Having the ability to use many lens options/brands is better than being stuck with one.

Shooting a small camera is easier than shooting a big one... for a variety of reasons.

Free software and firmware upgrades that add features... is good.

Over-sampling is better than up-rezzing.

A company that listens seems better than a company that dictates.

Companies that actually deliver the future are better than those that pretend the past "is good enough".

Pretty easy stuff...

Jim

Way too easy. It's so weird that this actually needs to be mentioned. All of these points I not only agree on, but its so logical that it's really a shame that you needed to do it because no one else was. I'm still having a hard time realizing that all this is now true and not only a dream anymore. Keep it up, and we will keep it up, too! Thank you!

 

[Subhadip Sen]

Alexa has a pretty image, but it's not a real alternative to Red due to the price of a bundle with Raw-recorder... BUT, about listening... Red should not underestimate the factor of taste and nuances. Red footage looks great, but in terms of natural look and feeling on highlights and skin-tones, film still has an edge in my opinion. A film like Drive looks amazing, shot on Alexa with HDcam deck. The Last Circus - shot on F35 also has an incredible look: http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/independent/thelastcircus/

Anyhow, I hope Dragon will bring an even more natural looking and pleasant image to the eyes. This is so much more important than more resolution and a larger sensor in my opinion.

Of course, all of this is subjective - many here would prefer the "natural look and feeling" of the Epic over Alexa - and in any case influenced much more by the colorist (addendum: and cinematographer, director and production designer) than the camera.

 

[M Most]

Of course, all of this is subjective - many here would prefer the "natural look and feeling" of the Epic over Alexa - and in any case influenced much more by the colorist than the camera.

As a colorist, I have to say that's really not the case. Every colorist is influenced by what comes up on the screen before they touch a thing. The direction a colorist takes is determined first and foremost by the base image, which is created by a specific camera or film stock being used by a specific cinematographer. While it is, of course, possible to manipulate that image - with both good and bad results - the base grade is determined far more by the material itself than it is the person timing it. Colorists don't try to make everything look the same, and although all colorists have their own individual tendencies and taste, where they go with the image is largely determined by what was captured. Even in the most extreme cases, where the final image winds up is often an "extreme" version of what was shot. It's not that often that things are brought into the image by a colorist that weren't already in the photography in one form or another, at least not as often as many people seem to think. Compositors, yes. Colorists, no.

 

[Daniel Reed]

Heheh. I like doing all that "weird shit". Gives the shooter and colorist control. A lot of control.

It's similar to the Camera Raw versus JPG mindset on the still side of the world. But once you go Raw you'll never go back. Same deal with shooting below 4k really. But that's coming from somebody who cares about how their material looks and what you can with it in post

+1

I completely agree.

 

[Bruce Allen]

It's similar to the Camera Raw versus JPG mindset on the still side of the world.

Except that instead of 8-bit JPG vs RAW... it's lightly-compressed 10-bit Log vs RAW. Big difference.

But once you go Raw you'll never go back.

I dunno... I know a lot of people who shot broadcast promos on RED RAW... then said "WTF?! It'll take this long to transcode my files?!"... and then chose Alexa LogC ProRes for the next shoot.

To me, shooting in a reasonably high-dynamic range RGB (like LogC, S-Log etc) format gives sufficient flexibility in the vast majority of situations... it's not THAT hard to set vaguely-correct white balance and exposure when you're shooting, for heavens' sake!

With RED, the issue for me remains the damn decode step that requires a RED ROCKET for realtime speed. I am not interested in having to buy an expensive extra device for every editorial & VFX system. We have probably 50 Mac Pros at our company, divided between editorial and GFX. If we're supposed to embrace the RAW workflow and work with R3Ds until the last second... does every one of them require a RED ROCKET?

At the moment we have one RED ROCKET and use that machine to transcode to a Log RGB format... but then it's basically the same workflow as a Log RGB format with an additional step to slow everything down.

I really really hope that RED at some point moves to a compressed RAW format that can be decoded in realtime by a modern GPU. Until then, it's often just too hard to work with R3Ds.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

 

[Subhadip Sen]

As a colorist, I have to say that's really not the case. Every colorist is influenced by what comes up on the screen before they touch a thing. The direction a colorist takes is determined first and foremost by the base image, which is created by a specific camera or film stock being used by a specific cinematographer. While it is, of course, possible to manipulate that image - with both good and bad results - the base grade is determined far more by the material itself than it is the person timing it. Colorists don't try to make everything look the same, and although all colorists have their own individual tendencies and taste, where they go with the image is largely determined by what was captured. Even in the most extreme cases, where the final image winds up is often an "extreme" version of what was shot. It's not that often that things are brought into the image by a colorist that weren't already in the photography in one form or another, at least not as often as many people seem to think. Compositors, yes. Colorists, no.

Thanks for the information. In a situation where the colorist does not influence the acquisition, I completely understand what you are saying, and I apologize for overlooking the fact that this is SOP in most cases, which would mean a misuse of the word "colorist". It depends on the different working methods of different crews, however, e.g. in our case the colorist is heavily involved in pre-production and collaborates tightly with the production designer and cinematographer, influencing everything from the production design to the camera used. The colorist is not just the person sitting behind the grading software but also the person influencing everything of color, literally, including the color of the contact lenses worn by the actor. I hope you understand where I am approaching the role of "colorist", and being on the opposite side of the world I only get to learn of different working methods from posts such as yours, so thanks for that.

In conventional terms, let me put it another way - the influence of the visual crew of the film, i.e. production designer, cinematographer, colorist and of course the director that can make one image "more natural looking and pleasant" than the other, irrespective of the camera used. Does this make more sense? This would also explain why not all RED or Alexa productions are of similar quality.

 

[Detlev Eller]

It is really hard to listen to this stuff. What are people thinking?

... a very distinctive question.

separating the crowd from the latter.

 

[Michael Hastings]

Except that instead of 8-bit JPG vs RAW... it's lightly-compressed 10-bit Log vs RAW. Big difference.



I dunno... I know a lot of people who shot broadcast promos on RED RAW... then said "WTF?! It'll take this long to transcode my files?!"... and then chose Alexa LogC ProRes for the next shoot.

To me, shooting in a reasonably high-dynamic range RGB (like LogC, S-Log etc) format gives sufficient flexibility in the vast majority of situations... it's not THAT hard to set vaguely-correct white balance and exposure when you're shooting, for heavens' sake!

With RED, the issue for me remains the damn decode step that requires a RED ROCKET for realtime speed. I am not interested in having to buy an expensive extra device for every editorial & VFX system. We have probably 50 Mac Pros at our company, divided between editorial and GFX. If we're supposed to embrace the RAW workflow and work with R3Ds until the last second... does every one of them require a RED ROCKET?

At the moment we have one RED ROCKET and use that machine to transcode to a Log RGB format... but then it's basically the same workflow as a Log RGB format with an additional step to slow everything down.

I really really hope that RED at some point moves to a compressed RAW format that can be decoded in realtime by a modern GPU. Until then, it's often just too hard to work with R3Ds.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

I'm committed to the Red cameras and workflow for a lot of reasons, but Bruce has given an excellent summation of the real issue with shooting Red for most people. The only realistic solution I see is for Red to take the ASIC technology they have developed and create a sub $1500 (and more realistically sub $1000) Esata or thunderbolt SuperRocket with as good or better performance than the current Red Rocket with better sharpening control.

Until we can work with footage in a streamlined manner at a cost of less than 10% of the cost of a Scarlet, R3D cameras will remain a niche product - and I don't think it needs to be that way.

My recommendation is a box not more than twice the size of the redmag station, utilizing at its core the playback engine from the epic and with a REDMAG slot and slot for 2.5" Harddrives/SSD drives, with eSATA and thunderbolt and maybe USB3 interfaces.

This may require a fairly intense engineering effort to pull it all together, and may need to be sold as a low margin product - but once it is done it will open up the RED/R3D world to ten times the number of users. That may not be so important right at the moment where RED has a backlog of orders - but it will be important once production catches up (and competitors start to catch up too.)

And it would really help Red's current customers too.

 

[Patrick Grossien]

I'm committed to the Red cameras and workflow for a lot of reasons, but Bruce has given an excellent summation of the real issue with shooting Red for most people. The only realistic solution I see is for Red to take the ASIC technology they have developed and create a sub $1500 (and more realistically sub $1000) Esata or thunderbolt SuperRocket with as good or better performance than the current Red Rocket with better sharpening control.

Until we can work with footage in a streamlined manner at a cost of less than 10% of the cost of a Scarlet, R3D cameras will remain a niche product - and I don't think it needs to be that way.

My recommendation is a box not more than twice the size of the redmag station, utilizing at its core the playback engine from the epic and with a REDMAG slot and slot for 2.5" Harddrives/SSD drives, with eSATA and thunderbolt and maybe USB3 interfaces.

This may require a fairly intense engineering effort to pull it all together, and may need to be sold as a low margin product - but once it is done it will open up the RED/R3D world to ten times the number of users. That may not be so important right at the moment where RED has a backlog of orders - but it will be important once production catches up (and competitors start to catch up too.)

And it would really help Red's current customers too.

I'm so in this with you. And a lot of others are too... Just ask Mark Toia

 

[chommavong somphane]

Heaven for one is wall mark, for the rest is not good enough.
i am for the last if I can afford it.
i m with you sir.

It is really hard to listen to this stuff. What are people thinking?

Jim

 

[Bruce Allen]

Thanks Michael. Yes they could do that... but time is running out!

My other thought is if RED really wants people to work with RAW R3Ds all the way... they should just dump the whole hardware decode box idea - and design their next version of REDCODE so that it can be decoded well by GPUs.

If something inherent to REDCODE means that it can't be decoded by GPUs or CPUs... then maybe they need to change REDCODE?

I am not buying a CanonRocket, SonyRocket, PanasonicRocket and AlexaRocket... even if they're $1000 boxes. Also, it looks like I won't have to, because they ALL will have options to record in formats that a normal computer can actually play back! AND their RAW formats seem to be easier to decode.

If 20 megapixel 3:1 compressed F65 RAW can be played back by the free version of DaVinci... what is Sony doing right that RED is doing wrong?

Bruce allen
www.boacinema.com

 

[Erich Ocean]

I'm committed to the Red cameras and workflow for a lot of reasons, but Bruce has given an excellent summation of the real issue with shooting Red for most people. The only realistic solution I see is for Red to take the ASIC technology they have developed and create a sub $1500 (and more realistically sub $1000) Esata or thunderbolt SuperRocket with as good or better performance than the current Red Rocket with better sharpening control.

Until we can work with footage in a streamlined manner at a cost of less than 10% of the cost of a Scarlet, R3D cameras will remain a niche product - and I don't think it needs to be that way.

My recommendation is a box not more than twice the size of the redmag station, utilizing at its core the playback engine from the epic and with a REDMAG slot and slot for 2.5" Harddrives/SSD drives, with eSATA and thunderbolt and maybe USB3 interfaces.

This may require a fairly intense engineering effort to pull it all together, and may need to be sold as a low margin product - but once it is done it will open up the RED/R3D world to ten times the number of users. That may not be so important right at the moment where RED has a backlog of orders - but it will be important once production catches up (and competitors start to catch up too.)

And it would really help Red's current customers too.

Last night, I tried copying previously-recorded footage back onto an SSD to see if they would play back in my Epic. They did not.

But...if they did, the Epic itself (and presumably, Scarlet) could be used as a poor man's RED Rocket. The workflow's not pretty, but the playback for stuff in camera is definitely faster than my iMac doing it with software! Maybe there's a module that could be built to hook an Epic/Scarlet up to a computer with Thunderbolt, piping the R3D data in realtime to the device and back?

 

[Carlos Florez]

I agree 100% with Jim's post. Before I was shooting 7D, now I'm shooting with my RED Epic, and all I can say is, " I AIN'T GOING BACK! "
Look at this beauty that proves how amazing RED is:
http://youtu.be/Q_30rrfD8i4?hd=1

 

[chommavong somphane]

That's all true but only from a certain point of view:

The points about always shooting the best possible quality original and it being better to shoot RAW makes more sense from a Cinema point of view; whereas from a for the web or fast turnaround, or even hour long broadcast documentary point of view there is a balance to be struck between the quality of the original and the challenges filming that way will pose to your workflow. From many of these non-cinema perspectives it might make more sense to use C300 or an DSLR or even a sony EX3 than a RED Scarlet or Epic.

The point about upgrading cameras being cheaper than buying a new one is I suspect more true if you are buying expensive cameras. I know you are doing your very best but there will surely be a decent cost to upgrading to the Dragon sensor, both in price and in the logistics of sending such a delicate package a long distance.

It's definitely better to film with a smaller lighter camera up to the point that shaky hands ruin the shot, but even a pared down Epic or Scarlet is not the lightest or smallest camera in the pack. The size and weight of the camera, accessories and crucially the logistics of battery use and recharging mean that both are much more serious pieces of kit than a DSLR is for example. And quite right too since the image quality is so much better! But I guess my main point is that for me at least the 4K image doesn't necessarily trump every other card.

If I read it right "RED DIGITAL CINEMA PROFESSIONSAL" ?
i don't see any video, one time air things.
sorry to mention this out in case you miss the logo or Jim's avatar.

 

[Patrick Tong]

WoW WoW!! Carlos......Great Short Film :001_tt1:

 

[Jon MIchael Puntervold]

Thanks Michael. Yes they could do that... but time is running out!

My other thought is if RED really wants people to work with RAW R3Ds all the way... they should just dump the whole hardware decode box idea - and design their next version of REDCODE so that it can be decoded well by GPUs.

If something inherent to REDCODE means that it can't be decoded by GPUs or CPUs... then maybe they need to change REDCODE?

I am not buying a CanonRocket, SonyRocket, PanasonicRocket and AlexaRocket... even if they're $1000 boxes. Also, it looks like I won't have to, because they ALL will have options to record in formats that a normal computer can actually play back! AND their RAW formats seem to be easier to decode.

If 20 megapixel 3:1 compressed F65 RAW can be played back by the free version of DaVinci... what is Sony doing right that RED is doing wrong?

Bruce allen
www.boacinema.com

Like you, I'm waiting for something like this to become a .r3d reality...