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RED GLASS

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Christopher Gosch

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So I was looking at the RED site today and saw that almost all of their glass is gone. Are they getting out of the lens business? Or getting ready for something new. Haven't paid much attention to their glass but was thinking about the 18-85 as a second zoom lens. Any thoughts or info would be greatly appreciated.
 
RED is getting out of the lens business... the world of lenses has changed a lot since they came out with those.
There's a lot of offerings from others now and they mentioned that they don't want or need to compete with that. They shook it up because they needed something great and "inexpensive" to go along with the cameras. Now there are a lot of choices out there.
 
As Patrick said they are out of the lens business, but the lenses are amazing deals for the price if you can find them used. I would check with Phil's lens guide for coverage issues with the Dragon sensor.
 
I love Red cameras, but their glass had a look I and many other DPs did not much care for - especially the color rendition and flaring characteristics, which lacked charm in my opinion. They were also very heavy for no good reason - Cooke minis will give you way better results, as will many other offerings that are less or somewhat more money. Better to rent and try before you buy, as each lens has it's own signature look, which really cannot be determined by just specs.
 
Here's how the story plays out in my mind, although I could have dreamt this up:

In 2007 RED started delivering amazing camera at a small fraction of the price that big hollywood cameras would have cost ($17,500 vs. $250,000)

So folks had the cameras, but good lenses were still very expensive. In fact, good lenses actually rose in value when RED released their cameras because suddenly there were more buyers than ever before. At that time, who knew if and when the big lens manufactures were ever even going to put out more new lens options.

RED, also with their theology of trying to sell the customer a complete package, realized it would be good to deliver lenses to go along with their camera system. This way the buyer felt comfortable knowing exactly how much they needed to spend for a complete system, and RED felt comfortable that their cameras wouldn't be held back by a lack of lens options.

So they made lenses.

Then, about 50 other manufacturers realized they could also accommodate the huge buyer pool that was created by RED, so we saw *alot* of new lenses come out. For a while, it was actually annoying for some old timers who only had to memorize 5 different lens sets. Now they were forced to learn about a new lens set every month.

In 2012, RED really had no good reason to continue manufacturing and exploring lenses because now the void had been filled. So they gradually phased them out, now that we see the void continuing to be filled by an ever growing set of new manufacturers (and old manufacturers) stepping up the plate)
 
Thanks for the info. I understand the idea of filling a void. I was just wondering about that 18-85, but I do like the Alura lens so I think thats the way I'll go. Hmm time to max out that LOC............
 
I'm not sure you will find a more affordable zoom lens in that price range. 18-85mm has a popular following, and you'll consistently see them sell for $5500-$7000 again and again. Its nearest neighbor as far as I know is the Cooke 18-100mm, but that's $3500 more expensive.
 
How about the Lomo 25-80 light weight zoom? I bought mine for $3k.
 
MichaelJQuill said:
How about the Lomo 25-80 light weight zoom? I bought mine for $3k.
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Some would complain that its missing range on the wide end. big difference between 18mm and 25mm. also, i tend to go a bit long on the long end... much prefer 100mm over 85mm. Just personal preference
 
Im not sure but I would add that lenses over time need servicing and after you fill the need in the market, like Jason mentioned, and your not selling any more, your only left with servicing and I cant imagine that RED makes very much off of the hours it takes to service a RED lens back to specs.
 
I would imagine that RED's manufacturer stopped producing their lens and therefore RED had no more product to sell. I don't see why RED would willingly stop making money hand over fist because "The world changed". The world hasn't changed that much. CPPs are more affordable than master primes but RED lenses were still competitive on price. And at that price they were a cash cow for RED.
 
Gavin Greenwalt said:
I would imagine that RED's manufacturer stopped producing their lens and therefore RED had no more product to sell. I don't see why RED would willingly stop making money hand over fist because "The world changed". The world hasn't changed that much. CPPs are more affordable than master primes but RED lenses were still competitive on price. And at that price they were a cash cow for RED.
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I'm 99% positive that, in discussion when the first RPPs started going out of stock, Jarred said something to the effect that they had sold out of them faster than they expected, that there WOULD be new stock of RPPs coming in and going on sale, but that there was going to be a very long lead time from the manufacturer, they wouldn't be back in stock any time soon.

At least that's my recollection.

Mike
 
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