"RED is Dead baby... RED is DEAD" or Chronicle of immature technology

[Noah Kadner]

Fear leads to the dark side. But seriously- I love it how someone who has no clue what they're doing shoots RED right into their foot and then pronounces the technology a failure and swears to never use it again.

Well too bad for you buddy. Next shoot when someone wants to shoot RED or some other digital camera you won't get the call. Because rather than getting the proper training and calling up a good DIT and data loader to assist you, you went all gung ho and blew it for your shoot. And of course rather than accept blame yourself for the f-up like a professional, you put it onto a camera that's so new it's easy to blame as some bleeding edge artifact.

Perhaps that will get you off the hook this time around. But in a couple of years when everyone else is shooting digital and film is collecting dust on a shelf somewhere, you'll be an obsolete player. So might just want to rethink yourself bro...

Noah

 

[Noah Kadner]

Nonsense.

The first released movie using red (jumper) went directly to #1 in the box office. Doug Liman, the director (mr. & mrs smith, bourne identity...) commented: There was always an Aaton on my set. Now there is always a red.

Sorry but you are mistaken on that account. There are a couple of very minor sequences shot on RED in Jumper(which was a box office bomb btw) but the vast majority was shot on film. However, movies like Che/The Argentine and G.I. Joe are entirely RED.

Noah

 

[Andrae Palmer]

I am not going to say anything about the crew and the specific Red camera they were using.
But as far as your production I see you are using Panasonic HVX200, I am sure everything was fine with it, have you shot with the Red? will you be saying the same things if you would loose a shooting day because of the camera and a camera that is still in the process of being build, and that is my main problem.
Red is not ready yet, it could be a great camera in 6 months, in 1 year I don't exactly when but it could also be a total failure because of the way it was brought to life, too soon from search and development, too soon from testing, and it is being shaved on our chicks.

How I learned to back up on set was with the Panasonic HVX200. One time we recorded for about 30 minutes and the Time Code was running on the FireStore so I thought everything was going fine. I had my MacBook Pro with me and checked the FireStore and it was a big file with nothing in it. Seems I had messed with the Time Code settings in the camera and had thrown everything off. Took another 30 minutes or so to figure out what I did wrong and to switch the camera back to the right settings. My laptop had a data card so I googled the problem online. Other people had the same issue and blamed the camera or the FireStore. Because of my diligence I was able to save the day. I blamed myself for wasting one hour of the crews time. I was prepared on set for such things and the day was not ruined because of this lapse. Now I carry a 17" MacBook Pro, EVDO data card and external hard drives for on set review and backup. Back at the editing room the editor then brings his hard drives for a further back up. Hey I'm an amateur... only have shot with the HVX200's and other prosumer cams... I'm not a pro like you guys.

I am very afraid of wasting other peoples time so I try to approach this like a military operation. The motto here is to BE PREPARED... just like the boy scouts. My 8 core Mac pro at home is also a RAID 5... I spent the extra money to ensure that data failure does not happen in post. The RED drive is a RAID 0 due to speed requirements. All this is very familiar to me perhaps because I come from a geek computer background before I ever touched a camera. Not knowing the limitations of data systems is where you guys mostly failed. Now the Codec Error problem is all REDs fault.. but that was a lesser secondary issue in the OPs post. The main problem was data loss and the blame for that rightly fell on your crew and not on RED.

 

[D Namir]

red sells more 35mm cameras than arri. Much more.

Even if one combines all arri cameras sales together, mechanical 16, 35, 65 and digital, red sells *much* more than arri.

Is it the quantity or the quality you are looking for?

 

[D Namir]

I'm curious, do you ever make duplicates of your original business documents before you mail them?

Exactly! The files shouldn't be lost. It should be reliable system.
It could be but it still isn't. It may be even in a few weeks...

 

[Patrick Tresch]

Guys...

You are going no where with this steril discussions!

Some people learned in the hard way. Too bad for the film/director/producer...

Now let's stop this discussion!

Pat

 

[Ed Blythe]

Guys...

You are going no where with this steril discussions!

Some people learned in the hard way. Too bad for the film/director/producer...

Now let's stop this discussion!

Pat

Yes. Blah blah blah. Back to business. You either know, or you don't want to know.

 

[Andrae Palmer]

Guys...

You are going no where with this steril discussions!

Some people learned in the hard way. Too bad for the film/director/producer...

Now let's stop this discussion!

Pat

I think this thread is very important. I'm sure lots of other people need to be educated about this.

 

[Ed Blythe]

But the point has been made. Repeatedly. Ad nauseum.

 

[Patrick Tresch]

I think this thread is very important. I'm sure lots of other people need to be educated about this.

Yes this thread is important in educating people... but I think we all got the point.

There is no need in finger pointing. This is their producer's job not reduser's.

Pat

 

[Babu Kantamneni]

Feel sorry for that guy.I have 2 reds with all available accesaries for 3 months.I played and got frustrated.No autofocus.Heavy.reboots.sometime slow.
Have too super8 videos.shooting kayotes and dogs.(Reminds me of damn computers 20 years ago.I am not ready for this shit.
On the other hand I let a bunch of 18 to 20 year olds(students of various kinds with my son) do whatever they want for the last month with these.Wow!3 shorts,2 fashion shows,one ?feature in works.
I dont like this shit.I am not ready for it.I am an idiot.
Self pity is Addictive.
Babu

 

[Finner]

Feel sorry for that guy.I have 2 reds with all available accesaries for 3 months.I played and got frustrated.No autofocus.Heavy.reboots.sometime slow.
Have too super8 videos.shooting kayotes and dogs.(Reminds me of damn computers 20 years ago.I am not ready for this shit.
On the other hand I let a bunch of 18 to 20 year olds(students of various kinds with my son) do whatever they want for the last month with these.Wow!3 shorts,2 fashion shows,one ?feature in works.
I dont like this shit.I am not ready for it.I am an idiot.
Self pity is Addictive.
Babu

Yep. The red is a digital cinema camera and it is not easy or simple. People keep fooling themselves thinking that, focus, post, 1 man shooting, configuration and a bunch of other things are EASY. Well they are not and expect to use a qualified crew to shoot properly with red. If you approach the red like you would a 35mm film shoot with a decent sized qualified camera crew things will likely go well. If you approach the shoot like a HVX 200 or f900 style camera you will sooner or later get burned. My bet is sooner.

 

[laguun]

Sorry but you are mistaken on that account. There are a couple of very minor sequences shot on RED in Jumper(which was a box office bomb btw) but the vast majority was shot on film. However, movies like Che/The Argentine and G.I. Joe are entirely RED.

Noah

d. liman used film and red for jumper.
heres what he has to say about it:
http://www.red.com/interviews

interestingly enough, jumper colorcorrected the red footage to blend into the film. no one, different from che now, complained....

 

[laguun]

Is it the quantity or the quality you are looking for?

in the case of red - both.

 

[laguun]

Exactly! The files shouldn't be lost. It should be reliable system.
It could be but it still isn't. It may be even in a few weeks...

Gdv,

the camera is working just fine for A-budgets released and in production right now.

if you arent able to produce on a red, sorry, bad for you - we are.

there are several rough edges - but thats part of our job to deal with. No matter if 35mm film, hdcam or 35mm red.

 

[Martin Weiss]

Mistake:
Working with digital harddisc media without backup (applies to all digital media). Doing so for hours worth of footage.
Solution:
Have negative insurance. Cost 3-4%.

I would be surprised if a neg insurance would have indeed covered this gross negligence.

 

[laguun]

I would be surprised if a neg insurance would have indeed covered this gross negligence.

true. question of budget mainly however.

 

[D Namir]

Gdv,

the camera is working just fine for A-budgets released and in production right now.

if you arent able to produce on a red, sorry, bad for you - we are.

there are several rough edges - but thats part of our job to deal with. No matter if 35mm film, hdcam or 35mm red.

Be sure that I am and will.
In my opinion I should have gotten a more camera ready product.
It has such immature design like when you changing a battery it takes more than a minute to shut it down swap battery reboot the camera... come on... we know it shouldn't be like that, it is not like that in a simple video camera, so you have a booting time sine the technology is different but at least a back up power could be installed inside the camera that will keep it going for 2-3 minutes till you mount the new battery.
But I guess for you it is OK. Too bad because that is not the way it should be and was suppose to be corrected while the camera was under development.
And the big problem is that some other manufacturer will come up very soon with a similar camera free from all these immature simple problems and then you will be left with a camera which as it looks like was made to last not more than 2 years (and I hope I am wrong) while with Arriflex cameras you can still shoot a feature film with a 2C which was made at WWII.
But I guess you are happy with what you have. Good for you for now. Will see you in two years.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]