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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 :)

RED ONE M-X Sensor Upgrade Program

I shot with my mX today for the first time. My initial reaction was: WOW, it must be fast I am a at a 5.6 when I was expecting less (2.8ish). It was very relieving/comforting/freeing to not have to stress about having enough light!!!!!! The camera worked great! no hiccups.

Yup, I got 13.5 stops at 320asa. 4.5 stops over and 9 under. There seemed to be a little more DR at 320. 500iso resulted in 13 stops and 800iso was 12.5. I setting my base exposures by matching the histogram readings. I was in "RedColor". My big disclaimer is I did the stops changes on my 35mm Zeiss superspeed MK2! Soon, I will do the test again using the same stop on the lens and I will change the light levels.
 
Steve Sherrick said:
I tend to think the whole tungsten issue gets blown out of proportion a bit on the M sensor. I don't disagree that R1 Mysterium loves daylight, loves HMI. You will get your best, cleanest footage under those conditions. However, with recent builds of firmware, tungsten shooting has improved quite a bit. I have found that the key to tungsten is just making sure the sensor has enough light to work with, and keep an eye on your channels. If the blue channel is severely starved you will see noise. In that case, make sure to feed it some more blue, either via an 80 series filter or by gelling some of the lights. As long as you monitor the blue channel and get your ratios correct, you can get some very nice footage from tungsten lights. Make sure to shoot charts for every setup, so post has reference point and of course, white balance the camera so they have a starting point. If you define white at the front end, makes everyone's lives easier later on. The charts can be invaluable, I always use them. And now with Red Color you have a way to refine the color even more.
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Hey Steve,

There's one thing I agree with you on...that is, sometimes we all blow the tungsten thing out of proportion, BUT having said that...I believe what you said didn't make much sense because if you CTB your lights or use 80 filters and move the lights in closer, you're basically emulating what an HMI would be doing for you (giving you daylight balanced light and more of it), not to mention you will have to use more or bigger tungsten lights if you plan on adding gels in front thus stopping them down a bit (or a lot...depending) and making your already weak lights weaker (don't forget that if you have a 2k HMI and a 2K Tungsten, in most scenarios, the HMI will have a LOT more light output). SO.....you can save yourself all that trouble and not shoot tungsten...I understand, though, that if you HAVE to, how you approach it is the way to go, and yes, thank Grame and Red for the new color science.

Yecid Jr.
 
Yecid Jr. said:
Hey Steve,

There's one thing I agree with you on...that is, sometimes we all blow the tungsten thing out of proportion, BUT having said that...I believe what you said didn't make much sense because if you CTB your lights or use 80 filters and move the lights in closer, you're basically emulating what an HMI would be doing for you (giving you daylight balanced light and more of it), not to mention you will have to use more or bigger tungsten lights if you plan on adding gels in front thus stopping them down a bit (or a lot...depending) and making your already weak lights weaker (don't forget that if you have a 2k HMI and a 2K Tungsten, in most scenarios, the HMI will have a LOT more light output). SO.....you can save yourself all that trouble and not shoot tungsten...I understand, though, that if you HAVE to, how you approach it is the way to go, and yes, thank Grame and Red for the new color science.

Yecid Jr.
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The problem was overblown, but CoolLights HMIs are so cheap (and really very good) that we just bought everything we use on a regular basis - it paid for itself in saved rentals in about 3 months, and now we charge the client rentals and pocket the cash.

Thing is, it was not a tragic difference, but lighting HMI is better. It also means matching outdoor light without gels on the windows that can eat a lot of crew time and worry some location owners.
 
Anyone out there know what serial numbers are being contacted right now? I have two shoots coming up that I'd love to use the M-X to shoot. These new tests are looking insane.
 
IanK said:
Anyone out there know what serial numbers are being contacted right now? I have two shoots coming up that I'd love to use the M-X to shoot. These new tests are looking insane.
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I'll second that! My camera is just sitting at RED waiting in line because my original sensor died. I'm currently having to rent a RED body for every shoot .....some sort of update would be nice.

FYI: I'll be having my meta data cable removed from my camera. RED says that a pinched cable caused the damage to the sensor board.
 
IanK said:
Anyone out there know what serial numbers are being contacted right now? I have two shoots coming up that I'd love to use the M-X to shoot. These new tests are looking insane.
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Last I heard was that cameras with invoice date up to 8th of february 2008 (no one above 700).

I am in this group and got my mail on the 3rd of february.

When the next group is up and how many are in that group is speculation.
 
I'm trying to figure out why this is such a big secret. Why do we have to speculate? I'm just trying to figure out when I might get my camera back. It's a production planning thing....not a hobby.
 
Lee Dashiell said:
I'm trying to figure out why this is such a big secret. Why do we have to speculate? I'm just trying to figure out when I might get my camera back. It's a production planning thing....not a hobby.
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It has been explained multiple times. They just don't have a large enough sample to give a good indication of how quickly they will get to each camera.
 
Lee Dashiell said:
I'm trying to figure out why this is such a big secret. Why do we have to speculate? I'm just trying to figure out when I might get my camera back. It's a production planning thing....not a hobby.
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Every RED One owner has a choice. Some will upgrade and some will not.
How do you expect RED to know how many upgrades to schedule until each owner responds?

500 confirmed upgrades takes longer than 400.
 
Just a simple update: ie. We are currently servicing camera #658 .....One week later: we are currently servicing camera #704.

Just a general update would be nice. My camera is dead at RED with a bad sensor caused by the pinching of the meta data cable, so some idea of planning is greatly appreciated. FYI, I will have RED remove the meta data cable from my camera. The fact that it caused a total camera failure is poor engineering. If that cable can cause a full sensor failure, the power to it should be able to be turned off or a better routing or protection seal/gasket should be available.
 
Lee Dashiell said:
Just a simple update: ie. We are currently servicing camera #658 .....One week later: we are currently servicing camera #704.
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How are they going to do that? Nobody sends them in order. They could do #400 today and #125 tomorrow...

About all they can do is tell us what the currently invited group is and I'm guessing they won't invite the next group until the influx of cameras slows down.

They could probably tell us that they have upgraded X number of cameras as of a certain date. However, that still isn't all that helpful and that is also info which RED may not want floating around.

Just a general update would be nice. My camera is dead at RED with a bad sensor caused by the pinching of the meta data cable, so some idea of planning is greatly appreciated. FYI, I will have RED remove the meta data cable from my camera. The fact that it caused a total camera failure is poor engineering.
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Removing the cable may be an overreaction. Thousands of cameras out there and yours is the only case of this I've ever read or heard about. In your situation, if you have already paid for the sensor upgrade, it would seem like not a big deal to fix you up with the new sensor and get you moving. But who knows... That may offend a bunch of others who are trying to wait patiently for their chance to send in a camera.
 
Jeff Kilgroe said:
Removing the cable may be an overreaction. Thousands of cameras out there and yours is the only case of this I've ever read or heard about. In your situation, if you have already paid for the sensor upgrade, it would seem like not a big deal to fix you up with the new sensor and get you moving. But who knows...
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I'm ready to cut this cable.. :willy_nilly:
 
Jeff Kilgroe said:
That may offend a bunch of others who are trying to wait patiently for their chance to send in a camera.
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I can feel his situation and can concede my place in line, 28 feb 2008 invoice, next platoon to be called in within the end of this month, but everybody and Red must agree.

EDIT!!! Hey, i'm not trading place, i'm just ok with his Red going ahead of the line!
 
I have certainly tried to look at this on the good side of things.

It's bad when your camera quits working and it's less than 90 days out of warranty. It's really bad when it happens when you're out of town and it's 7PM the evening prior to your 5AM call time.

I can confirm that there is a God, his name is Egon Stephan Jr. and he owns CineVideoTech, a phenomenal camera rental facility in Miami Fl. He came to the rescue and met me at his shop at 8 PM. He couldn't verify that we had insurance and I couldn't prove it that evening, but went ahead with the rental of his RED and totally saved our shoot.

After returning from Miami, I sent my camera to RED for repair and they told me that the sensor board was bad in several places and said that it was caused by the meta data cable being pinched. I will say that the mount had not been off of the camera since October 10th and I used the camera to shoot a feature during the rest of October and part of November with no issues. ..... the bad news, the repair bill would be over $7000.00 to replace the sensor. That will make you want to remove the meta-data cable. Especially if you don't rent you camera out and don't shoot with S4 lenses.

The good news...after talking with Nick at RED, I learned that the M-X sensor would be available at the end of January and that I could leave my camera at RED and have the new sensor installed. Even better news was that the M-X sensor was going to be less than the original.

The bad news...my serial number is #4505 it will take a long time to get to me.

I'm in an unfortunate situation however it could be worse. I could be paying for the old sensor to be put in my camera and then paying again to have the Mysterium-X sensor put in.

I will tell you that making a loan payment on a non functioning camera is a tough thing to do...renting one in place of yours is even tougher.

I'm headed to DC tomorrow for another RED shoot, the bad side is that I'm renting another camera just like the one I own, the good side is.....I'm working.

My push to learn the schedule that RED is on is just so I know where I am. This has been pretty painful on my end and I'm just wanting it to come to an end.
 
After hearing Lee's story, it made me wonder if Red offers any sort of extended warranty for an additional fee?

Thanks,
Tim
 
Tim Morten said:
After hearing Lee's story, it made me wonder if Red offers any sort of extended warranty for an additional fee?

Thanks,
Tim
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That question was asked at the Paris Red day.

Ted said they ran the numbers from the knowledge they gathered on the past 2 years, and in their opinion it wouldn't be an interesting option for the customers, because most of the repairs ended up not beeing very expensive, so they think it makes more sense to pay for the repairs when needed, rather than paying a fixed amount for an extended warranty.

Also, he said that after a MX upgrade, you get a 90 day warranty.
 
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