Scarlet users scnd class users

[Steffen Baermann]

Hi all,

as the Dragon roll out is slow, RED today posted that Scarlet users are last in row to get the Dragon, after all Epic owners got it. There may be technical and logistical reasons for it, but I have to say I feel a bit betrayed, as when we got sold the upgrade no-one really told us, that we would be the last in row.

I was assuming that RED would not keep up to the promises of a roll out in September, and I planned for a delay already. I consider myself still being a Red customer, and I want to be treated fair.

Sorry venting here, but I think, the sneaky email I got the other day, that I may want to order a Epic x-grade now, and have a better camera in my hands soon, was already taking me off. I conciously decided for Scarlet, as I feel that 4K is enough for the moment. The Problem is the Sensor though and that's why I decided for Dragon.

Now I may say, well on the day I get it, maybe the new BMD is out also for 15% of the price of a scarlet dragon. Maybe the image is not that nice, but I can afford 6 Cameras for the same money, which allows me to do completely different shots and production ...

Well I guess, I can be happy if Red talks to me as a Scarlet customer still, especially writing a critical post here. Maybe I shut up, before I get pushed to the very last line in the waiting list here

We were asked to give love to the development team for the HDR-X. Guys I give you lots of love - once I have the camera in the hand !!!!!

RED ==> Deliver on your promises. That makes loving customers.

In Germany we say :

Der Spatz auf der Hand ist besser als die Taube auf dem Dach.

Which means, be happy on what is in your reach rather, than dream about something you can not get.

Also means, as Dragon is out of reach for me now, so I will invest into products of a company that can deliver !

Thanks

Steffen

 

[Björn Benckert]

So you do not feel that people that bought the Epic M just to get a good place in line and paid a quite hefty amount of money to do so should get anything for their money spent....
Or people that are willing to pay more than the price of 2 scarlets extra just to get in line by buying the carbon dragon.

Then you also have to add to all this that most epic m and a lot of epic X buyers bought their camera before the price was sliced in half for epic... Basically those guys very much paid the developing costs for the rest.

Also it's really so that Scarlet is built from epic leftovers, without epic's being sold their would be no leftovers to make low priced scarlets from.

So I do not at all see any reason for your ranting. Sell your scarlet used and pay up for carbon dragon if you feel that your place in line is not good enough. If you feel thats too costly then you have to understand that pretty much everyone in the que in front of you paid quite a bit more than that to be where they are. It's quite easy to get up there, just pay what they paid and you even get in front of them.

A carbon dragon today is less money than what we paid for our epic M + upgrade to dragon.

If you consider to go for the BMC4k thats is all your decision of course but I have not seen those cameras delivered and even so when they do come I know they will have pretty much the same issues as the BMC 2k, heavy rolling shutter, moare, no r3d files, etc.

So yes, All in all you very much are a second class RED user, as if it was not for the epic users there would not be a scarlet to buy for the price you paid and if there was not epic dragon users then there would not be a scarlet dragon for the price that it will come at.

 

[Mike 'Fireman' Ross]

Also means, as Dragon is out of reach for me now, so I will invest into products of a company that can deliver !

Well, every business is different. Every project has different budget.

You buy what you can afford, if that makes sense.

If it doesn't make sense to buy, you rent.

You crunch the numbers, and if you crunch them right, you're in profit.

Perhaps another camera is better for you to buy just now. Only you can make that decision.

Mike

 

[Steffen Baermann]

Hi Björn,

thanks for the reply. You are confirming, my thoughts. Obviously Scarlet is only there to be the entry camera. And if Epic would not be there, no Scarlet would not be there. Still Scarlet users pay the same or more for the upgrade, and where offered and asked the same day to upgrade. And it is good to say openly Scarlet users are the second in row. Everybody who is entering this market should know this. And accept !

 

[Robert Hart]

Bjorn. Maybe that response was a bit savage. - The Scarlet may be comprised as alleged of below-spec Epic bits. It was still sold as a product "worth its price" to a defined entry-level market. It may have been sold as a loss-leader to bring users into the Epic fold which it has done. Not too far in history back, Scarlet was an aborted promise, albeit one curtailed for very sound reasons. I am not judging RED for any business decision it might make. There may be technical reasons for the Epic-owners-come-first declaration. If Epic-suitable Dragon components are only harvestable from part of the entire Dragon component production run, the Scarlet upgrades may be intended to consume an overflow of sub-par bits and pieces. Accumulation of those sub-par components would take time to occur and be proven as still suitable for the Scarlet upgrades. However if the product is not graded according to performance this time round, Scarlet owners who have committed ( I don't know if they have put up a deposit as well ) surely should have some consideration for first-in-best-dressed. As business models go, the alleged use of perfectly functional but sub-par bits and pieces for Scarlets is as much a stop-loss or harm-reduction protection for the company's bottom line as it is a discount beneficence kindly offered for the Scarlet buyers, win-win for both parties. There is a lot of unknown and guessing going on among us humble public. A second-tier pecking order for the upgrade as you suggest may be fair and just given the greater historical investment by Epic owners. It seems to be a fairer deal than the Japanese vendors seem to be offering. But it is what is "seen" to be fair which counts for any commercial enterprise. I think that RED may once again be harming its future in a manner that has become a little familiar to those who followed the products over time. The history of Cinema Products Corp might be a valid study for RED management and marketing. -- There are people who don't own the product who irrationally love to hate RED. There is wisdom in not feeding them further encouragement.

 

[Manfred Lopez]

... The history of Cinema Products Corp might be a valid study for RED management and marketing. ...

Hi Bjorn. I found your post level-headed and very well said. But that bit about the history of Cinema Products Corp got me curious. Is there a place online where I can read up on that? Sound very interesting. I tried the wikipedia page, but it's kind of dry and uninformative.

 

[Scott Crawley]

I feel your pain Steffen and I think we will hear less and less talk about preferential treatment from Red, not because the practice will end but because it is bad business to continually remind your largest group of customers that they are second rate.

The truth of the matter is that there are many good reasons for rollouts to be prioritized that way and some of them are purely logistical; there are fewer Epic Ms to upgrade, etc.

While Epic did come first and part binning was part of the process I respectfully suggest that if Red were able to roll out Scarlet on the same day as the first Epic they would have. Also I would not assume that Scarlet is a loss leader because the price is lower and the margins are smaller. I attribute most of that to scale and cost. Epic parts simply cost more, and with the volume of Scarlet sales it is possible and even likely that it outperforms Epic in terms of gross revenue.

Scarlet is entry level and is not their most capable or professional tool on offer, but Red values all of their customers. Believe that.

 

[Eric Santiago]

I dont feel like one.

Everytime I fire up me Scarlet, Im just happy Im in the party

All kidding aside, some of us dont/cant afford any Dragon upgrade.

I guess I could have just kept my opinion to myself.

But the title made me jump in

 

[Brian Merlen]

The upgrade order has been firmly established for a while now... I am sorry it upsets you but the reality is last time I checked I don't think BMC is shipping 4k BMC in numbers anyway. Hardly any Epic owners have Dragons yet either, these things take time. Its not easy to take 10,000 cameras in and do and upgrade sensors in them, no one else does that, and your kidding yourself if you think its gonna be fast for any company to do this quickly, even if it was Sony or Arri. Only most companies rather not do this, and just sell you a whole new product with a whole new MSRP priced accordingly. So when I see people giving Red BS for the fact that this is a huge logistical process it bums me out. If I had to buy a whole new camera I would get out of the game. The ONLY reason I am in the game is Reds upgrade program lets a guy like me move from Scarlet to Epic to Dragon. Stepping stones I can save towards...and I for one appreciate it, and could care less if its late. Just more time to buy other accessories, high end glass for instance

 

[Michael Jarvis]

I have the perfect remedy! So, I had this really cool "Dragon" sticker made. Slap that thing on the side of my Scarlet...and....kablammo! All my clients give me lots of love and money! I can show them the same awesome movies and show them how awesome my Dragon Scarlet is. They all just stare in awww. Then when it really comes out, I'll just tell them that it was all an illusion...and its gonna be way cooler than they ever thought...and throw more money at me. Either way....its a giant party. Problem solved.

ps...on a serious note....I'll more than likely not upgrade the Scarlet. Makes more sense to just buy a new Dragon Epic out of the gate and use the Scarlet as an awesome workhorse B cam.

 

[Robert Hart]

Manfred.
　

I am probably drawing a bit of a long bow in the Cinema Products comment and on reflection, I was probably in turn a bit savage on the original poster as well.

The Cinema Products Corp built a robust and user-friendly sound-on-film 16mm motion picture camera that became more or less the industry-standard for television news gathering. They made and sold a lot of them.

As with RED, there was a sort of, "the CP is inferior to the Éclair/ARRI" thing going at the time. In part that was true. The CP borrowed technically on older 16mm and 35mm film transport mechanisms, the Fords and GMs of cameradom if you will.

They went well back in history but were proven solid in service. The CP designs, whilst an excellent fit for modern needs, were also workarounds of those older systems but with exciting modern innovations like solid state electronic components and crystal sync systems which did not require signal cables.

The design stuck with an older magazine tech which was not conducive to rapid swaps. I guess it was used because it was already there, proven and an established industry-standard component across several camera types. There were a few technical glitches with mirror-shutter timing in an earlier "bowtie" versions. Some people would comment that because the film movement was not pin-registered the image would drift and float. All that aside, I recall a sort of product enthusiasm that I had not seen since until the SI2K and RED developments came along. In reality and as Ken Hale of Whitehouse AV subsequently and more recently proved in his own tests, when properly maintained and set up, a CP16 image could be rock-steady in double exposure tests.

Then along came ENG cameras, patterned ergonomically along the lines of the CP16. Within a short time, the CP16 became obsolete. The company was suddenly out of its traditional market and forced to compete against the likes of ARRI, Éclair and the new AATON, all coaxial magazine style machines and its own CP16 machines now surplus and finding their way onto the used market. CP made a brave attempt to build a coaxial magazine camera which gained acceptance but the production run was curtailed. The Angenieux 17.5mm-75mm Super16mm capable compact zoom lenses that Ken Hale sells as new-old-stock are from that production run.

The camera was tagged CP-GSMO. In apparent co-incidence with RED's own military thematic, the acronym GSMO stood for "Gun Sight Man Operated" ( Cit. Wikipedia ).

Cinema Products was also diversified into Cinema audio reproduction equipment and aquired the rights to the iconic Steadicam. As a well-known brand, it eventually faded from view around year 2000 for whatever reasons I do not know. Maybe the principle movers and shakers involved wanted to move on or retire, a bit like Jim Jannard now wanting to step back a little maybe. Icons like ARRI are still around. For how long remains to be seen as labour costs in the Euro zone are high compared to S. E. Asia.

RED products are innovative but represent a vulnerable niche. I see RED perhaps falling back upon its laurels with Dragon finished and clear for where next in the current camera platform can the enterprise go. Digital Cinema 645? - Would likely need a new hardware platform. Digital cinema distribution as a diversity? - That's pretty much sewn up by established interests which already vertically integrated will be a tougher nut to crack than offshore entities like Sony etc..

Maybe like Cinema Products in its 16mm camera line, RED digital cinema aquisition may end up competing with itself, especially if Epic and Scarlet owners get future shock, decide near-enough is good enough and ride out the next upgrade. Unlike Cinema Products, RED does not seem to be embracing diversity except in the camera-associated accessories it makes for itself or approves and innovations like Redray.

The brief reign of the alternative 35mm groundglass adaptor vendors converted almost overnight into camera-related accessories they had also developed to complement their adaptor systems.

RED might diversify into military-related sensor products but find itself up against Dalsa, which it saw off as a digital cinema competitor. Dalsa is now part of the Teledyne umbrella of enterprises so financially may be better protected to ride out an attritional campaign. It would be sad to see RED hit a peak and then wane as so many icons now seem to do in a sort of solar cycle.

Cinema Products, Atari, CTOS/UNISYS, Texas Instruments were exciting icons of their time? Where are they now?

 

[Carlos Reyes]

Although the order of upgrades has been clear for a while, I think its really gonna be Epic M first, Epic X starts and then soon after scarlet. Not everyone is going to upgrade and not everyone is going to upgrade at the same time. Its not like they're gonna wait for EVERY Epic X to be upgraded, I'm sure they'll gauge how many orders they're receiving and go from there. Just a shame considering I Have the money for my scarlet upgrade NOW and Im sure a good amount of Epic X owners dont. But I knew what I signed up for.

 

[Tom Greenberg]

Frankly, I am much more interested in the timeline for upgrades than the order they will be done in. As someone who is still gathering the necessary funds to upgrade, I am hoping that the fantastic opportunity that RED is providing us Scarlet owners will still be available when I am finally able to pull the trigger. I've decided that Epic-X is a great first step for me, so I will be making that upgrade ASAP, and then hopefully upgrade to Epic Dragon sometime thereafter.

To those who are disappointed by the specifics of Jarred's post, remember that RED did not have to offer us any upgrade path at all...they chose to do so to support their customer base. I for one, am grateful for the opportunity!

 

[Ben Scott]

As a Scarlet owner who really wants to upgrade to an Epic and then to a Dragon I don't in any way feel shortchanged by what is on offer. Of course the people who paid several times what I did and the people who bought before I did should get the option first.

The priority boarding on flights is usually only £20-30 extra - these mofos have had to pay tens of thousands for their place in the first half of the queue. Without them we would even have a Scarlet, let alone an upgrade path to Epic and Dragon and Scarlet Dragon.


I'm not a sycophant about feeling part of the Red family but my camera now does 36fps at 4k WS which it certainly didn't do and didn't say it was going to be able to do when I bought it. Absolutely no reason for Red to have offered us that in the last firmware for free other than they wanted to, and they value Scarlet users. TO say they treat Scarlet users like second class citizens is not only untrue, it's pretty rude. If you can't see why the people who put Red on the map are given the upgrade option first then perhaps you should check out Sony's amazing discount to go from the F3 to the F5 or F55.

Oh wait... There isn't one.

 

[Ben Scott]

Frankly, I am much more interested in the timeline for upgrades than the order they will be done in. As someone who is still gathering the necessary funds to upgrade, I am hoping that the fantastic opportunity that RED is providing us Scarlet owners will still be available when I am finally able to pull the trigger. I've decided that Epic-X is a great first step for me, so I will be making that upgrade ASAP, and then hopefully upgrade to Epic Dragon sometime thereafter.

To those who are disappointed by the specifics of Jarred's post, remember that RED did not have to offer us any upgrade path at all...they chose to do so to support their customer base. I for one, am grateful for the opportunity!

Being in the same boat, on this very subject I spoke to my bomb squad rep the other day and he said as of now there was no deadline for the upgrade offer and when one came into play everyone would be given a very log notice period.

 

[Björn Benckert]

Bjorn. Maybe that response was a bit savage. - The Scarlet may be comprised as alleged of below-spec Epic bits. It was still sold as a product "worth its price" to a defined entry-level market. It may have been sold as a loss-leader to bring users into the Epic fold which it has done. Not too far in history back, Scarlet was an aborted promise, albeit one curtailed for very sound reasons. I am not judging RED for any business decision it might make. There may be technical reasons for the Epic-owners-come-first declaration. If Epic-suitable Dragon components are only harvestable from part of the entire Dragon component production run, the Scarlet upgrades may be intended to consume an overflow of sub-par bits and pieces. Accumulation of those sub-par components would take time to occur and be proven as still suitable for the Scarlet upgrades. However if the product is not graded according to performance this time round, Scarlet owners who have committed ( I don't know if they have put up a deposit as well ) surely should have some consideration for first-in-best-dressed. As business models go, the alleged use of perfectly functional but sub-par bits and pieces for Scarlets is as much a stop-loss or harm-reduction protection for the company's bottom line as it is a discount beneficence kindly offered for the Scarlet buyers, win-win for both parties. There is a lot of unknown and guessing going on among us humble public. A second-tier pecking order for the upgrade as you suggest may be fair and just given the greater historical investment by Epic owners. It seems to be a fairer deal than the Japanese vendors seem to be offering. But it is what is "seen" to be fair which counts for any commercial enterprise. I think that RED may once again be harming its future in a manner that has become a little familiar to those who followed the products over time. The history of Cinema Products Corp might be a valid study for RED management and marketing. -- There are people who don't own the product who irrationally love to hate RED. There is wisdom in not feeding them further encouragement.

I did not understand half of that. But I think it's all quite clear. Red says they make scarlets from left over epic asci boards that does not preform well enough to run at the epic needed throughput speeds. Still that does of course not make scarlet not worht it's price. On the contrary, Scarlet is built as a tank just as the epic, no other camera even close to the price range of scarlet comes with titanium electronic mounts, fat 9 inch touchscreens, 5k 12p sensor, same exact color science as it's bigger brother, r3d compressed raw, etc. I'm actually a bit amazed that people do not understand how powerful the scarlet MX actually is. Personally I love it and the price it comes at is amazing, we use scarlet all the time next to the epic, and intercut / use it for closeups etc. And read has always been nice to early adopters, all since the prepayments for red ones back in the days. So I find it a bit odd that people are upset about the fact that they move on in the same manor.

So again, Scarlet is a great camera. If you want to move from scarlet to dragon asap then selling your scarlet second hand now and then you order a carbon dragon.... still you pay about the same or less (do not remember the exact price) that I paid for our Epic M when we bought it.... Whats unfair with that?

Let me know when you can shoot frames like this with a motion camera from any other brand.... To me it's quite clear that it will take years for that to come:


Here is a scarlet 4k frame: http://www.flickr.com/photos/107237384@N04/10593913734/

Sharp as should be...

Here is the exact same setup shot with alexa raw and uppressed to 4k: http://www.flickr.com/photos/107237384@N04/10593882595/

Hmm... to me its quite clear that the alexa frame looks like shit for details in comparison, and when trying to key them, scarlet wins big time.

Here is another frame...My guess is it will take a couple of years before Arri gets to the same level... and when they do it will not cost under 10k USD and there will be no upgrade mentioned: http://www.flickr.com/photos/107237384@N04/10594152193/

Edit: I give it to the F65, I guess that one can keep up with the scarlet but then you have to think of the price and that you then could go and order 2 carbon dragons instead and probably get them both cheaper and quicker than the F65 that actually has quite a bit of delivery times.

 

[Terry VerHaar]

It's hard not to weigh in here. :smiley:

We all want what we want, when we want it, but that just isn't realistic in this case. There are constraints all around and RED has to recognize and deal with them. Chances are someone is always going to feel slighted.

I think one thing every Scarlet owner should consider is trading up to the Epic-X right away and getting to work earning money to go all the way to Epic Dragon when it's available to you. You can work with an even better camera than your Scarlet, almost immediately. And, when the dust clears, you'll own the best camera on the planet (at least for now).

 

[Eric Santiago]

It's hard not to weigh in here. :smiley:

We all want what we want, when we want it, but that just isn't realistic in this case. There are constraints all around and RED has to recognize and deal with them. Chances are someone is always going to feel slighted.

I think one thing every Scarlet owner should consider is trading up to the Epic-X right away and getting to work earning money to go all the way to Epic Dragon when it's available to you. You can work with an even better camera than your Scarlet, almost immediately. And, when the dust clears, you'll own the best camera on the planet (at least for now).

I know as a Scarlet owner with no experience with EPIC but with original RED MX, I feel Im working with the best camera at the moment

Until I have access to an EPIC, this Scarlet is my love and life

 

[Marcos Montenegro]

It's amazing the feeling of entitlement some people have. What other company gives you the opportunity to upgrade sensors in the first place?

I was a Scarlet owner. Upgraded to Epic-X. Loving life and looking forward to upgrading to Dragon. Go out and shoot something.

 

[Robert Hart]

To put things in a more appropriate perspective, who among aspiring owners of any flavour of RED camera could have ever dreamed of being able to afford a new 35mm film camera, Nagra audio recorder, costs of processing, the cost of the film stock, workprint, magtrack transfer, audio mix, internegative, answer print, process to distribution print, shipping costs and fear of loss in transit back in the day. - One digital cinema camera, a decent microphone and mixer, one decent computer, editing and grading software, a few disk drives, electricity to make all the stuff go, also light your way at night plus a roof and four walls to keep the weather out and a decent floor so the editor's chair doesn't rock. It might be a stretch but you could make yourself an acceptable distributable cinema feature by adding a decent script, location, actors, a barebones crew and a modest camper van on a trailer park. We do live in remarkable times.