Second KX or V-Raptor EZ?

[Stephen Pruitt]

Hi all. . .

I have ZERO interest in off-speed shooting. I'm 23.976 filmmaker. I also have no interest in 8K finishes. Again, I'm strictly a 3840p sort of guy.

Given those parameters, what, other than field of view differences and maybe half a stop of range, am I likely to experience buying a new V-Raptor XE versus as second Komodo-X?

I love the size of the KX and already have an OG I'd be replacing, but the new XE does, indeed, appear appealing, and for mostly the wrong reasons I suspect. . .

What say ye?

Thanks.

Stephen

 

[Dominic Borrelli]

May Phil can give the most experienced and detailed reply. Would be interesting for me as well.

As I've heard the V-Raptor should be more robust with more processing power compared to KX.

It would be interesting to know if the VRX sensor itself leads to better image quality even in crop-mode like 6k S35 compared to KX and if the processing-power delivers better R3D quality even in LQ and ELQ. What about AF performance compared to KX?

 

[Phil Holland]

V-Raptor XE should be the same level of performance of the [X] without the high frame rates and advanced features. Here's a format comparison for the field of view:

PHFX.COM | tools - formatCompare

RED V-Raptor 8K VV 8K 17:9 & RED Komodo-X 6K 17:9 - Crop Factor Datasheet

phfx.com

But the critical thing, is this camera is 8K capable as well as 4K deliverable anamorphic capable. Those are the pros.

If you purely need 6K to deliver say a 4K final, Komodo-X is a great value. But 8K and a larger format is real good here too. And Raptor XE also can give you 5K and 6K S35 if you think of it that way.

This is actually a difficult choice and will depend on your use case.

I think everybody knows I'm a VV man and I think 8K man also comes with that here. I have 5X 8K VV cameras, 3 V-Raptor [X] bodies and 2 Monstro from DSMC 2 era for specialty imaging, and one Komodo-X, one OG Komodo that I don't mind saying lives on a shelf with deep love and admiration as it was the first.

The Raptor sensor stands alone in this market as far as I'm concerned and is extremely good. If you want that larger format, the resolution, and slight dynamic range and image cleanliness boost, whelp, that's the answer.

Honestly, all this is priced pretty damn well now. Though this shouldn't be how you think of things in 2025, Raptor XE is less expensive than the RED One body and is vastly more camera. And um... Much less expensive than Monstro at launch. I'm a big boy and made my ROI on those cameras, so not hurt by that outside of the temporal chaos, but V-Raptor XE is "better" than the previous $86,000 Monstro in most ways. Insane value really.

Just to mention, 8K oversampling for a 4K finish is both good from an image noise perspective, but also a color perspective with the proper Bayer Color Filter Arrays we enjoy. And you notice that more and more the longer you work with such things.

For me this is such a tough one because Komodo-X and Raptor XE in my mind are very good values for the level of image quality they can achieve and general feature set and I/O. It's really a 6K S35 or 8K VV conversation first thing there.

 

[Stephen Pruitt]

Thanks for your detailed answer to my question, Mr. Holland! Truly!

In terms of video noise, is the V-Raptor visibly quieter than the KX in nighttime low-light situations? That's where I'll be shooting most of the next film.

Thanks again!

Stephen

 

[Patrick Tresch]

I would say yes to your question Raptor has the edge and it's noise is really nice if not too compressed. Komodo-X hasn't the best noise handling. But it's not a no go if your'not looking fo Sony A7s3 high ASA. My favorite is still the Monstro with LLO ;-).

 

[DJ Meyer]

The only advantage to K-x over the raptor is that it is smaller, cheaper, and has the tiny monitor on top. In every other way the raptor is superior.

 

[Malk Kamalko]

Game over - buy Nikon ZR and be happy .

 

[Patrick Tresch]

Game over - buy Nikon ZR and be happy .

Not quite the same beast ;-) But really impressive though