60 replies to this topic

[Andrew Walker]

I use to be one of RED's biggest supporters and I still love my Epic. But Jim needs to hire a PR person and just stop going on reduser or something. Personally I like Jim, at least the Jim I have met in person. Very polite and willing to listen to everyone. The problem is that when he's in front of a keyboard he does some really off hand things. The other problem that someone else stated here was that they have way too many moderators running around with the power to ban and make things disappear.

RED also needs to stop dicking people around because its going to get so bad that no one is going to want to deal with them. Because at this rate they will piss off the wrong person and that will be the end of it, no matter how kickass their cameras are. RED is the only camera company that I know of that threatens their customers to shut up or they aren't going to even let them buy gear for their cameras they already have. I was told to shut up when RED was just sitting on my camera with all my money. When I kept asking where my camera was after they had my money for over a week I was told that I can be quiet or that I wouldn't get a camera. The biggest problem I see is that most of the Bomb Squad reps are completely in the dark as to what is going on. Why not tell them what is happening so that they might convey that info to the customers that they deal with day in and day out.

Its a shame what happened to Phillip Bloom and his whole RED experience but it doesn't surprise me in the least bit. This kind of stuff has been going on for years. Its about time someone just said "**(obscenity removed)** it" and shed some light on what is going on.

[Brian Drysdale]

I guess it shows that at the very least you should "burn in" the camera in yourself before doing any work with it. Arri seem to have a heavy duty "burn in" process on the Alexa, I don't know if RED have a similar stage, but I know the BBC do it with at least some of their new cameras and probably all of them.

Edited by Brian Drysdale, 12 December 2011 - 03:47 AM.

[Phil Rhodes]

Its a shame what happened to Phillip Bloom and his whole RED experience but it doesn't surprise me in the least bit.

Me either. Alarm bells rang for me almost immediately - there's a post from me somewhere on this forum, from about 2006, in which I wax enthusiastic about Red and the idea of a wealthy man doing something interesting and useful with his money. That state of mind didn't last long, unfortunately, and I quickly began to anticipate exactly this sort of situation, based on a feeling that the company was more interested in the showmanship of publicising rather flexibly-defined technical specification and deadlines I didn't think they could meet (and in my view they didn't).


I never wanted to criticise Red for producing a bad camera, although I now think in terms of their first release, certainly at the time of release and until the sensor refresh, it was a pretty bad camera. The HVX-200 was a pretty bad camera and I don't feel this way about Panasonic, for instance.


P

[Stephen Williams]

[ The HVX-200 was a pretty bad camera and I don't feel this way about Panasonic, for instance.[/size]


P

I remember that IBC well, Panasonic were not a happy bunch.

[Robert Houllahan]

Rent Rent Rent Rent........ Unless you know you can make the money you paid for the camera back quickly I just don't see any reason to buy one of these little technological time bombs. Want to shoot your Indie breakout hit on a Red? Budget for the whole film is less than the cost of a Epic? There are plenty of Red-1 MX rigs out there for rent... Need to shoot a industrial with a little look? How many days of rental on a F3 is it going to take till you are better off owning it? Allot, like 45 days and that is without any accessories.

With film cameras you can be fairly well assured that in fifty years it will still be making great images, with Moore's law the whiz bang camera you got today may be superseded in a matter of months by something half the cost.

-Rob-

[Thomas Dobbie]

I think this is worth reading,eloquently sums up the whole situation.
http://salahbaker.bl...-pr-titans.html

[dave smith]

I think this is worth reading,eloquently sums up the whole situation.
http://salahbaker.blogspot.com/2011/12/clash-of-pr-titans.html

I didn't find it eloquent; more a mean spirited and skewed take on events, with hints of character assassination and a refusal to find Red or Redusers at fault in any way.

Epic is designed to appeal to the Digital Stills shooters market [DSMC, remember?] with its lighter form factor , stills auto-focus lenses capability, use of standard tripod with quick plate, DSLR style handgrip, etc etc. All of which make the criticisms of Philip Bloom's approach ill-informed.
IMO.

Edited by dave smith, 13 December 2011 - 02:44 PM.

[Paul Bartok]

Im sorry but I cant stand RED users stupid ideoology, dont get me wrong i like RED Cameras but there forum seems to be cultish, its now "cool" to own a RED, and there denial of use of upscalling is anoying it some how pulls of great quality but i mean compared to the alexa its not the same for example. scarlet vs c300

[Keith Walters]

I think the whole RED thing has pretty much run its course by now; "RED sails into the sunset" I suppose. It was a worthy attempt, but let's be realistic: The battle is now between Film, Alexa and Canon. Let's all try to move on from there...

If you have the time, it's fascinating to read through the whole RED folder from the beginning. All the gung-ho statements that never really came to anything, all the ridiculous claims made by clueless posers trying to pass themselves as working professionals and who eventually disappeared back into the imaginations of whatever pretentious nonentities spawned them; all the scathing and RED-hating posts that are endlessly referred to, but don't appear to have actually existed; all the imbeciles trying to claim a working schedule "with their RED" that would put a CCTV camera to shame. It's all in there, or not, as appropriate, (or inappropriate).

And a lot of really solid information that never seems to be so clearly presented anywhere else. It is really a shame that most people have lost interest; this forum was a vast improvement of the endless one-line content-less sycophanic drivel that makes up the bulk of Reduser posts. Or the worthy but often incomprehensible CML. And a lot more fun too.

[Phil Rhodes]

I'm not sure about Canon. What they're doing is good (read all about it in an excellent article from a trusted source!), but they don't really have anything that's pitched squarely at Alexa.

I think they could do better, and I wish they would go ahead and produce a US$50k cinema camera because I believe they have the ability to produce an exceptionally good one, but perhaps it just isn't a big enough market to entice them. I can't say it would me. They may take some lower-end Alexa jobs, but I don't think they'll be taking a big slice out of the Arri pie.

The most significant outcome of all this, for me, is what we discussed at the Visual Impact event last week: what you can now have, for what money, is absolutely astounding. I spent UK£15k on a 4:3 standard-definition camera eleven years ago, and that's more than what a C300 costs, or soon will cost. The price to performance ratio of modern cameras has abruptly spiked, in just a few years, way beyond any improvement seen in the previous hundred years, and I think it's clear that no matter what sort of stuff you're doing, anybody who complains about the availability of good camera gear is being excessively ungenerous.

P

[Thomas Dobbie]

I didn't find it eloquent; more a mean spirited and skewed take on events, with hints of character assassination and a refusal to find Red or Redusers at fault in any way.

Epic is designed to appeal to the Digital Stills shooters market [DSMC, remember?] with its lighter form factor , stills auto-focus lenses capability, use of standard tripod with quick plate, DSLR style handgrip, etc etc. All of which make the criticisms of Philip Bloom's approach ill-informed.
IMO.

Sorry Dave,I'm not sure we were reading the same article.The author of the blog is certainly no Red fanboy,and his condemnation seemed to be equally directed at both parties.

[Keith Walters]

I'm not sure about Canon. What they're doing is good (read all about it in an excellent article from a trusted source!), but they don't really have anything that's pitched squarely at Alexa.

What I meant was, Alexa will be first cab off the rank, Canon for when all the dynamite goes off or you want the compactness.
I can't help noticing that the bulk of the Top Shelf features that use or have used the Epic, are 2-camera 3-D action pics, where its compactness (and low cost) would be beneficial, particularly during any protracted learning curve. However, after seeing Captain America, a 3-D action movie that was shot flat, with by far the best "live" 3-D effects I have seen, entirely generated in Post, maybe 2-camera stereo rigs aren't the way to go after all.

If the industry chooses that path instead, that considerably increases the range of capture options, film included.

I think they could do better, and I wish they would go ahead and produce a US$50k cinema camera because I believe they have the ability to produce an exceptionally good one, but perhaps it just isn't a big enough market to entice them. I can't say it would me. They may take some lower-end Alexa jobs, but I don't think they'll be taking a big slice out of the Arri pie.

The most significant outcome of all this, for me, is what we discussed at the Visual Impact event last week: what you can now have, for what money, is absolutely astounding. I spent UK£15k on a 4:3 standard-definition camera eleven years ago, and that's more than what a C300 costs, or soon will cost. The price to performance ratio of modern cameras has abruptly spiked, in just a few years, way beyond any improvement seen in the previous hundred years, and I think it's clear that no matter what sort of stuff you're doing, anybody who complains about the availability of good camera gear is being excessively ungenerous.
P

I'm sure they will do better. It would be entirely practical for them to produce a true 1080 x 1920 consumer stills/video camera. As the stills market has amply shown, there is a sizeable market for large-sensor cameras that amateurs may never really understand how to use, but which can be put to good use by Pros.
As I've said elsewhere, I'd give it 4-5 years before true HD 1080 x 1920 video cameras start to appear in the "Surprise Buys" aisle at Aldi's

[Andrew Walker]

I think the whole RED thing has pretty much run its course by now; "RED sails into the sunset" I suppose. It was a worthy attempt, but let's be realistic: The battle is now between Film, Alexa and Canon. Let's all try to move on from there...

If you have the time, it's fascinating to read through the whole RED folder from the beginning. All the gung-ho statements that never really came to anything, all the ridiculous claims made by clueless posers trying to pass themselves as working professionals and who eventually disappeared back into the imaginations of whatever pretentious nonentities spawned them; all the scathing and RED-hating posts that are endlessly referred to, but don't appear to have actually existed; all the imbeciles trying to claim a working schedule "with their RED" that would put a CCTV camera to shame. It's all in there, or not, as appropriate, (or inappropriate).

And a lot of really solid information that never seems to be so clearly presented anywhere else. It is really a shame that most people have lost interest; this forum was a vast improvement of the endless one-line content-less sycophanic drivel that makes up the bulk of Reduser posts. Or the worthy but often incomprehensible CML. And a lot more fun too.

I don't know what your talking about. RED hasn't run its course. Productions of all types are going to be shooting on it for years to come. I was just saying their customer service sucks and they really need to work on it.

[Keith Walters]

I don't know what your talking about. RED hasn't run its course. Productions of all types are going to be shooting on it for years to come. I was just saying their customer service sucks and they really need to work on it.

Obviously the people who have invested in RED cameras will continue to pimp their alleged virtues, and are bound to get some work, but I think you'll find it's going to pretty quickly turn into a race for the bottom. So far, despite the hype, they haven't had that stellar a track record. The Epic is surely a vastly better camera than the original RED one, but that's not really saying much, and it's also a much more expensive camera. Yes, a handful of 9-figure productions have used the Epic, but a lot more haven't. Anyway, the proof of the pudding is how many people come back for a second helping, so don't count your turkeys until they've all come home to roost....

Even on Reduser, despite the best attempts of the True Believers, the forum has become deadly dull over the last few months, particularly after it was announced that Scarlet was really going to be "Epic Lite". Outside the Reduser-verse, it's pretty much dead in the water.

Yeah, you can call me names, jump up and down waving your Red Banner, trot out the same tired old list of box office duds from has-been producers, or TV series that lasted one season, if that, or endless sh!t music videos of talentless cookie-cutter wannabes and so on and so on, but reality will not budge.

[Vincent Sweeney]

Again, for me shooting at 1080p is a joke and I would never do it.

You should call up all those top-tier DP's that are shooting "jokes" and show them the light man!

[dave smith]

Sorry Dave,I'm not sure we were reading the same article.The author of the blog is certainly no Red fanboy,and his condemnation seemed to be equally directed at both parties.

Perhaps you should have another look.

The article is full of disparaging comments about Bloom and contains no criticism of Red at all.

[Emanuel A Guedes]

C'mon, we should all put a bit of salt on everything Bloom is able to write in his blogsphere or anywhere else.

I respect the person and especially what he has achieved, integrity and whatever you want but, even a few minutes ago I've read he is being sponsored by Rode. We all know his connections within the industry, Canon, Sony and so on. Arri is just the latest one. So please, give me a break, please Jim Jannard knows very well the error he committed. IMHO he should be more grateful to people like Stephen, as for instance, who cannot have a legion of fanboys as same as Jim or Bloom, but has posted this in these same boards just a few weeks ago:

http://www.cinematog...showtopic=54062

And it is not the first time I write it ;-) BTW, I read Bloom's article before all this controversy and didn't change my idea about what I thought then. Not even one comma of my mind. Just not posted for everyone to take a look at.

[Jim Jannard]

1st off... I'd be surprised if RED has run it's course. My bet is that we have actually pushed the industry to step up. We will continue to do so...

Keith's comments mean nothing to me. Big posts behind a little mouse.

Andrew's post mean everything to me... he is a customer. I'll do whatever it takes to make him happy and solve his issues.

The Philip Bloom situation was a tragedy. I caused that. My fault. A misunderstanding that went terribly wrong. No excuses. My bad. But it had nothing to do with EPIC's capability.

Stephen owns an EPIC. He is respected here. His comments and opinions matter. Stephen wouldn't compromise his reputation for anything. I'd consider listening to what he has to say.

RED is just beginning. We aren't going away... no matter what Phil wishes.

The amount of biggest budget projects shot on EPIC points to the fact that someone thinks EPIC matters. And the number is growing... not the other way around.

We took care of our RED ONE customers with an upgrade path to EPIC. No other company has ever done that. We have upgrade paths for our EPIC customers to the Dragon sensor. Obsolescence obsolete. Truly.

If you don't like our presentation... I get that. But pretending that RED is done or doesn't matter just isn't reality.

Jim

[Jim Jannard]

There are a few significant milestones happening regarding RED.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo will be released in 4K. It is one of the best looking movies ever released. (You can be the judge)

The Hobbit will be released in 4K 3D at several locations. That will be a 1st.

Spiderman 4 will be released in 4K is selected theaters...

There are several more major features that will be released in 4K. The list will grow quite significantly in 2012.

Jim

[Stephen Williams]

There will always be a few people who cant handle Epic, it's a huge step forward from a DSLR. As I usually shoot 35mm, I find the move fairly easy. I continue to be blown away by the images & how much info is there.