HD For Indies

Red Digital Cinema Camera

This started out as a summary of Red for my (almost done, I swear) NAB wrap-up, but I decided to break it out as it's own article for now.

I'm writing this on May 22nd, nearly a month since NAB 2006 started. Since that time, I STILL feel that the Red is an incredibly exciting product under development that could and should profoundly change the market for HD cameras anywhere NEAR it's price point. As with all products under development from a new company, they run risks: risks of delays, risks of unexpected complications due to any v1.0 product, etc. But knowing even just the subset of the team involved, I think they stand an excellent chance for success.

In my mind, the two biggest unknowns for Red (or risks, pick your phrasing) are below. The other issues - the workflow, the codecs, the storage, the price point, etc. - all that stuff is either known (price & workflow) or I'm comfortable/confident with progress and direction (based on my weekly or more often interaction with the team). So the unknowns are these:

1.) Time to market - this is an ambitious, complex product and project from a brand new company that has not done this before, nor has this particular team worked together before. As with ANYONE doing something along these lines under those circumstances, that introduces risks of the unknown. With all of the areas in which they are trying to break new ground, there are also risks of It'll Just Take Longer. I call it the Space Shuttle Syndrome - if you've been building things with dozens of parts and a 1 in a million chance of failure and that's been great for you so far, and now you suddenly need to build something MUCH more complicated than before (like the space shuttle) with 2 million moving parts, suddenly things just got a whole lot logistically more complex. (Note that means a 2:1 chance something will fail at that point.) I also hope they avoid the Mythical Man Month problem, wherein a project starts running late so you throw more manpower at it, and it can actualy slow things DOWN if it is an engineering related product. In any case, I'd hate to see this product get substatially delayed - it would hurt the industry's perception of them as serious, and the longer a product takes to get to market the less valuable/valid it is perceived as. The Kinetta is an excellent example of this - Jeff Kreines is a smart, nice guy, I wish him all the luck in the world, but we've been waiting YEARS to see this camera ship - I saw him discuss it at NAB 2004, and we're STILL waiting on it. The company claims it is because they are waiting on AltaSens to deliver a sensor that is good enough for their needs. OK, fine. But regardless of why, we're still waiting. I'd hate to see something slow down Red's delivery to market in a similar way. Panasonic's HVX200 was also "going to ship pretty soon now" for a loooooong time, and a lot of people got pretty impatient for them (but it turned out well for Panasonic, it's a good little camera). Those are the Cons and risks. On the Pro side, Jim Jannard and Ted Schilowitz have seen a lot of complex products delivered to market, and between the two of them have a lot of expertise in birthing logistically complex products. Their outside consultants that I've met are top notch (Stuart English is a great example of that, he's considered the father of the Varicam).

2.) Image quality - I have no reason to doubt what the Red team is claiming, and they're claiming a LOT - huge resolution, great dynamic range, a commitment to working with and/or providing quality lenses, etc. But no test footage has been seen outside the core team (I haven't seen any test footage yet, I can't TELL you how many times I've been asked that one, so NO, I haven't seen any yet!), so nobody outside Red knows. The camera concept is great, the workflow sounds great, the price is right, but we'l need to see the image quality to know whether this is an interesting diversion or a real sea change in the industry. I'm less concerned about this risk than the timeliness factor based on my conversations with various people on the project, but it is still an unknown for this product. In short, big complicated things take longer than one expects, especially when there is new stuff involved.

But I'm optimistic - without knowing anything about the internal pace of progress on the product (and if I do learn stuff about that, I'll quit writing about it because it won't be fair to them), my gut says they are going to take longer than their best-case scenario they talked about at NAB. They were VERY clear that the stated goal of shipping first units by end of 2006 was an ENGINEERING TARGET, NOT a promised ship date when they discussed at NAB. But just looking at the ambitiousness of the project, looking at the complexity of the product, looking at all the brand-new things they're doing, looking at the fact that while the team is very experienced and the individuals involved are top notch, it's just a LOT to get done in that timeframe, and my gut says I wouldn't be too terribly surprised to see it ship first units in early spring and in bulk by April to June, or perhaps even later. Now, to be perfectly clear, I have ZERO inside information about this, this isn't leaked info to soften the market to get used to the idea, this is just my personal read on the situation based on the facts stated above, based on my experience working with large complex projects in the past (I used to work at frogdesign, where industrial design, interface design, software development and product design all mingled in a vaguely similar way to the Red project). I am NOT saying it WILL take that long, I'm just personally prepared for it to take that long and not be too surprised about it. Could take longer, I dunno. If they meet their engineering target of end of 2006 for first units, I'll be delighted and if I'm around them I'd be first to lift a glass and congratulate them (I want to play with this camera too, and BADLY).

But I remain optimistic that they WILL ship this camera, it'll work as advertised, and it'll be a Killer Thing for indies trying to make digital movies, at a price point that makes the alternatives look (foolish? silly?) ah - shall we say "unwise." The core concepts driving the development are true to good filmmaking, not coming from "we have this bizarro tech, how can we productize it." The team is well experienced in the practicalities of product development, optics, industrial design, shake and bake testing, shooting in the real world, codecs, etc.; the advisory panel is wide ranging and well experienced, and most importantly, there will be no BS crippling of the product to defend a legacy market or "hold back for the next release" - they are gung ho on making this the best possible camera they can.

So my take on it? This may not be a good year to buy an HD camera with options such as this due next year. Is it worth putting money down on it? I'd say this - if you think you MIGHT want one, and can afford to let them hold your $1000 until it ships (whenever that might be, and you can get your money back any time, no questions asked, and he's a billionaire, so I don't think you need to worry about him running off with a few hundred thousand dollars in pre-orders), it seems like a good idea to me, and for my shooter friends, I tell them to rent this year, put money down, and be ready to be VERY happy some time next year. I honestly believe that, and that's what I say to my close friends when they ask face to face.

Another thing that bodes well for Red - they are just the right size. They are big enough and well funded enough that they won't be resource starved to do what they need to do, and small enough to still be nimble. If some of the existing players are oil tankers - large, slow, but efficient at delivering a LOT of product given enough time; Red is a cigarette boat - turns on a dime, delivers a goodly chunk of product and in a big hurry. They have no legacy markets to protect, such as "We can't go tapeless, what about our VTR division!" so that they can do whatever they think is best for the PRODUCT. And this is a product driven company, where the company serves the product, not the other way around. Why do I say this? Is it naive to say so? Look at it this way, and allow me to be somewhat crass for a moment - this is Jim Jannard's personal project. Perhaps even his pet project if you wanted to look at it this way. The guy founded Oakley and owns the majority of it. His net worth is so far in excess of all the money that Red could likely make, that it just doesn't matter. Red is about Jim putting himself and his reputation on the line to make something great. Do you REALLY think the billionaire is going to make a flunky little product and not care about how it turns out, especially after the guy has spent decades being obsessed with optics and cameras? Jim's already publicly said that if the product doesn't sell and he just gets one to use for himself he'd be happy. And I think that's a key ingredient to this whole thing. But of course, I DO think the camera is going to sell, and sell well, especially once test footage is seen and the product is in production.

Personally, I think the camera sounds great, and as a post guy, if they can pull off what they are talking about, it'll be fantastic.

Great TRUE resolution, fantastic high quality workflow, killer price point, and a commitment to making great gear promise to make Red an industry changer.

Well, I've certainly written extensively on this one before, so if you missed it, here's everything I've had to say about it to date:

Dec 6, 2005 - New Digital Cinema Camera Coming: RED. 4K. 60p. RAW format. Wow. 

Dec. 7, 2005 - More Thoughts on RED camera

Dec 16, 2005 - HD For Indies Exclusive: The Scoop on the RED camera-YES it's for real - this was the biggie that started it, and this is what Yahoo and the AP linked to

Dec 18, 2005 - What features do you want to see on Red?

Dec. 18, 2005 - RED Camera - out in "late 2006" according to Jannard

Dec 18, 2005 - More info on RED, including from Jim Jannard himself 

Dec 19, 2005 - DVInfo.net has a thread to discuss Red Cameras

Jan 8, 2006 - Quick update on RED - Graeme Nattress joins the team

Feb 1, 2006 - HD4NDs Exclusive Interview with Jim Jannard, founder of RED camera (this is a good one)

April 9, 2006 - Red changes their site for NAB

April 14, 2006 - HD4NDs Exclusive: Ted Schilowitz, now "Leader of the Rebellion" for Red Cameras, talks about Red & NAB 

April 22, 2006 - Article on Red up at DV.com

April 24, 2006 - All the Scoop on the Red Camera... (from the show floor at NAB 2006)

April 24, 2006 - NAB 2006: Details on shooting modes with the Red camera - this is a GOOD one if you want to understand your shooting and recording options

April 24, 2006 - NAB 2006: Red One Camera pricing and availability

April 24, 2006 - Red site has been updated with pricing and details (this was Day One of NAB 2006, the product launch)

April 24, 2006 - NAB 2006: All the specs on Red (finally!)

April 24, 2006 - NAB 2006: End of Day One Report-Red, Apple, G-Tech

April 25, 2006 - NAB 2006 - Day Two in the RED Booth

April 26, 2006 - Studio Daily | First Look at RED! DESCRIPTION - Steve Gibby did a great interview with Jim Jannard, founder of RED - LOTS of good details in this one

April 26, 2006 - Mike's Thoughts on the Theory Behind the Red One Camera

April 26, 2006 - Exclusive, Behind the Scenes Pictures from the NAB Red Booth and more

April 27, 2006 - Red Digital Cinema Camera wins award at NAB 2006

April 29, 2006 - Interview with Ted Schilowitz of Red on the DCS site

April 28, 2006 - Filmshots interview with Ted Schilowitz of Red Digital Cinema Camera Company

May 1, 2006 - Red - not available in silver - rendering in black of Red digital prototype

May 15, 2006 - Latest Red Cage One rendering - what do YOU folks think?

May 23, 2006 -
Videos from Day One of NAB 2006 - pricing first announced.

Labels: Red