HD For Indies

(click for bigger view)
Several things of interest concerning the Red One camera have happened in the last 24 hours:

First Pictures of "Spike" - the first Red One functional prototype (a different pic than above)

Jim Jannard, Red founder, said on DVXuser.com (click for picture):

Here is a quick sneak preview of "Spike" before final assembly. It is a bit later in December than we had hoped for, but here she is. This is aluminum "Spike" and NOT a rendering. As soon as she is locked and loaded, we will post more images on the new www.reduser.net website, which should go live tomorrow. This is NOT from production tooling. It was machined at the RED garage in Orange County. She should be operational shortly (days, not weeks).

We have chosen not to show internals for obvious reasons... AND production RED ONE will NOT be shiny silver. :-)

Someone asked in that thread about whether reservations would open up again, Jim responded:

Chris... we have thought about this often. It is possible that we will open up reservations for a few days (maybe 3) early next year. The terms and pricing will be slightly different than the 1st round of reservations, but good just the same. We will absolutely open up for firm orders at NAB. My bet is that you would want to get in before that.

Somebody else asked if they are just now putting together prototypes, whether this would affect ship date, Jim responded:

The only timeline we have officially published is: 4k footage in the fall (2006)... we were two weeks early, our 1st camera together in December (that would be Spike), and production early in 2007. What we do with test cameras until shipping we reserve the right to do in private, especially since our plans change daily. Test units will certainly be out before production, but I don't want to commit to when, where, who and why. We'll keep you posted as we go along, but we have enough pressure to ship early 2007. We will not be held accountable for any other milestones.

While we have said that shipping 1st production units around NAB is our goal, "early" can technically be May 31st.


My read: if they are just getting the shell ready on Wednesday the 27th, that's good that it is ready. Far more important and challenging is the status of the guts of the thing and whether they are ready to go in and WORK. If the guts are ready to go in, they're in good shape. Ideally, they'd flip it on and shoot ANYTHING (how about Jim's smiling mug?) just to say "Did it!" and squeeze under the "in 2006" self-imposed target date. And if there is a snafu that pushes them back a week...I don't really care, they would still be generally on track. I'm not so concerned about shipping on a given day (although a big "We Are Shipping!" banner at NAB booth would have great PR value), as I'm concerned about shipping in GENERAL - if I can get mine by summer (and I mean the "normal" definition of June-August), I'll personally be satisfied...and I don't have an exceptionally low reservation number.

Jim mentions their goal is to ship "around NAB" - even that leaves them some slack. But it does sound like they will absolutely have working units, perhaps even production units, in the booth at NAB. And for PR and market reasons, that's the most important thing to have done.

There's also another picture here:

another "Spike" sneak peek... - Reduser.net

You'll notice that is on Reduser.net - it is the new new, Red specific forum board, started by DVXuser.com's Jarred Land.

Site looks good Jarred!

If you were a member of dvxuser.com you'll need to register again for reduser.net. The Red threads on DVXuser.com will be locked down in the next day or two for archival purposes, so start going to reduser.net for your new info. I predict that is where most of the up-to-the-minute skinny will happen, I'm just skimming the cream off and reporting it here (until Jarred barks at me to link not quote!) : )

So go sign up so you can see everything and post your own thoughts and questions over there.

And as always, check the above threads, lots of discussion/conversation going on over there. If you have a question, post it here (using Comments link below) or over on dvxuser or reduser and the Red team will usually respond pretty quickly.

-mike

PS - oops, I actually got at least one of these quotes from this thread on DVinfo.net:

Spike Sneak Preview... - The Digital Video Information Network