The Horror of dead pixels

[tj williams]

So we have a Sony HDCam Camera. Now there are too many dead pixels for the electronics to hide them. Sony would like to charge 20K plus and labor to put in a new pixel block. Yes I know about Lucke. They don't support these cameras.
Sony tech says "maybe caused by flying in airplanes too much"???? Cosmic rays???

So a question for the RED team. after a while even a mysterium will get dead pixels. Heck most sensors have some right out of the box. What are the limits about hiding them? What are the approximate costs to replace a sensor.

[Gregory Karydis]

Good question, I am concerned as well.

[Chris Gearhart]

There was a thread on this earlier:

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?t=420

[Tonaci Tran]

If traveling by plane is a legitimate issue that could cause dead pixels, it would be cool if RED created (of course after the dust settles since they have too much on their plate) a nice futuristic looking case lined with lead making RED safe for travel in the skies.

[PaulClements]

Yeah, and the box has to glow red as you open it so that your face and anyone standing nearby is consumed in the light lol... it'd be like a non-digital filmakers Kryptonite encased in lead

[tj williams]

I told the Sony Tech.... So I should wrap it in lead foil.... Said that would'nt work.... so maybe actual Kryptonite???

[J. Bernard Vallon]

I'm sure that would go real well with airport security: A giant lead-lined case with a glowing red orb on the front.

"Can I see inside sir?"
"No. The cosmic rays will destroy the mysterium inside."

[Jim Arthurs]

My understanding of checked baggage X-ray procedures, from an old Kodak white paper, is that when they scan across a lead film bag they simply "dial it higher", increasing the radiation until they CAN see the contents... which is why Kodak was recommending NOT using the lead bags... ultimately the film would be ruined.

[tj williams]

Jim that is truly amazing....
Who ever thought that ex. fast food workers would be in charge of the nations security.
They must hate anything wrapped in foil?

Wish a RED teamer whould chime in here to let us know..... how many dead pixels can a mysterium hide?????

[tj williams]

RED air transport, gamma radiation, and effect on sensor? thread now covers these concerns. hope we can hear from RED team members about this hardware issue there?

[tj williams]

Having talked to a coupla Nikon techs this is approximately what they said Please bear in mind that I am not a camera tech. and may have misunderstood some of what follows. Nikon pro. sensors are larger than the RED sensor and are also of professional quality:

Regarding dead pixels in Nikon Beyer array.

Nikon professional cameras ship with a maximum of 3 dead pixels.

Over periods of use additional pixels will "die". For most of the SLR Nikon users who are taking 20" and less blowups from a 8K plus arrays this will not be a problem since they cannot see single or even small groups of dead pixels on their output.

Usually in small screen or prints they will not see a single dead pixel since they are so small in a large pixel array. Groups of pixels can be seen and singles can be seen in a theatre sized projection or billboards. In still work this all goes thru photoshop which is quite capable of fixing this problem.

To test your camera for dead pixels shoot an image of a white card blow it up more than 300% in photoshop and check for any not white spots.

What to do about not white spots: Could be dust so clean sensor with special swabs! If cleaining does not remove it, Nikon cameras have a feature "dust reference photo" where you take a white picture and command the camera to mask from adjoining pixels. Then the camera should show no pixels dead unless there are too many at one location.



All This said what does this mean about RED Sensor?

1. Many of us will be shooting for theatrical projection from a 4K sensor. Thus we are shooting for playback on 60" HD tvs and Theatre digital projection from a sensor about 1/2 the pixels of most SLR sensors. Reasonably we will see unmasked "dead" pixels more easily than most SLR users.

2. RED Mysterium may or may not be mask enabled like the Nikon this is now unknown. If this was anticipated by RED design team, which is a reasonable assumption then the masking may be more effective than Nikon.

3. RED Cine may also provide a means of masking "dead" pixels.

4. Mysterium may be especially un-suseptable to this phenomenum. In SLRs it is not clear how common it is and what the causes are since most users do not do work which exposes this problem. Nikon Canon etc. of course do not publish any information on failures rates. It may also be that RAW conversion and output software contains some masking or smearing capability.

3. Probable costs of replacement sensor in an SLR are about $500/600 range so we should assume mysterium will be less since it is made interchangeable and SLR cameras require quite a process to change the sensor.

4. SLR cameras come with a warranty which covers pixel failure. RED warranty has not yet been revealed.

5. It probably makes sense when using the RED to shoot a white card and inspect as part of camera prep.

[Stephen Williams]

3. Probable costs of replacement sensor in an SLR are about $500/600 range so we should assume mysterium will be less since it is made interchangeable and SLR cameras require quite a process to change the sensor.


Hi,

I guess you're joking! A replecement mysterium sensor under $10,000 would be one hell of a bargain IMHO.

Stephen

[tj williams]

Stephen: A sensor is not a camera, I have no idea what a mysterium will cost to replace nor do I know one can compare it with a NIKON. Having already lost 10s of thou because of my dying Sony camera, I'm concerned about the issues above.

Previous estimates on NIKON were from techs who don't bill the customer so I got an actual bid: $225 to replace high end Nikon SLR sensor. aprox. 150 depending on issues to re-program (mask) dead pixels on a specialized computer setup at Nikon Service Center. Cleanin the sensor $40 different info from this tech says to look for white spots against black background. On my previous HD camera we would both shoot a black field and a white field so maybe both are right?

So if a mysterium is twice the price of a 12megapixel Nikon then $500 - 600 is actually a little high? But who knows...maybe it costs $17500 (now there I am joking!)

[Martin Drew]

I think your maths might be a bit out TJ, most SLR sensors don't have as many pixels as the RedOne sensor certainly you have to go pretty high end to get twice as many.

M

[Mark L. Pederson]

there are already several software solutions for masking dead pixels -

PF CLEAN and MOKEY can kill dead pixels with ease.

We are talking about a HELL of a lot less work than traditional dust-busting of film scans.

this is a service all next-gen post houses will offer.

And yeah, sure, I know there are lots of "one-man shows" on this forum who want to do everything themselves ... folks who don't want to go to a post house at all ... but I can assure you that on any feature film above the level of "ultra low budget" - the producers will NOT be allowing the DP to take RED DRIVES home to "process" on their workstation at home ... this is a very unrealistic concept for many reasons.

do not be afraid of dead pixels. be afraid of bad scripts.

[Martin Drew]

And for the "one-man shows" there is Revision Effects Re:Flex plug in for After Effects $595

[Mark L. Pederson]

Yup! I think that is the cheapest option.

Also, I should mention Foundry Forge - all their products kick ass -

[tj williams]

Martin... I think you are right... Much digital stuff I don't know I compared Nikon at 10Megapixels and 4K.. Bigger apple than the Orange...ehhhehehe Oh well. so the pixel count is 10.2 on the NIkon and about 11+ on the RED.

Offhollywood.
Thats certainly true. anything can be fixed. recent doco in Calif/Ariz my partner comes back with a bunch of Sony HD footage having multiple dead pixels which died during the shoot. He took it down to xxxxx a local post production company and they fixed it. His wages for the week of doco shooting 4K the cost of fixing it 4K not a happy day.

Martin its also true that this can be fixed in the desktop computer. This is the path I tried to get my friend to take. rentals of a deck. and computer time and operator time no guarantee and the cost was about 3K

Fixing always costs money. Truly in even a small budgeted feature say 2 or 3 mil this is not an end of the world issue, although it's still gonna cost a producer a bunch of crane, steadicam, extra grips, locations etc. and he is gonna look hard before he uses the same gear again!

[Justin Anderson]

If traveling by plane is a legitimate issue that could cause dead pixels, it would be cool if RED created (of course after the dust settles since they have too much on their plate) a nice futuristic looking case lined with lead making RED safe for travel in the skies.

Or just put a lead liner on 5 sides of the sensor block...

[Mike the beginner]

Hi,

I guess you're joking! A replecement mysterium sensor under $10,000 would be one hell of a bargain IMHO.

Stephen


You are probably near the mark on that one Stephen.

I may be mistaken but i thought someone at red commented some time ago that they actually considered just selling the sensor itself rather than the camera.

Oh and the cost was er....expensive.

TJ if i recall the price was not far short of the camera. I am sure with the huge success of the red one so far (around 1500 reservations) the sensor price has probably come down a bit. Remember the expense of the Dalsa D20 i think? the sensors were really expensive and more than a few failed i gather.

Mike the beginner

[tj williams]

Mike
If that is the case then concerns about
1. dead pixels and whether or not they can be masked
2. warranty issues related to sensor failure
are probably pretty good questions.

[david farland]

......What to do about not white spots: Could be dust so clean sensor with special swabs! If cleaining does not remove it, Nikon cameras have a feature "dust reference photo" where you take a white picture and command the camera to mask from adjoining pixels. Then the camera should show no pixels dead unless there are too many at one location.

All this said what does this mean about RED Sensor?

1. Many of us will be shooting for theatrical projection from a 4K sensor. Thus we are shooting for playback on 60" HD tvs and Theatre digital projection from a sensor about 1/2 the pixels of most SLR sensors. Reasonably we will see unmasked "dead" pixels more easily than most SLR users.

2. RED Mysterium may or may not be mask enabled like the Nikon this is now unknown. If this was anticipated by RED design team, which is a reasonable assumption then the masking may be more effective than Nikon.

3. RED Cine may also provide a means of masking "dead" pixels.

4. Mysterium may be especially un-suseptable to this phenomenum. In SLRs it is not clear how common it is and what the causes are since most users do not do work which exposes this problem. Nikon Canon etc. of course do not publish any information on failures rates. It may also be that RAW conversion and output software contains some masking or smearing capability.

3. Probable costs of replacement sensor in an SLR are about $500/600 range so we should assume mysterium will be less since it is made interchangeable and SLR cameras require quite a process to change the sensor.

Nice thread ...

I'd say,in-camera firmware, as you've mentioned - "dust reference photo" makes a lot of sense, otherwise you'd continually need to do it in REDCINE just for that camera. Best do it at the source cos as you go down stream everything get muddied and I'm sure the process would be more error prone. However that would not help in your friend's situation, where it was discovered after footage was shot. So I guess you'd also want a REDCINE 'post' solution.

To protect it's brand, of a product..well... that hasn't launched yet, I'd think RED would have a pretty aggressive warranty returns policy. But hey, we don't even know what the pixel failure rate in the field will be yet! I'd feel better if in the first six months, this feature isn't on the camera cos it'd mean that RED doesn't have a reason to think pixels might blow.
Cheers,
DF

[Stephen Williams]

But who knows...maybe it costs $17500 (now there I am joking!)

Hi TJ,

Many people believe it maybe more!

Stephen

[Dominic Jones]

When talk first started circulating about this camera and it's price, I remember being literally amazed that anyone was talking about producing a sensor of this spec for anywhere near that price, never mind a complete body...

$10,000, as Stephen says, would be a bargain by any standards.

[david farland]

You hav’n a laugh….aren’t ya boys.

$17,500…….RED One Camera (RED unit price)
$10,000…….Mysterium Sensor (Sony parts price)

DF

[Stephen Williams]

You hav’n a laugh….aren’t ya boys.

$17,500…….RED One Camera (RED unit price)
$10,000…….Mysterium Sensor (Sony parts price)

DF

Hi David,

Rememer Jim is fairly wealthy, he does not need to show a profit in his first year trading. He might be more interested in a large market share and then let the profits flow in later.

Have you by any chance heard of Microsoft? If you look back a few years you will notice their operating system was 1/4 of IBM's, it worked out OK for Bill Gates.

Stephen

[david farland]

Sorry... I thought you guys we just havin' a laugh at TJ......silly me

Jim and co. may make a lot of money in the future….they deserve it for their vision, risk taking, genius, hard work..blah blah blah…and for simply making the world a better place..

….however I don't think he's going to begin by over inflating the replacement price of his defect flagship item!

Cheers,
DF

ps: saw your web site…love your pictures!

[Mike the beginner]

Red are offering us a great camera at a knock down price.

I do not wish to discuss red busines plans but i have read enough to know that the cost to produce the red one for $17,500 is in all probability significantly above $17,500 to produce at 1,000 units.

Red now have around 1500 units to produce. I will be pleased for them if they manage another 1500 in the next 12 months.

It does not matter to me one hoot how much profit or loss they make.

I am very confident that once those first 100 units are out in the field we will all be jammed into this forum searching for every ounce of feedback.

The amazing thing about Jim Jannard is that "he cares a lot about his camera" how it is built and how well it works out in the field. I have no doubts he will provide us with a great product and a great service back up.

We have heard from others who jumped in to be an early user on a particular camera and regretted it! Red will ensure that early beilievers will never regret getting in early with him and his goals.

I wonder how many hours a day these guys are putting in though:biggrin:

Mike the beginner

[tj williams]

Hi Mike/stephen
So I called a Nikon repair depot new Nikon 10mpixel sensor installed costs $225 exact quote>

of course they make many more of these than Mysteriums. even so 10K seems hi to me. Of course if that is right, an who knows? then the post about the life of sensor, the warranty of the sensor, the means of masking dead pixels in the camera. is even more relevant to our costs as operators.
I hope RED folk will chime in to explain some of this prior to NAB

[donatello b]

IMO - the RED team has got to be very busy putting together all the final details .. the final spec's have not been released , the camera probably is finished but the firmware probably still getting tuned ... i've noticed many questions on the boards really are geared toward a released camera ...
prices will be released shortly and by NAB all other details will be released ...
i don't think RED has time to chime in very much in these final days/weeks as we all know when we have a deadline coming up things change day to day ..

RED is creating a camera with unmatched spec's let alone the price..
i think we'll be very pleased with warranty/service etc when they release the info which we all know will be by NAB ...

[Stephen Williams]

….however I don't think he's going to begin by over inflating the replacement price of his defect flagship item!

Cheers,
DF

!

Hi David,

There was a time when Sony would replace a sensor free of charge because their sensors did not have dead pixels!

Stephen

[tj williams]

donatello.... I see your point 30 posts and no one from RED wants to talk about the Mysterium pixels/warranty etc. ...... Guess it's gonna stay, well, a mystery until NAB...

[Brian Broz]

I know with the Arri D20 that there is no way to repair pixel blemishes in camera (based on pixel location / size / color). Not sure exactly how it works, but the An update needs to be sent to the factory and then re-loaded into the camera.
We have recently done a pixel blemish compensation on a Panasonic HDX-900 and the way Panasonic allows you to repair lit pixels (and store the corrections in memory) is quite user friendly and much easier than Sony IMHO.
FWIW

BBroz

[Steve Gibby]

donatello.... I see your point 30 posts and no one from RED wants to talk about the Mysterium pixels/warranty etc. ...... Guess it's gonna stay, well, a mystery until NAB...

I think Dontello is spot on with what he said. RED has a lot on their plate as they sprint down the home stretch to NAB. Their staff is understandably busy. The RED shipping schedule has been confirmed. NAB just five weeks away. The tech specs for RED One have undoubtedly been locked in, but not published yet. 30 posts, 300 posts, 3,000 posts, or 3 million posts is not going to get them to release specs until they are ready. Peppering them with multiple threads and requests for exact specs won't force them to answer you. For the past 15 months RED has been unbelievably good and refreshingly open when it comes to sharing their thoughts and taking suggestions. They've shown that they pay close attention to details. Their team is undoubtedly aware of tech issues with camera systems, like the dead/dropped pixels subject of this thread. Let's just give them some breathing room and exercise a little patience until NAB.

[tj williams]

Hi Gibby

Compared to Sony Panasonic etc. The RED folk are completely open and have published far more data about the upcoming camera and have listened more to users by a wide margin.



Peppering them with multiple threads and requests for exact specs won't force them to answer you.

That seems a little harsh to me... From my point of view asking questions about potential problems, about features we want, about ways of approaching work flow, about literally hundreds of concerns, from all of us who have asked a lot of pretty good questions provides the RED team with valuable feedback. As a designer I'd think that various problems brought up and discussed would be of much more help than a bunch of fan flattery.

[Jannard]

We have 1000 problems to solve... make no mistake that this is an undertaking of epic proportions. We had an incredible day yesterday. A big celebration of passing a major hurdle. But we still have a lot to do in a very short period of time. We will post prices on Monday. We will be at NAB with a working camera. We will show 4K REDCODE footage on a 4k Projector at NAB. We will try to ship the 1st cameras very near to the NAB timeframe. We have great announcements at NAB. But trust me... this is the most difficult task I have ever been associated with. And I LIKE IT.

Jim

[Jannard]

As it relates to dead pixels... every sensor has dead pixels. And every RED sensor has a dead pixel map with dead pixel correction. No RED sensor will have dead columns or dead rows. If there is any way to see dead pixels in the footage... it is rejected. Dead pixels are not acceptable in RED footage. Period. If you receive a camera and see dead pixels in your footage, we will fix it. I would not accept a camera that had dead pixels and neither should you.

Jim

[Gordon Prince]

We will try to ship the 1st cameras very near to the NAB timeframe.

Mr. Jannard, is there any similar chance for the 101-200 reservations...?

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?t=751

Thank you.

[Steve Gibby]

Hi Gibby

That seems a little harsh to me... From my point of view asking questions about potential problems, about features we want, about ways of approaching work flow, about literally hundreds of concerns, from all of us who have asked a lot of pretty good questions provides the RED team with valuable feedback. As a designer I'd think that various problems brought up and discussed would be of much more help than a bunch of fan flattery.

I’m exactly the wrong guy to make that comment to. Since December 2005 I’ve posted more RED questions, suggestions, and feedback than almost anyone on the planet - from day one of the establishment of RED User in December 2006, and day one of the establishment of the DVX User RED Forum (December 2005), and the DV Info Net RED Forum (December 2005). My RED forum posting totals on the three RED forums since December 2005 are as follows:

Red User = 273 posts
DVX RED User Forum = 502 posts
DV Info RED Forum = 320 posts
Total RED forum posts for me = 1095

As posted on forum member lists, your posting totals on RED forums are:

RED User = 210 posts
DVX RED User = 1 post
DV Info RED Forum = 0 posts (not a member)
Total RED forum posts for you = 211

In addition, I volunteered thousands of hours out of my busy production schedule to be a moderator for the DVX User RED Forum and the DV Info RED Forum for several months in 2006, until my production schedule caused me to give up being a moderator for those RED forums.

Summary
If the publicly available RED forum member lists are correct, you are a relative newcomer to the process of giving online tech suggestions to the RED Team. Those records show that you were never a member of the DV Info RED forum, only gave one RED-oriented post to the DVX User RED forum in it’s year-long existence, and now since mid-January of this year you have posted 210 posts on this RED User forum. In contrast, I joined all three RED forums as soon as they were formed, DVX User and DV Info in December 2005, and RED User in December 2006, and I have posted 1095 RED-oriented posts. In my RED forum posts you will find literally hundreds of camera feature suggestions, concerns, and feedback that I submitted to RED – including hundreds of posts I made long before you ever started posting on RED forums. In my post #34 of this thread I said that the RED Team “is undoubtedly aware of the tech issues with camera systems, like the dead/dropped pixel subject of this thread”. In Jim’s post #37 that followed, he verified exactly that. In my post #34 I mentioned how busy the RED Team must be as they finish up the camera and get ready to ship it. In Jim’s post #36 he confirmed just that.

As I’ve itemized, I’ve been posting suggestions to RED since they announced their camera system – long before you started posting suggestions to them. Making a statement to me like you did is simply singing to the choir. All this said, each member of the RED forums and reservers of RED cameras, are important contributors on this forum and others. RED has always welcomed the posting of suggestions, criticisms, and concerns. I think everyone’s input has been valuable to the RED development process – yours included. Except for one DVX User RED Forum post you made in mid-2006, your input to RED started late in the RED One development process. You started posting on RED User in mid-January, about six weeks ago. Better late than never, but starting to make suggestions and voice concerns at such a late date in RED’s development and suggestion cycle means that 1) Many of your suggestions/concerns have already been suggested by others over the past 15 months (search tool will verify) 2) suggestions at the 11th hour may not be able to be incorporated in the camera. 3) some respect for those who have contributed to the suggestion/concern process from the very beginning should be given by newcomers. At this point the camera system specs have undoubtedly been locked down. I think RED has been really thorough in listening to input and paying attention to details. I don’t expect a perfect camera system, that’s an impossibility. I do expect a well-engineered, high-quality camera system, and I feel that is what will be delivered.


-------------------------------------------------


We all look forward to getting our RED cameras and plugging them into our workspaces. There are many questions about RED cameras that will only be answered by using them on the set or on location. I’m convinced that RED has been thorough in the development of the RED camera system. I felt they would be, thus I reserved my RED cameras and lenses early in the development cycle. I think you have some very good real world production experience, and your suggestions/concerns shed some important light on many issues. If you’re at NAB I’ll look forward to meeting you and chatting in person. We’re all part of the overall RED family of adopters. That’s some good common ground…

[Joel Kaye]

We’re all part of the overall RED family of adopters. That’s some good common ground…

Good post Gibby. At this late date is there are a lot of people just getting interested who don't know the history you posted. Anyone with a RED reservation under 350 or so signed up in the first month a year ago. I know I called the first day and am still way down at #141.

Since then RED has been unbelievable at taking hundreds, perhaps thousands of suggestions from many experienced people. It's not quite an open source project, but it's probably as close as anything like this could ever get. It's one reason I'm so confident RED will completely kick-ass.

No one has cause to criticize the RED team's desire to listen and implement as much as reasonably possible within their price point. Yeah - call me a fanboy, but it is because I've been watching and posting a lot regarding design ideas way back when and have seen many of those ideas implemented. But will the kitchen sink be in RED too? Maybe. :weight_lift:

[david farland]

I’m exactly the wrong guy to make that comment to.....

.......We’re all part of the overall RED family of adopters. That’s some good common ground…

Gibby,
Usually I learn a lot of good things from your posts.....not that one!

TJ was obviously defending your comment that he was bugging them on multiple threads e.g..window sensor spec....probably was.

....not implying anything about yourself!

DF

[tj williams]

Hi Gibby,

RE my post 35 and your 39 I must not be making myself clear. I have read a great many of your posts both recent and by searching the archives. I have found as I'm sure most do, that your insights are well worth reading. I suspect that the final RED 1 camera will reflect many of your concerns. I have reviewed my post as far as I can tell there is nowhere in my post where I said or in any way implied anything negative about your many helpful posts. Certainly I'm quite aware that you have been long term involved whereas I'm a recent purchaser #1150 and have mostly only posted since then.

What I did say is two things:

1. "peppering etc." seemed critical of my asking the very type of questions and trying to get a discussion of topics similiar to many you have written. It's true that I asked this on another thread and when rob brought up that he didn't feel it was congruent with that thread I started a thread. I thought that was cooperative not somehow "peppering etc."

2. That compared to all the major manufacturers of electronic cameras the RED team has been far more open and interested in the questions and opinions than any of the manufacturers.

Even though I have come late to the party, I believe these are the kind of developers who will be interested in constantly improving their product. In fact they have made much of the end of obsolescence. I therefore believe that questions and concerns are not over as even if our concerns and desires cannot be included in RED 1 they may be in version 1.1

RED leader, thanks for the clarification about the sensor. This sounds similiar to the way NIKON has handled this problem which has been very successful.
As a person who has lost 10s ofK due to Sony pixelfailure, I especially appreciate the confirmation that the RED team has solved this problem and also that you are standing behind your sensor in such a strong way.

[Michael Hastings]

I agree that the cost of the mysterium is not anywhere near the 10K figure.

If Nikon will replace it for $225 including labor then the chip itself would be about $125 or less RETAIL and Nikon's cost would be on the order of $25 or less. (Keep in mind that I just bought a 6.1 megapixel Vivitar camera with a 3X zoom, a flash, battery, firmware, USB, 2.5" LCD, movie mode, video out etc. - for $99!!! retail at Office Depot - on sale but regular price is only $149 and it takes pretty darn good pictures. No creativity allowed but good for a lot of situations.)

Here's my ballpark guess - I would bet $100 that the Mysterium at the 2000 pc price is less than $1000, I would I would give 2 to 1 on that bet that it is less than $1500, 3 to 1 that it is less than $2000 and 4 to 1 that it is less than $2500. I would be somewhat surprised if all of the direct costs - that is Mysterium, all circuit boards and components, connectors, Machined body, LCD, etc., and direct assembly labor add up to more than $6000 and very surprised if it added up to more than $10,000.

I have been doing short run manufacturing for 25 years and have a sense of what is involved, but the other reason I say it is because not a month before NAB last year a friend of mine and I were talking about the whole 24 p issue in video and I said that I wouldn't be surprised if someone like Nikon souped up one of their DSLRs to do 24 frames a second - that they aren't that far off now and with the new larger memory cards it was really just a matter of speeding up the chip readout and memory interface. People already use DSLRs for time lapse. They already have all of the pieces. I picked NIKON because Canon probably wouldn't want to undermine their broadcast lens business, since Sony, Panasonic, Ikegami, JVC, etc. would be annoyed and push Fujinon instead, but Nikon hasn't been in broadcast lenses in 10 years or so. This goes to one of the reasons that RED is feasible - they have no ongoing customer base to service, no other product lines to fit it around, no legacy products to match like remotes, CCUs, etc. Second RED is basically creating a package of existing technologies but the gestalt is somewhat revolutionary. Similar to what Apple did in the beginning.

And don't feel that anyone is getting screwed if the gross profit is 2, 3, or 4 times the direct costs - you have to have that to be a viable business. My guess is that we early reservers I'm #206 are essentially getting the eventual dealer price for being first and buying direct. In other words I suspect that RED will jump to close to $25K when the backlog is caught up and more conservative customers see that it actually works.




Hi Mike/stephen
So I called a Nikon repair depot new Nikon 10mpixel sensor installed costs $225 exact quote>

of course they make many more of these than Mysteriums. even so 10K seems hi to me. Of course if that is right, an who knows? then the post about the life of sensor, the warranty of the sensor, the means of masking dead pixels in the camera. is even more relevant to our costs as operators.
I hope RED folk will chime in to explain some of this prior to NAB

[tj williams]

Hi Aqua...
My experience in fabrication says you are just about right about costs. Which is great cause this means RED camera, is a viable business from the get go and therefore will be around, not dropped and leaving us with orphan products. Because of the RED team leader's strong response to questions about pixels and their method of correcting pixels I feel very confident that dead pixels will not show up in new cameras and RED warranty will be covering the chip in a complete way. I just wish there was an opportunity to buy stock! This would be better than Starbucks! and I'm in Seattle...lol


RED LEADER


Dead pixels are not acceptable in RED footage. Period. If you receive a camera and see dead pixels in your footage, we will fix it. I would not accept a camera that had dead pixels and neither should you.

Brian: My partner and I have considered the Panasonic HDX900 as a replacement for our Sony. It does seem to be a better system, more easily usable. The Sony manual masking system daunts even experienced techs. The problem with both these systems is that they use a buffer memory to store the correcting information and the buffer can fill then you need to go to an after-market person who will do a buffer addition so you can continue to correct dead pixels. The red method if I understood correctly will have no limit about it's ability to mask pixels. With this many pixels, at least for HD level work we will all be dead before there are so many masked pixels that it shows.

[Steve Gibby]

TJ,

No worries...

Misunderstandings are common in a forum environment. I felt the comments in your Post #35 were intended to educate me on the importance and function of RED forums as avenues for communicating input, concerns, and questions to RED. Taking your post that way, my Post #39 was a summary of the fact that I’ve had the flick on that since the announcement of the RED One system. My Post #39 was a reaction to your Post #35, which was a reaction to my Post #34, which was a reaction to your Post #32. Your Post #42 clarifies what you meant in your earlier posts, thus now it’s clear that we simply had a misunderstanding.

I didn't intend the word "peppered" as strongly as you took it. I used that word to illustrate the action of posting similar questions on multiple threads – something termed cross posting in the forum rules. We're all anxious to continuously get more info on the RED One system. Forums like this are intended to be a place where we can discuss, raise issues, ask questions, and get answers. RED User, and before that DVX User RED forum, have been ground zero for giving suggestions and getting info.

The communication via RED forums, between RED, and us, their customers, will never stop. Jim Jannard has stated his intention to make RED the best digital cinema camera company in the world. He’s a guy with a track record of reaching his goals. RED will get to that goal, and stay there, by continuously listening to feedback and suggestions from the front lines – the actual cine-style and EFP-style end users of their products. If they stop listening, which I don’t believe they ever will, then they will be in danger of drifting out of touch with their customers and the realities of a rapidly evolving production environment. Nothing is static – everything is dynamic. Technology won’t stand still – and RED can’t either. I believe RED is here to stay, and that they will always welcome input and suggestions about their products. If they didn’t operate that way, I simply wouldn’t have decided to purchase their products.

I hope this clarifies my thinking on these issues. I think it’s time to move on. C-ya at NAB!

[tj williams]

Hi Gibby,
I'm not a big internet forum guy. Other than the Steadicam forum where we all use our own names, I haven't posted much in the past. Thanks for taking the time to understand that we misunderstood each other. I'm much more fun in person than on a keyboard.
All The Best,
TJ

[Joel Kaye]

more fun in person than on a keyboard.

In person everyone gets to see each other's expression, vocal tone and can clarify themselves very quickly. It's so easy on a forum for miscommunications to happen. (heck, they happen in the real world despite all the additional feedback)

Ultimately everyone here wants the same thing - an easy to use camera that lives up to the hype. And a company that listens. I think we're getting that.