Thanks to 300...

[Peter Matthes]

Thanks to Mike Seymoure and Tonaci for there twittering, this was first class information.

+1

Had it not been for Mike's tweets, I would not have known that Bomb Squad reps could be reached last night.

Also, a big thank you to Marco Montenegro for working so late.

P.S. I still hate Twitter.

[Steve Johnson]

So let me add to this by saving thanks to everyone involved.

I also want to expand on a post I made on twitter.

We walked into the room - straight from the very $$$ canon event.
There was a group of several hundred Red customers sitting around on fold out chairs - looking at a not very animated or informative screen while trying to get a signal themselves on whatever laptop/ipad/phones they had... after watching some great show reel stuff - it became apparent that there were serious server issues. They were people rolling their eyes and just talking amongst themselves - but the atmosphere was mild, and going down, at this point no music, no flashing lights... just a dull wait.

It seems like Jim, and nearly all the senior team were off in another area either trying to post, or trying to sort out servers... and so the users sat and waited... now there was some catering but this was no expensive open bar... it was OK but not a party set up with expensive waiters etc - I am talking a table and a small queue of semi-bored people - waiting for anything to happen.

At this point Red's Scarlet launch could have gone one of two ways.
Option 1 : Management annoyed at the external server crashes - cancels the event - says sorry and tries to reschedule... standard approach - which would have been a PR nightmare, let's face it earlier at Canon there was an ARMY of PR handlers - staff, - VIP suites etc etc - nothing went wrong - it was perfect ... In Red's position - most companies would have bailed and the CEO would have been annoyed but certainly justified in cancelling the event.

Option 2: Walk out in front of the semi-disappointed mob and give a personal heartfelt honest - this is where it is - I am personally going to tell you - talk. Stand and answer questions until you can get a bunch of cameras in here for people to look and play with. Jim turned a PR nightmare into a near religious rally - and his customers loved him for it. He was transparent - and direct and turned 300 annoyed customers into 300 product evangelists. It was one of the most impressive displays by a CEO I have ever seen. Even the Mic did not work when he stepped up. But one thing did work - his singular belief in what he was doing and saying... and this honest approach just inspiring to see.
At 6:23 - it was a lame party and a bitter disappointment in the making
at 6:30 - it was the only place on the planet to be - the only room to be in if you cared about digital cinematography and thinking outside the box. It literally suddenly became the coolest empty bit of soundstage in Hollywood. One guy - no crap - not even a working Mic and 300 customers who totally walked at the door thinking this company cared about them.

I am sorry for those of you who would have liked to have been there and could not be, and who suffered that painful internet experience of nothing on refresh - but for a small band - a rare few of us...it was inspiring. I wish you could have all seen it.

Mike

Truly inspiring post Mike!

THANK YOU for all the posts you did, and the other guys to get the message out to us all on Twitter - I know we where all retweeting your tweets to our follows to get the messages out.

THANK YOU!

[Kingi Finlayson]

This my first post, lol.

I just want to say thank you Jim. Thank you for doing what was best FOR US. I know that you and your team have made tough decisions with Scarlet X. I agree with many that those decisions are truly historic. For me, it fills my heart with sincere gratitude, to have someone IN OUR CORNER. Someone doing what is right FOR US. I look forward to shooting many films on my Scarlet X.

Thank you again.

[Christopher Adams]

It actually turned into a good thing that we got raided. The 300 turned into a team on a mission to help us get the word out. It was really impressive to see everyone step up to solve the problem....
Jim

So Jim.. Does that mean down the line there will be a spartan camera?

[Andy White]

Well - it's really interesting that the eventual no hype event and the coming together in time of need feelings that have been created here... Red family et al.

One thing to be thankful for is the fact that it was an open event with 3rd parties there... :)

The slow trickle of info & specs via Twitter and feeds etc, was tantalizing and (to be honest) probably more fun than the 'full on' originally planned event with everything presented in detail.

Bottom line is this will do great things for Red's reputation (amongst those who doubt) and now, at last, we know the specs of the Scarlet.

Thanks to all - it was fun (and very old school in a way) as events unfolded!

[Jeff Brown]

Jim, from the thread title I thought you were thanking the C300.

If I were you I'd be thanking Canon too....:)

[Bill Anderson]

Mike Seymour: great description of the event, and many thanks for posting updates last night. I was looking over your shoulder all night.

[Lauri Kettunen]

Just curious about the history and how the reasoning has developed at Red; When Scarlet was announced for the first time remember thinking that the DSMC concept involved deliberately a hole for Red One as a 4K camera. In other words, it appeared like it did not make sense to introduce a (plan for a) 4K Scarlet instead of the 3K one as that would have rendered Red One obsolete. But now, three years later 3K capturing targeting to HD and 2K delivery is also not-the-future, and hence, the obvious decision was to go to 5K capture and 4K delivery, and furthermore, Red One was given the position it deserves as the celebrated first generation Red camera?

[Ben Coleman]

So let me add to this by saving thanks to everyone involved.

I also want to expand on a post I made on twitter.

We walked into the room - straight from the very $$$ canon event.
There was a group of several hundred Red customers sitting around on fold out chairs - looking at a not very animated or informative screen while trying to get a signal themselves on whatever laptop/ipad/phones they had... after watching some great show reel stuff - it became apparent that there were serious server issues. They were people rolling their eyes and just talking amongst themselves - but the atmosphere was mild, and going down, at this point no music, no flashing lights... just a dull wait.

It seems like Jim, and nearly all the senior team were off in another area either trying to post, or trying to sort out servers... and so the users sat and waited... now there was some catering but this was no expensive open bar... it was OK but not a party set up with expensive waiters etc - I am talking a table and a small queue of semi-bored people - waiting for anything to happen.

At this point Red's Scarlet launch could have gone one of two ways.
Option 1 : Management annoyed at the external server crashes - cancels the event - says sorry and tries to reschedule... standard approach - which would have been a PR nightmare, let's face it earlier at Canon there was an ARMY of PR handlers - staff, - VIP suites etc etc - nothing went wrong - it was perfect ... In Red's position - most companies would have bailed and the CEO would have been annoyed but certainly justified in cancelling the event.

Option 2: Walk out in front of the semi-disappointed mob and give a personal heartfelt honest - this is where it is - I am personally going to tell you - talk. Stand and answer questions until you can get a bunch of cameras in here for people to look and play with. Jim turned a PR nightmare into a near religious rally - and his customers loved him for it. He was transparent - and direct and turned 300 annoyed customers into 300 product evangelists. It was one of the most impressive displays by a CEO I have ever seen. Even the Mic did not work when he stepped up. But one thing did work - his singular belief in what he was doing and saying... and this honest approach just inspiring to see.
At 6:23 - it was a lame party and a bitter disappointment in the making
at 6:30 - it was the only place on the planet to be - the only room to be in if you cared about digital cinematography and thinking outside the box. It literally suddenly became the coolest empty bit of soundstage in Hollywood. One guy - no crap - not even a working Mic and 300 customers who totally walked at the door thinking this company cared about them.

I am sorry for those of you who would have liked to have been there and could not be, and who suffered that painful internet experience of nothing on refresh - but for a small band - a rare few of us...it was inspiring. I wish you could have all seen it.

Mike

Mike,
You made it all worthwhile for us that couldn't be there or see anything. I followed your tweets the whole time. Other than being slightly frustrated that I couldn't get red.com to load having the info streaming out in real time eased the pain. This morning my first Red product was ordered and is sure to be the first of many.

To Jim, congrats on a perfect "Red Style" product launch. There always has to be a touch of drama for these things for Red, it keeps it real and gives Red their character. We don't need to to go perfect like Canon, that was boring.

Thanks again everyone that was there making it happen!

[SeanBrown]

How many Scarelt's were ordered?