Lucas' Digital Impact?

[Matthew W. Phillips]

I dunno... I swear the Red website had it listed at $12,500... That has been over 10 years now so I might well be wrong about that, but for some reason 12.5 sticks in my head as the starting price - because I was a 19 years ogling over wishing I could afford. Can't find it now, and all the posts and things I see from back then say 17.5... Maybe 12.5 was the pre-order price, or a deal they where running at the time. Dunno, but I KNOW I saw 12.5 on their website for the base camera at some point around or before its release.

If I would have preordered at 17.5 and then it was on sale for 12.5, I would have been real pissed off. :D Not that it mattered because the price nose-dived once people realized that RED did not make obsolescence obsolete.

[Landon D. Parks]

It could have maybe been a year after release and I was looking at a battle-tested model? Don't really know for sure can't remember much back that far.

[Brian Drysdale]

I feel this site has a disconnect from the real world outside of Hollywood about the budget size spectrum. In Hollywood, sure, 5 million is "low budget." What you call micro-budget would probably be considered low-budget in smaller film markets and what you would call "no-budget" would be called micro-budget. Is anyone aware of just how poverty it is in smaller markets? Features are made for less than $10k in many markets. RED One in its prime was looking at no less than $500/day for the body if you rented unless you "knew a guy."

 

I would call £250,000 low budget, micro budget is less than £25k I know of one Euro 50K feature that managed a RED One as the camera, since they pulled off a deal with the rental company. It was quite popular in the european feature film market and weekly rates do factor in on a feature film.It wasn't that unusual on shorts either, I've worked on a few that used a RED One.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

 

I would call £250,000 low budget, micro budget is less than £25k I know of one Euro 50K feature that managed a RED One as the camera, since they pulled off a deal with the rental company. It was quite popular in the european feature film market and weekly rates do factor in on a feature film.It wasn't that unusual on shorts either, I've worked on a few that used a RED One.

Perhaps you got a deal or someone you know. But rewind back then and recall that the largest cost of dealing with the RED One was the stability issue (most productions wanted 2 bodies just in case) and then the workflow issue. It was incredibly burdensome to deal with that footage and expensive to shoot native 4k to delivery.

[Stuart Brereton]

The RED One was widely adopted by all kinds of low budget filmmakers. Then, as now, the RED market was split between rental houses who had properly equipped packages, and owner/operators who had packages pieced together with stills lenses and cheap accessories who would rent themselves and their camera for a couple of hundred dollars a day.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

The RED One was widely adopted by all kinds of low budget filmmakers. Then, as now, the RED market was split between rental houses who had properly equipped packages, and owner/operators who had packages pieced together with stills lenses and cheap accessories who would rent themselves and their camera for a couple of hundred dollars a day.

I do recall seeing cheap rates on owner-ops once people realized that owning a RED One wasnt the ticket to early retirement. But it still didnt negate the need to pay for the workflow to get it deliverable.

[Stuart Brereton]

it still didnt negate the need to pay for the workflow to get it deliverable.

I first shot with the RED One in 2008. Even then the RAW footage could be transcoded on a laptop.

 

It wasn't workflow issues that were the problem, it was reliability.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

I first shot with the RED One in 2008. Even then the RAW footage could be transcoded on a laptop.

 

It wasn't workflow issues that were the problem, it was reliability.

lol. As a Computer Science Grad Student, I find this hard to believe. I have an i7-4790 with 16 GB of RAM and an SSD and it still takes a decent chunk of time to render out full HD footage (1080p @ 24p) Laptops in 2008 would not edit 4k footage easily...especially on the out render.

 

Edit: What laptop has 4k display? Pray tell?

[Stuart Brereton]

lol. As a Computer Science Grad Student, I find this hard to believe. I have an i7-4790 with 16 GB of RAM and an SSD and it still takes a decent chunk of time to render out full HD footage (1080p @ 24p) Laptops in 2008 would not edit 4k footage easily...especially on the out render.

 

Edit: What laptop has 4k display? Pray tell?

I said laptops could transcode RAW footage, not edit 4K. Please read the post before responding to it.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

I said laptops could transcode RAW footage, not edit 4K. Please read the post before responding to it.

Oh, I am sorry. I did misread. But what a ridiculous point to make that an indie can "transcode" footage but not edit it?

[Stuart Brereton]

Oh, I am sorry. I did misread. But what a ridiculous point to make that an indie can "transcode" footage but not edit it?

In 2008, the accepted workflow for RED was to transcode to Pro-Res, offline edit, and conform from the 4K RAW files. Some people used the QT proxies for editing, but that didn't last long. That is still the most common workflow, even though there are many edit systems that can now handle 4k material natively.

 

Our film was largely transcoded on a Mac Powerbook, and was edited on a Mac desktop. Hard to see how that is an impossible workflow for an indie film.

[Tyler Purcell]

The RED ONE was originally sold for $17,500.

 

It was announced in 2006, but took them more then a year to ship the first generation. The prices didn't drop until 2009.

 

The big problem with the RED cinema cameras initially was their target audience. They were selling cameras to rental houses and top professionals who were looking to make money off a new toy. The original RED workflow was a nightmare, they didn't get their act together until 2010.

 

In contrast, the 5DMKII was released fall of 2008. It was $2799 retail, took standard DSLR glass (instead of the expensive PL of the RED) and most importantly, recorded to a then, more standard MPEG format vs special JPEG2000 of the RED.

 

So where the 5DMKII was a YEAR behind the release of the RED ONE, it was so much less money, it played a pivotal role.

 

At the time of the RED cinema release, there were already many options for that rental price bracket. There were zero options for the smaller guys, which make up 90% of the filmmakers out there. Everyone was still shooting on "video" cameras, some of them shooting HD for sure, but none of them with a real cinematic look.

 

So one could say for the top professional filmmakers "experimenting" with digital technology, the F900/Viper type cameras were something to talk about. However, I think it was the smaller cameras and the lower-end filmmakers that made the difference.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

In 2008, the accepted workflow for RED was to transcode to Pro-Res, offline edit, and conform from the 4K RAW files. Some people used the QT proxies for editing, but that didn't last long. That is still the most common workflow, even though there are many edit systems that can now handle 4k material natively.

 

Our film was largely transcoded on a Mac Powerbook, and was edited on a Mac desktop. Hard to see how that is an impossible workflow for an indie film.

Depends on the Mac desktop...MacPro? Looking at a few grand plus FCP X...

[Saul Pincus]

 

Facets of digital filmmaking were around before George Lucas, and will mos def be after. I remember reading something that stated he was the first guy running a major picture with some digital cameras and eventually became the first to finish an entire major film with digital cameras. There was a Rodriguez movie that did it early too, but Lucas even had a hand in that.

 

If you want to be precise, Lucas had a hand in the digital revolution decades before he shot Attack of the Clones with a CineAlta. He was always pushing digital imaging, editing and audio innovations, and many of the brightest minds in experimental computing and digital tech were recruited to Lucasfilm in the early 80s due to Lucas' mandate. This excellent and definitive history of Lucasfilm's digital and computer divisions covers the details: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0937404675/qid=1114447087/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-9311989-3816147?v=glance&s=books

 

So, really, his shooting Episode II digitally was the natural final step in his desire for an all-digital pipeline (rather than a first)!

[Stuart Brereton]

Depends on the Mac desktop...MacPro? Looking at a few grand plus FCP X...

It was a regular Mac desktop of whatever variety was available in 2008. FCP X didn't exist at the time, so it was more likely to have been FCP 5. The point is, it was transcoded and cut on readily available, consumer machines running software that was very popular with indie film-makers. No high end equipment, no expensive professional edit suites.

[Saul Pincus]

It was a regular Mac desktop of whatever variety was available in 2008. FCP X didn't exist at the time, so it was more likely to have been FCP 5. The point is, it was transcoded and cut on readily available, consumer machines running software that was very popular with indie film-makers. No high end equipment, no expensive professional edit suites.

 

 

Final Cut Pro 6 was the tool of choice at the time. I worked with the Red One on a feature for six weeks as a producer, director and editor in the fall of 2008, and the workflow was simple and reliable. As Stuart notes, any relatively recent off the shelf Mac Pro of the period was capable of transcoding the material to HD for offline cutting with good efficiency. The $$$ came in external storage, which at the time, could cost the same as a semi-souped up Mac Pro. I think a lot of the "horror stories" conjectured about the Red post workflow from the period come about because the Red truly represented the first time a pro cameraperson or filmmaker could also theoretically be his/her own editor and finisher, with true high end gear and glass – but if you weren't trained in post, a lot of folks got lost and looked to place the blame on the system rather than their own inexperience. If you were a post professional or knew who to hire, then your after-camera life was bliss.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

It was a regular Mac desktop of whatever variety was available in 2008. FCP X didn't exist at the time, so it was more likely to have been FCP 5. The point is, it was transcoded and cut on readily available, consumer machines running software that was very popular with indie film-makers. No high end equipment, no expensive professional edit suites.

I would be curious to know what the export time of a feature film in 4k would be on one of those machines? Can you enlighten me?

[Stuart Brereton]

I would be curious to know what the export time of a feature film in 4k would be on one of those machines? Can you enlighten me?

I have no idea. We did our conform and color at tiny facility in Hollywood which was little more than a garage operation. Also, no-one was outputting at 4k in those days, there was no need. We used the 4K RAW files for color-timing, but the mastering was done to either 2K or HD. I would imagine that other film-makers may have chosen to use their Pro-Res transcodes as a master and output that way.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

I have no idea. We did our conform and color at tiny facility in Hollywood which was little more than a garage operation. I would imagine that other film-makers may have chosen to use their Pro-Res transcodes as a master and output that way.

I see. So there was still a Post house in the pipeline. I still stand by BM being a turning point for indies to achieve superb results with the maximum control and minimum of cash outflow. Most indies I know locally do all of their own post work and we dont even have a Post House in these parts (Northern California.) unless you go to SF.

[Saul Pincus]

I see. So there was still a Post house in the pipeline. I still stand by BM being a turning point for indies to achieve superb results with the maximum control and minimum of cash outflow. Most indies I know locally do all of their own post work and we dont even have a Post House in these parts (Northern California.) unless you go to SF.

 

You required a calibrated monitor, a fast drive array and talent in color correct, but a "post house" by traditional definition was not necessary even when working direct from 4K RAW.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

 

You required a calibrated monitor, a fast drive array and talent in color correct, but a "post house" by traditional definition was not necessary even when working direct from 4K RAW.

Saul, I can tell you that a "fast drive array" (which I assume you mean some protocol of RAID) is not enough to render massive amounts of data because your Processor or memory can become a bottleneck. 2008 was a long time ago in computing terms. I would think a good system for that sort of thing back then would be some server type setup like Intel Xeon with dual Processors....$$$ not cheap.

[Stuart Brereton]

I see. So there was still a Post house in the pipeline.

As I said, it was a garage operation. One guy running an early version of Apple Color on a suite set up in his home. RED RAW in those days was much more compressed than it is now, about 15:1 if I remember right, so the files were smaller.

[Saul Pincus]

Saul, I can tell you that a "fast drive array" (which I assume you mean some protocol of RAID) is not enough to render massive amounts of data because your Processor or memory can become a bottleneck. 2008 was a long time ago in computing terms. I would think a good system for that sort of thing back then would be some server type setup like Intel Xeon with dual Processors....$$$ not cheap.

 

I never claimed rendering was "fast." It wasn't – but a lot of indie filmmakers gave up speed if it meant control and less $$$. That's a true snapshot of 2008.

 

Transcoding to ProRes for HD offline, by comparison, was real-time or better and therefore fine for single-camera shoots (which most indies were.)

[Matthew W. Phillips]

 

I never claimed rendering was "fast." It wasn't – but a lot of indie filmmakers gave up speed if it meant control and less $$$. That's a true snapshot of 2008.

So can you answer my query of how long it took to render a feature length export at 4k on an indie system?

[George Ebersole]

 

Bit of a (non)film history thing here..

 

Facets of digital filmmaking were around before George Lucas, and will mos def be after. I remember reading something that stated he was the first guy running a major picture with some digital cameras and eventually became the first to finish an entire major film with digital cameras. There was a Rodriguez movie that did it early too, but Lucas even had a hand in that.

 

Do we owe the Star Wars prequels a lot of credit for the clout digital holds today? Or at least speeding up the innovations?

 

 

I'm a Lucas fan, but the writing was on the wall way back in the 80s, and probably even before that, that film was simply too bulky and cumbersome to allow the kind of shots and editing that directors and producers had been dreaming about for ages.

 

I've told this story before on this BBS, but I'll repeat it, I worked at a place called City Stage, and there someone came in with a tape showing something called "Beta-16" All it was was 16mm footage telecined to BETACAM. Big deal. But they were using super 16 and transferring it to BETACAM to make it easier to work with in post.

 

A few years before that SONY and Canon were already experimenting with variable shutters on consumer cameras. Which meant that you could show "filmic" like footage show with a consumer camera on your TV.

 

The reason that's important is because if you were an indy film maker, but didn't have the resources to rent a Bolex, Arri or whatever, then all you needed to do was to shoot on one of the new micro consumer formats, and your footage, even though it was on video, would have a film look.

 

With all due respect to Lucas, who pushed a shift in the industry standard, I think the shift was already happening. My guess is that he may have known about it, and then probably thought it was a good idea for the industry as well.

 

And the shift came none too soon as Hollywood was trying to consolidate itself and cut off "the flux of new talent" to keep the industry insular. But, as an atheist, "god bless the Japanese" and their consumer electronic's tech wizardry, because just as Hollywood was pushing to phase out 16mm to keep new film makers out, the camcorder boom was taking place.

 

And the rest is history.

 

As a kid looking through viewfinders of SONY, Ikegami and RCA cameras, if the display technology could be miniaturized like that, then there had to be a way to grab the definition one saw in those old view-finders, and build on it while retaining the same kind of image definition. But that it would take further progress in the R&D department, and it would depend on what the material scientists could come up with in terms of new conductors, capacitors and resistors.

 

I was skeptical as to when (years? decades? centuries?), so I was debating as to whether or not to put my then own film career on hold, or to soldier on hoping to stay on top of the tech, knowing the digital distribution was probably no more than a few years away (remember this was 1985 to 1989).

 

Again, I'm guessing Lucas probably knew what I knew, but probably didn't have a hand in the technology until it became practical in terms of theatrical exhibition. I mean, who the hell wants to watch raster filled images on the movie screen?

 

Of course, if you really want to get "geeky" about the whole thing, Ma-Bell (remember the "phone company"?) was already experimenting with televideo in the 1930's, and it was an experiment to see if electronic shopping was feasible or even disereable. Those experiments continued onwards, and I think were partially financed by Chevron (some of you remember the old Chevron commercials about a giant plastic computer terminal where people "in the future" would take classes from their home).

 

Again, all part of the "digital transition".

 

Okay. Geek mode off :)

 

Does that help? :D