Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time
You might remember that a couple of years ago, Linus Tech Tips spent a somewhat insane $138,000 on a couple of 8K RED cameras & accessories. Well, like most of us after having a camera for this amount of time, they’re starting to notice some of the annoying quirks of their camera.
In this case, the loudness of it between takes as the fan kicks into overdrive. So, they decided to try and switch it over from fans to water cooling.
RED’s entry into the world of smartphones was supposed to be exciting. As one of the leaders in cinema cameras, everybody expected the RED Hydrogen One to be a magical video powerhouse of a phone. Now that they’ve started shipping, though, some customers aren’t quite so impressed with what they’ve received for their money.
These review from The Verge, Marques Brownlee (MKBHD) along with some real live sample footage shot with the Hydrogen One show that it really doesn’t live up to what users were expecting.
You know we’re at peak levels of crazy when somebody shoves 16 8K RED Helium sensors into a single camera. But that’s exactly what Facebook and RED have done with the new Manifold 360 camera.
Designed for “immersive cinematography”, the Manifold allows RAW video capture from all 16 cameras at 8K resolution and 60 frames per second each simultaneously. Oh yeah, it’s way out there.
RED recently simplified its camera lineup to three separate product lines. Monstro, Helium and Gemini. But how do the three new systems all stack up against each other? That’s what Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer and filmmaker Vincent Laforet wanted to find out. So, he got all three cameras and took them out to compare them side-by-side and see for himself where the limits were.
You may look at this post and think “I’ll never own a RED camera, why should I care?” but Vincent’s message here is clear. It’s not that we all need RED cameras, or to show off his fancy cameras. It’s to demonstrate that we all need to test our camera’s limitations. We need to know what those limits are, where and how we can push them, and when we definitely can’t.
If you’ve always wanted to buy a RED camera and have been saving up – now may be the right time to get it. The company has announced that they’re dropping prices on all of its cameras, and you can save up to $25,000. Additionally, RED is simplifying their product lineup and it will offer only three cameras.
The release of RED’s new Hydrogen One holographic smartphone is drawing ever closer. We’ve known about its modular connectivity through the pogo pins on the back, but very little has been said about what they’re for. It’s been suggested that we’d perhaps see battery packs or small camera modules to use “real” lenses and that it may offer communication with RED’s range of cameras.
Well, the first of those cameras has been announced. RED has teamed up with a 3D VR camera company, Lucid on an 8K prosumer 3D camera. A camera not only shoots holographic content that can be viewed on the Hydrogen One but a camera which also uses the Hydrogen One as its “viewfinder” while shooting.
At Facebook’s F8 developer conference, the company has announced some exciting news: Facebook and RED are teaming up to develop a high-end, professional VR camera system. It will reportedly be able to capture hi-res imagery in so-called 6DoF (six degrees of freedom). The viewers will be able to explore the high-quality content in real time within virtual reality.
With disappointing iPhone X sales, and the overall reduction in iPhone sales, it seems Foxconn are branching out. And they’re brancing out into the 8K prosumer video market, if Nikkei Asian Review’s report is accurate. They say that Foxconn are teaming up with cinema camera manufacturer RED to make professional quality and affordable cameras available for the general public.
Given that RED’s current 8K Weapon systems cost somewhere in the region of $50K once you buy all the associated bits, that’s one heck of a goal. Nikkei say that Foxcon are “seeking new revenue sources to compensate for weakening smartphone demand”, and that they want to “reduce its business dependence on Apple”. Apple currently accounts for more than 50% of Foxconn’s sales.
If you’re a tech geek, I guess you find it interesting to see how the cameras are made, repaired or torn down. If you also dream of owning a RED camera (or you’re so lucky that you already do), this video will be a real treat for you.
On their YouTube channel, RED Digital Cinema has published a video that takes you behind the scenes of their factory in Irvine, California. It lets you take a peek into their premises and see how the famous RED cameras are being born. And there’s small preview of RED’s new $80,000K Weapon with Monstro 8K VV sensor.
RED has recently announced Hydrogen One, their very first smartphone. There was only one mysterious render photo with the announcement, but now there’s finally something more to see. Marques Brownlee had an exclusive chance to get his hands on a couple of prototypes. In his latest video, he shares the first hands-on with RED’s smartphone of modular design and with a holographic display.
You can find out more about John on his website and follow his adventures on YouTube.
His videos have over a hundred million views, have been extensively published by news outlets, and has even received recognition from a few film festivals, such as International Ocean Festival
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