Nikon RED future vision challenges BMD

Here’s a fascinating interview by Jon Favreau FD Times concerning the background, immediate implications, and hints about what we can expect in a few years. The very short answer is lots of collaboration and sharing during the current honeymoon with new directions on the horizon for lenses and mounts, sensors, image processors, and so on. BMD and other camera manufactures will be taking notes…

https://www.fdtimes.com/2024/05/01/keij ... st-title_2

Interesting article Rick. Thanks for sharing.

What caught my eye was the continuation of the RF mount at this time, but it’s obvious Nikon considers the 55mmx16mm Z mount superior! They talk about options but I think at some point evolution will occur. That’s a 55mm throat and a 16mm flange focal distance.

Several other ‘strengths’ of Nikon will be applied to RED.

I imagine Red wont discontinue the use of RF until DSMC4.

Good Luck

Another interesting observation was Jarred Land complimenting Nikon on the capabilities and raw speed of their processor in the Z8/Z9 running ten times faster than RED’s fastest. You can see that also coming in the near future. I’ve shot with the original Z6 in 2019, but apparently the more recent Z9 and Z8 are quite impressive.

Thanks for the link Rick!

Z-mount and Nikon glass are two of Nikons fields of domination and they will deliver adaptability very well.
Regarding EXPEED 7 performance, the 10-times faster is in regard of Nikons 6th generation of the Expeed. Not ten fold faster then Red's

Yes, thanks so much for that correction. The Nikon processor is “way more powerful than what we [RED] have.”

I had to skip the unbearable and empty marketing babbling from Land but what the Nikon guy said was interesting.

we know that there are a lot of the people who love our old lenses. The nice vintage Nikkor lenses have their own unique look which has been appealing to cinematographers and photographers alike. We understand those requirements. In the future, we would like to take these different approaches into consideration for an additional cinema lens lineup if we have a chance.

Sounds like Nikon cinema lenses are coming but it might take a while.

I have the Z8 and it is impressive. Oddly, not much can be found on the web about it's video capabilities. N-Raw produces quite a beautiful image. I haven't done any side by side comparisons with my BM or Canon cameras and have not formulated an opinion regarding stack ranking. One thing I love about the Z mount is that it can be adapted to both Nikon F and Canon EF with little expense. I have a ton on lenses I can pop on that camera.

The same marketing love-in I recall initially when Ford took over Jaguar; Sir John Egan had turned them around from a terrible quality badge under British Leyland to a respected private marque, with a billion pound+ stock market value and triple sales. Ford snapped; Egan was out within weeks; Ford were saying they'd been had and the factory was like a Soviet era one; love-fest over; spent a fortune; though sales went through the floor and then offloaded for a loss a few years later.

I really admire the V-Raptor-X; Red have always been interesting and with a lot of good tech and innovation; I was there on those forums when it all began. Grahame Natress used to be on DVinfo.net a lot too; there were few forums in those days.

The only thing that has ever worked against Red is some of their loud and wild marketing; aggressive patent defence, for something that should never have been granted and would not have been in Europe; and whipped up Fanboys who as I've said elsewhere often end up doing a brand more harm than good. Arri don't run a forum.

The interesting thing here though to me was about the processor tech; I thought Red were doing pretty well there but the industrial scale of Nikon may just take them up another peg or too at the high end.

I have the Z8 and it is impressive. Oddly, not much can be found on the web about it's video capabilities. N-Raw produces quite a beautiful image. I haven't done any side by side comparisons with my BM or Canon cameras and have not formulated an opinion regarding stack ranking. One thing I love about the Z mount is that it can be adapted to both Nikon F and Canon EF with little expense. I have a ton on lenses I can pop on that camera.

Nikon has not been a name in the world of video but that is now changing rapidly, firstly with the internal raw (NRAW and ProRes Raw) in the Z9 followed by the Z8 and now with the acquisition of RED. The Z8 and Z9 are world class hybrid mirrorless cameras with superb image quality and AF, generally quite a lot cheaper than equivalent Sonys and Canons as well. The ability to use F mount lenses with the FTZ adapter is fantastic but the Z mount lenses are in all cases signficantly better than their F Mount counterparts so well worth building a collection. I've been into Z series cameras since they were introduced and they are just getting better and better.

NAB2026 and NAB2027 will be very interesting for Nikon. Of course the other manufacturers won’t be caught like a deer in the headlights, they’ll also be advancing with their strong suits.

I had to skip the unbearable and empty marketing babbling from Land but what the Nikon guy said was interesting.

we know that there are a lot of the people who love our old lenses. The nice vintage Nikkor lenses have their own unique look which has been appealing to cinematographers and photographers alike. We understand those requirements. In the future, we would like to take these different approaches into consideration for an additional cinema lens lineup if we have a chance.

Sounds like Nikon cinema lenses are coming but it might take a while.

That's basically just nodding towards the various movies that have been made with Nikon lenses over the years. Rehoused or supposedly in some cases purposely built under other brand names.

They'll never commit to anything. At some point it'll arrive or it won't. It's not like it makes much sense to release one single lens.

I expect we shall see several true Nikon Cine lenses in the next few years and they may also come in RF mount but that would be an option as the Cine Z mount will eventually dominate. A bit of understated coyness in the remark: “In the future, we would like to take these different approaches into consideration for an additional cinema lens lineup if we have a chance.” Of course they’ll have a chance as the die has been cast in April 2024.

All things considered and all the lessons learned with their toe-in-the-water Z9, this product manager has set sail in the unchartered waters of a new Nikon Cinema product division.

A note on the role of Jarred Land. No more Fire Chief. Repeatedly we are told Jarred is an advisor. You or I could be called an advisor. And if it were you or I, rest assured you or I would be ‘here today and gone tomorrow’ after we’ve given our advice.

The prospect of Nikon releasing cine lenses in already overstuffed market is far less interesting than a proper cine cam with next level AF.

Good Luck

Arri don't run a forum.

Wanna bet?

https://forum.arri.com/

JB

The prospect of Nikon releasing cine lenses in already overstuffed market is far less interesting than a proper cine cam with next level AF.

Good Luck

Nikon is a glass company by heart.
They are one of a handfull optical glass manufacturers and one of a selected few lens and sports optic manufacurers which actually produce their own glass.
Even though they with some Z-lenses have been manufactured by Tamron.

Nikon will not have any problem what so ever to release a solid lineup of cine lenses within a copuple of years.

Wanna bet?

https://forum.arri.com/

JB

Thanks John, I realised afterwards you might feel the need to correct that. Difference is it's a very professional and Arri engineers all over it; and there's no whooping fanboys neither, from what I can see.

The prospect of Nikon releasing cine lenses in already overstuffed market is far less interesting than a proper cine cam with next level AF.

Good Luck

Howard, what you say is true when looking at the total lens offerings available from a growing plethora of vendors covering a wide range of cost and a variety of lens mounts.

But, I wouldn’t describe the marketplace for 16mm FFD 55mm throat true cine lenses with Nikon glass as overstuffed. Especially if they brought out cine zooms with constant aperture covering very useful focal lengths. Admittedly they haven’t talked about such zooms, but if they do want to make a good impression and penetrate the traditional cine market, including such zooms might be a bold option. Something like the ARRI Signature 24-75mm T2.8 LPL but a more affordable 20-100mm T3 Z mount if possible.

I’m not their target audience for such lenses when I (sadly) can’t even manage to acquire the Fujinon 20-120mm T2.9 Super 35 zoom which would pair with my Tokina 11-20mm T2.9.

You'd think they'd initially target hybrid shooters. Those Nikon users are going to be easier to target and a larger volume market than high end Cine.

The same lenses would also work on a future Red Z mount camera. Creating an incentive for those users to add the next gen Komodo.

Adding more niche higher end lenses would likely come later.

If Nikon wants to get into the Premium Cinema Lens Market they need to embrace 3 things to be used on other Premium Cinema Cameras:

1) PL & LPL
2) /i Technology and ARRI LDS
3) Parfocal Zooms

If they are making Nikon Z Mount Cinema Lenses for a NikonRED Cinema Camera that has a native Z Mount, then they can only focus on Parfocal Zooms while dealing the Z Mount Data Protocol they already have. However, those Cinema Lenses will be niche to only their cameras with their mount.

So, if they don't embrace the other mounts their lenses will be limited. And, /i Technology for PL lens data is pivotal. Blackmagic just showed they can really use that data well with the new URSA Cine.

We'll see what the future holds. I'm not going to lose sleep over the Nikon acquisition of RED and worrying what will come from it. I know a bunch of RED Fanboys who are worried about losing their RF Mount after having invested in it. Even if Nikon and RED have said they will still support RF, the RED Fanboys wonder for how long before they would really have to switch to Nikon Z for the best experience with a RED. That's where I am just like, PL is still the best investment due to being able to be used on so many cinema cameras.

RF was and is still limiting. Canon took a page out of the Red playbook and brought legal action against mfrs using an electronic RF mount. I can live without Samyang and Viltrox but Sigma and Tamron? I understand why companies leverage their IP, it’s still annoying and it’s the consumer that pays.

An active mount can make an electronic zoom parfocal, the same way it can enable 300 degrees of focus travel. Panasonic cams are already beginning to implement this with linear focus. The future isn’t cogs and gears.

Good Luck

I can live without Samyang and Viltrox but Sigma and Tamron?

Canon opened up RF for Sigma (and Tamron iirc), there will be the first Sigma RF lenses this year.

Nikon started offering linear focus on it's higher end lenses I think two years ago. If not close to it. It's an option in the menu along with how many degrees of focus. I can't remember if 360 is included but I remember 270

Does the FFD of RF allow RF lenses to be adapted to Z mount? I suspect not, but someone may have an innovative means of doing so. If there’s no way, I can hear the current RED shooters collective groan. Those who use rental houses may not be overly troubled, but many RED shooters own their RF lenses. Anyone using mFT native lenses won’t be using the Z mount. Difficult arithmetic for Nikon to manage if they want to capture a share of existing Cine shooters. They’ll have an easier path capturing stills shooters or those with stills lenses plus their existing Z shooters who move to Cine lenses.

Looks like we're in for a bit of a rollercoaster with Red transitioning so quickly from the Red Raptor to the Red Raptor X. For those Raptor owners trying to keep our gear up-to-date without breaking the bank, it's a lot. Nikon, stepping in after acquiring Red, says no new cameras for a couple of years, which is a bit of a relief but still leaves owners guessing about what’s next. With Sony and Blackmagic rolling out new features and gear like the revolutionary UrsaCine or Burano, it's a really tense but honestly exciting time to be in the market for a camera upgrade.

The potential for Nikon to integrate Redraw into their Nikon Z9 could be a game changer. We really need some solid plans though—not just teasers. A clear, unified direction would make it easier for owners to stick with Red through this transition and see what Nikon really brings to the table.

So, Nikon-Red, we’re all eyes here. It's critical to communicate clearly and bring out something that reassures us we made the right choice sticking around. Blackmagic is already making moves to takeover at the highest levels, and we know we stand with them! They are truly the future.

I’m not heavily invested in any mirrorless glass. Seems odd to spend thousands of dollars on lenses that lock you into a single mfrs ecosystem. I hope Nikon/Red does do something creative with the Z mount, I saw very little incentive in pursuing RF myself. I do know a couple of guys that are letting out that groan however.

Good Luck

In the interview I recall there was a remark made alluding to the optical quality of the Z mount’s short 16mm FFD because of the very short distance. I have no idea about the physics that would benefit with such a short distance but it may be that chromatic aberration or other effects are easier to control.

I did wonder if they might be planning lens designs that are telecentric from the exit pupil. I don’t think we’ve heard much talk of telecentric lenses across the cinematic universe for years now. Is it possible that that’s easier to achieve with shorter FFD?

My mind’s gone blank on trying to recall the manufacturer of Super 35 telecentric lenses (hoping that is the right term for lenses that direct the rays of light perpendicular to the sensor surface).

Edit
Found it! Right or wrong, these are the Schneider Xenar Cine III Super 35 PL and EF lenses that are described by Adorama as telecentric:

https://www.adorama.com/sr3521cxrmet.html

https://www.adorama.com/sr3521cxcaft.html