RED ONE01

Today was my second shoot using RED stock. Actually it was a 2 RED camera shoot this time. Cool stuff! I was brought on board by Brendon Cochrane (DIT/RED owner) as a camera intern primarily to gain hands-on experience with the RED camera. This production was perfect for me to learn because it was a talking head style shoot which consisted of only Interviews. The set wasn't so busy so Tony Segreto (Camera Operator) was able to give me the very basics of the RED hardware.

First he took me through how to swap out batteries (RED Brick) and mount them to the camera body as well as the battery charger. What I found interesting is that it doesn't slide onto the camera like a typical Li-Ion battery. Instead it connects to the body with a DC power cable. What I found convenient and safe was that all the RED cables use a hook system. When the cable is plugged into the body or accessory, there are hooks that lock it in. You hear a click and and you know it's secure. If you try to pull it out it wont come out. In order to disconnect the cable you have to pull down the metal sleeve on the connection head in order to disengage the hooks. Once that happens it's safe to pull out the cable.

Soon after I learned how to load and unload the RED hard drive (Digital Magazine) from the camera. It's the same process as ejecting a hard drive from a mac, very easy. Loading is easy as well. Once the Hard drive is connected to the camera, it automatically reads the drive and knows that it's loaded and ready to go. Most of the time the mag will have clips already saved on it so it's best to format the drive and give it a new reel number before the camera is ready to shoot.

I feel great about my new knowledge of the RED and hopefully I'll be able to learn more during the next week or two if Brenden hires me on his next project.