Kinefinity MAVO LF

[Lustgarten]

U.S. Kinefinity office

U.S. Kinefinity office

As an aside I was in China two years ago and met with Kinefinity in a small condo like complex on outskirts of Beijing. Nice guys, smallish place at the time. We discussed the idea of my representing the cameras in US, but I think they wanted someone who would invest more money than i was prepared to spend to market the camera in US. Not sure, just the vibe I got. Guys were Kinda hard to read and of course there's the language difference. My concern was the camera was a bit too expensive and wasn't likely to become used on commercial shoots due to its unfamiliarity with clients. Competing with BM was gonna be a problem as well. Additionally it had rather poor rolling shutter at the time.

 

[Sttratos]

But movie ticket sales in China (just googled it) reached a new record of 56 billion yuan ($8.6 billion) in sales in 2017 - which definitely supports your point about the growing market - but it's just not logical to compare that to camera sales.

That is entertainment people digest everyday. It is a part of life like food & water.

Cameras, especially cinema cameras, are a niche product. They will not be selling 8.6 billion dollars in cameras ever.

I forgot what we were arguing about, but maybe it's about success...which is relative. You're right; they can sell a few cameras in Beijing and be very successful.

But coming to America - even though I agree may be an inconvenience - certainly would not hurt them. All they need is one office, even a small one.

The Germans did it. The Australians did it. The Americans (RED) are doing it all over the world.

So I guess that's where we're at...what is success.

I agree that it wouldn't hurt them. Bu clearly they don't think it's worth it. Or like I said they would already have an office in the USA.

 

[Trek of Joy]

Definitely a sign of times changing. You are right. I remember when some U.S. companies wouldn't bother with some international markets including China. Now they are all punching themselves to get in the Chinese market. Times changing indeed. Hard to put a number. But in probably 20 years time it will be all China.

Over 2.7 billion people - or a 1/3rd of the planet's population - in China and India alone. After touring through both countries last year, its crazy how much everyone is pushing to carve out a piece of the market in both countries. They don't need western cinema at all. Top home grown movies can completely crush anything going out of the US, Chinas top grosser pulled in over $900m - or 5.7 Billion Yuan. Both such massive markets that dwarf the US in sheer numbers, and the Chinese middle class is larger than the entire US population. Checking out cell phone carriers and plans is mind blowing. Just staggering numbers, its easy to see why Kinefinity has no interest in setting up shop here. They probably can't keep up with demand back home. Though I shopped for camera gear in both countries, not really any great deals outside of HK. Of the 55 countries I've visited over the last couple years on 6 continents, Hong Kong has the best camera prices hands down.

Cheers

Chris

 

[roxics]

Selling individual movie tickets and cheap smart phones is one thing. Selling $14,000 cinema cameras is another. I can't imagine the market is big for that anywhere. Seems like you'd want as much coverage as you can get. But if you're just starting out, I'm sure it takes time to ramp up to international sales.

It does look like a nice camera. I remember being fairly impressed by the image quality of one of their other cameras from a demo reel I saw. But I also agree that spending that kind of money on a camera that has no in-country support would be a gamble most wouldn't want to take.

 

[Trek of Joy]

Selling individual movie tickets and cheap smart phones is one thing. Selling $14,000 cinema cameras is another. I can't imagine the market is big for that anywhere. Seems like you'd want as much coverage as you can get. But if you're just starting out, I'm sure it takes time to ramp up to international sales.

It does look like a nice camera. I remember being fairly impressed by the image quality of one of their other cameras from a demo reel I saw. But I also agree that spending that kind of money on a camera that has no in-country support would be a gamble most wouldn't want to take.

I wouldn't take the gamble either without a real presence in the US, but that's not my point. You can go beyond movie tickets and cell phones and look at the Chinese auto industry - virtually all Chinese automakers don't care about the US market or many markets outside of China. And they sell many more cars in China than in the U.S. - over 11 million more last year. The Chinese film industry is huge, most theaters had a couple western films and the rest were Chinese. China has more screens than the US, sells more tickets and its largest cinema company is a division of the largest retailer on the planet - Alibaba. Then there's TV - China supposedly has a billion sets in homes, with access to 3,000 channels nationwide and more cable subscribers than the entire US population. China also has the largest social network numbers and the largest number on internet users on the planet. Something has to be shooting all that content. If people on youtube are shooting with Red and Canon cinema cameras, surely there are Chinese content producers doing the same. Kinefinity has consistently rolled out new models and has a fully developed ecosystem from looking at their website, so somebody has to be buying them in numbers large enough to sustain new development.

I browsed a lot of camera dealers, large and small, including a few that were heavily focused on video with full lineups of cameras and cinema lenses. I don't speak Chinese and nobody I encountered spoke English, so tinkering was tough since all the menus were in Chinese. Anything you'd expect to see at Adorama or B&H was there, it was cool. I got the chance to sit in on a Sony demo event of the a9 a month before it was released, didn't understand anything they were saying, but it was still a great hands-on experience. Its easy to see why they were there, the demand in the US and Europe is shrinking, but the demand for luxury goods in China is expanding at an amazing pace.

Cheers

Chris

 

[High1ander]

I agree with some others here that China is plenty for a company like Kinefinity. To me it strikes more as a logical fallacy to think that US market share is a must for a thriving business. Kinefinety isn't vastly superior or cheaper than the other products on the US market, so why try setting up shop there?

I live in Europe/Sweden now and sure I would like to come across a Kinefinity camera for a reasonable price, but I know it is too small of a market to squeeze into, since selling it here would bring up the price a lot through import taxes and then if there was a need for fast/easy support it would even go higher and "still" that camera would be "Chinese-can't-be-sure-it-works"-stamped. However, that is sort of the trade off available, you can get it cheap but without warranty/support, or you can have great warranty/support and pay premium price. I also think it is harder for a Chinese company to go to the US than vice versa, since in the US the salaries/rent is way higher. I mean, setting up shop in the US cost 3-4 times as much as setting it up in China, and the camera cost is the same. Also, now with Trump fiddling with all trade agreements might not be the best time to invest in a US office, if US decides to increase import charges...

 

[IronFilm]

Interesting that all of the labeling on the camera is in English. Also, in the lower right hand corner of the LCD, it appears that the Mavo may have built in ND filtering, something RED does not.

View attachment 130012

Enjoy

Kinefinity offers an e-ND option for all their cameras with a Kinemount (which is most of them, all of their recent models).

 

[IronFilm]

I think this will be a reality we will all have to start getting used to. The west will become less and less important. There was a time the USA was the biggest marketing for everything. This is no longer the case. It's happening to the car industry, it happened already with Hollywood where movies are no longer made for American audiences and are now actually even targeted at China. It's happening to everything. I don't think some realize how huge of a market China is. They basically no longer need us in the west. The west is more dependent on them now. How many western companies wouldn't be able to compete if their products were not made in China? It's clear Kinefinity is not very worried about the U.S. market or they would have opened an office long ago. They probably sell enough cameras to keep them busy in China alone.

Indeed, Kinefinity sells many many more cameras locally in Asia than in the Western world.

And they're a small company, who struggle to keep up with demand as it is now.

Thank you for the link, but I mean more what Jarred and Jim (and their inner circle) think...not RED camera operators.

I'm thinking more like on a Jinnimag level:

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?155462-Jinnimag

It was a great pity that any third party media options have been crushed (especially for prospective RED ONE owners, and if they're limited to teeny CF cards! What harm would RED possibly have if they opened up to *ALL* CF cards now in 2018? None! But they'd gain a lot of good will).

It's surprising how small they have gotten these things, can't be more than about a 4 inch cube for the main body.

Roughly 5D sized in their minimal configuration.

 

[IronFilm]

It looks a bit appetizing but I have to ask, is there anyone left in the market to sell a camera to these days? Does everyone already own one, heck even two "cinema" cameras already?

cheers,

There is always a younger generation coming up who need something to start out with from scratch with.

Or people with older gear who need to update.

The continuous cycle will never stop.

 

[Trek of Joy]

One other obvious question/hurdle about setting up shot in the US - given the amount of stolen intellectual property in China and the striking similarities between Kinefinity and other products - would they even be able to without going to court?

It was amazing to see the blatant copies of everything from Range Rovers to Starbucks all over China. The streets are littered with Chinese made copies of Jeeps, Toyotas, Hondas, VW's and so on. You can walk into coffee shops with Starbucks logo, colors, fonts and so on - but they're not Starbucks (the real thing is also there). At times its like a bizzarro world where things are similar to what you're used to seeing, but not quite right. Except for KFC, they're everywhere.

 

[Tamerlin]

It does look like a nice camera. I remember being fairly impressed by the image quality of one of their other cameras from a demo reel I saw. But I also agree that spending that kind of money on a camera that has no in-country support would be a gamble most wouldn't want to take.

Yeah, that will be the tough part for Kinefinity to overcome, and probably why it's not willing to incur the cost of getting in, especially when it's pitting a basically unknown $14,000 camera against a very well known (and liked) Scarlet-W and for not that much more a Varicam LT.

At this point, I'd consider it for sure... as a secondary camera, because I already have a camera that I can depend on that's backed with solid customer service. But for most owner/operators, who are the most likely to purchase a camera like the Mavo, owning two cameras is a significant financial stretch, forcing the to choose between the unknown and the known. And right now, no one is asking for Kinefinity cameras. But to get to that point, Kinefinity would need to have cameras in the hands of local filmmakers.

It's a tough time to launch a new camera!

 

[bitnaut]

I’m taking a chance...I just put in my preorder for a 6k MAVO. I think it’ll be a nice step up from my old reliable FS700/Odyssey 7Q+ combo.

Anyone else?

 

[starcentral]

Just downloaded it.

It plays VERY NICE in the grade and very easy to give a tweak and make look good or interesting. They have a real winner here and hoping they can address some of the concerns and shortcomings.

 

[NorBro]

I downloaded the two 6K clips (5760 x 3240) and they are indeed super nice. Very clean.

 

[Tom Roper]

Skin tone seem perfect. Is it magical? I don't know. Maybe it is. Leans a bit toward orange, coke can is not red. Here's my grade. Seems like another great camera.

 

[starcentral]

Even with their prices, they are not exactly giving them away. Somehow I expected the prices to be far less. I mean over $10k-14k for an unknown camera without any local support, or proven track record, etc.. just seems rather steep. I'd sooner opt for BMD, not that their camera's are 100% either, but at least they are local and have replaced complete camera's for people without any issues.

 

[nyvz]

Edited

 

[nyvz]

Yeah, that will be the tough part for Kinefinity to overcome, and probably why it's not willing to incur the cost of getting in, especially when it's pitting a basically unknown $14,000 camera against a very well known (and liked) Scarlet-W and for not that much more a Varicam LT.!

That's not an apples to apples comparison. Retail prices for Mavo are $8k body only, $9.5k with monitor, media, battery. Scarlet-w is $12.5k without a lens mount, and about $18k for a very basic kit. That's about twice the cost. Varicam is even more.

 

[Grug]

The sample footage looks GREAT. Highlights clip a bit harshly, but I'm liking every other aspect I see.

 

[nyvz]

The sample footage looks GREAT. Highlights clip a bit harshly, but I'm liking every other aspect I see.

Yeah unfortunately it's very hard to make direct comparisons between kinefinitys and other cameras since by default they specify about 4.3 stops of highlights where every comparable camera in the range defaults to 6-7.5 stops. So most kinefinity's samples are effectively overexposed by 2 stops compared to competitors. This makes it impossible to judge shadows properly and makes highlights look really rough. Fortunately you can adjust highlight range in the menus but many people don't.