4. Theory of Operation
The RED ONE™ ™ Digital Cinema camera provides high performance digital imaging over a
wide range of frame rates and optical formats including Super 35mm, 35mm and Super16mm.
The camera is supplied as standard with a PL mount, and may be configured with 19 mm rods
to accommodate most cinematography lenses, matte boxes and follow focus systems. Adap-
tors for 15mm offset studio and 15mm lightweight rods are also available.
In addition to compatibility with existing PL mount cinematography lenses; a select range of
S35/35mm format PL mount prime and zoom lenses are available from RED Digital Cinema.
Other lens mounts, including Canon FD, and Nikon F are available from RED and 3
rd
parties,
permitting the use of Nikkor and Canon photographic lenses. To use these mounts the PL
mount must be removed. It is recommended that this should be done only in a dust-free envi-
ronment, as the sensor and optical path will be exposed to the elements during this process.
A B4 mount to PL mount adaptor is also available to permit use of 2/3” HD lenses on the RED
ONE™ camera. The optical coverage it provides is equivalent to S16 mm. Hence, the maximum
recording resolution with these lenses will be 2K RAW. (2048 x 1152 pixel progressive scan)
MYSTERIUM™ Sensor
The MYSTERIUM™ sensor has been specifically designed for use with the RED ONE™ cam-
era, and provides variable frame rate imaging over 1- 60fps in 4K or 3K resolution, and 1-
120fps in 2K resolution record modes.
Native color balance for the MYSTERIUM™ sensor is 5,000 degrees Kelvin, but may be elec-
tronically compensated for any color temperature in the range 1,700 to 10,000 Kelvin. White
Balance presets are available for Tungsten (3200K) and Daylight (5600K) lighting; the camera
may also calculate a color neutralizing White Balance value using a standard white card tech-
nique.
MYSTERIUM™ includes integrated 12-bit resolution analog to digital conversion, capable of
delivering up to 11 stops of dynamic range when operating in daylight at a sensitivity of 320
ISO.
Image Processing
Images received from the MYSTERIUM™ sensor are formatted as pixel defect corrected (but
not color processed) 12-bit RAW data - similar in image quality to a high end digital stills cam-
era.
The sequence of 12-bit RAW images received from the sensor is compressed using proprietary
wavelet based REDCODE™ RAW compression. The RAW data recorded is independent of the
RGB signal monitored from the monitoring path. ISO, white balance or other RGB color space
adjustments made to the monitoring path are not burned into the recorded 12-bit RAW data.
