Just when you thought it was safe to wade back into the format waters comes Red Ray. The new Red Ray DVD player was demonstrated to attendees of a recent day-long Red event at the Rio Casino in Las Vegas – a chance for current and future Red One camera owners to socialize, compare notes and examine the latest wave of Red accessories and tools for unlocking the potential of the system.

The player is scheduled for release later in 2009 and will play 4K files from the Red One, 3K Scarlet video and many HD formats, plus native R3D RAW files from CompactFlash.

Beyond the new player, a panoply of new PL mount lenses were also on hand, and they created the most buzz, given that affordable lenses have been in short supply since the 5,000-plus Red One cameras came into use. Red Digital’s own set of Red Pro Primes took center stage. (The set includes: 25, 35, 50, 85 and 100mm lenses, all T1.8.) But the highlight was a test range where the performance of the lenses could be compared with similar lenses by leading competitors like Cooke and Zeiss. The consensus from attendees was that the Red Primes matched or beat their competition in all cases.

‘Their resolution, color and overall quality was really impressive,’ said early Red One adopter Clark Dunbar of Mammoth HD.

Leading the competition was Zeiss, which introduced a complete set of new primes based on Zeiss ZF still photo lenses with new housings designed for cinematography. (The seven Compact Primes range from 18mm to 85mm and from T3.6 to T1.5, and each weighs around a kilogram.)

A second U.S. lens manufacturer, uniQoptics, also introduced a Prime PL Signature Series (18, 25, 35, 50, 85 and 100mm). Each Prime is color-matched, with an aperture range from T1.9-T22.

Also new are IBE’s Rebel line of 4K PL mount lenses and its Red Null lens, specially designed to adjust and verify the focal flange of Red Ones to within five microns; Fujinon’s new PL mount zoom lenses; and Thales Angenieux’s 16-42mm DP Rouge, the only wide-angle zoom lens in this spring’s bumper crop of PL mount lenses.

Getting away from the new glass, there were also handheld solutions for operators on offer. Tiffen-Steadicam demonstrated its Flyer LE being used in motion by a cameraman motoring down the aisle on a Segway. The slightly beefier Archer (up to 22 pounds) is also optimal for use with Red One.

Element Technica offered a less costly handheld alternative with its Mantis, a highly adjustable handheld kit that employs a low-profile two-axis gimbal to achieve Steadicam-like camera moves with a Red One, including pan/roll adjustments.

Perhaps the most impressive bit of support gear was the C-MOCOS, a camera control system by Wunderwerk. The seven-axis arm offers a limitless range of camera angles and movements, all performed by the amazing Cmocos robotic arm – a spin-off of the European space program. But, a warning to budget-conscious Red shooters: if you have to ask the price, you probably can’t afford it.