Re: Digital Intermediate anyone? Now part of the DS Crusade

[Schy Gleason <schy(at)schyproductions.com>]

Title: Re: Digital Intermediate anyone? Now part of the DS Crusade

Big Questions...

Have you seen these people in your marketplace? Have they visited your operation to better understand what you need from their products? How can we expect innovative products without active participation from the key people leading Avid's future development?

Dana Ruzicka, Vice President (publicly heard saying in public that there is no money to be made in the high end market)
Joseph Bentivegna, Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, Avid Video 
Michael J. Rockwell, Chief Technology Officer 
 
The core problem:
 
Avid has allowed itself to become distracted by Apple & FCP
Avid has lost focus on its core market
Avid has become a corporate behemoth that is no longer innovative
Avid dictates to the market instead of listening to the market
Avid lacks visionary understanding of their core market needs
Avid has become too focused on short term, quarterly goals and lacks any long term strategy

sg


on 1/31/06 12:55 PM, Bill Admans at badmans(at)fotokem.com wrote:

>> I can only wish I had a crystal ball 8 yrs. ago and took that Flame assistant job ...

Those of us with crystal balls have had the painfully shattered

-----Original Message-----
From: DS-List(at)googlegroups.com  [mailto:DS-List(at)googlegroups.com]On Behalf Of Boros,  Igor
Sent: Tuesday, January 31, 2006 12:44 PM
To:  DS-List(at)googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Digital Intermediate anyone?  Now part of the DS Crusade

You can only imagine how the rest of us feel ... who  were with DS since the beginning, investing time, money, careers ...
I can  only wish I had a crystal ball 8 yrs. ago and took that Flame assistant job  ... :-(

I.


On 1/31/06 3:38 PM, "Patrick Hausler"  <patrick(at)cuttersinc.com> wrote:

This actually makes me very sad…coming from  smoke/flame where both DI, and vfx work were an absolute pleasure. I’ve met  tons of facility managers that refuse to dump anymore money into the  Autodesk discreet boxes in favor of DS though. It really ticks me off. I’m  still in the process of learning the box, so I reserve my judgments about it  for now, but this conversation is not giving me  hope.
 

Patrick Hausler
Cutters, Inc.
www.cutters.com  <http://www.cutters.com>  
www.soldesignfx.com <http://www.soldesignfx.com>  

---

From:  DS-List(at)googlegroups.com [mailto:DS-List(at)googlegroups.com]  On Behalf Of Boros, Igor
Sent: Tuesday, January 31, 2006  1:24 PM
To: DS-List(at)googlegroups.com
Subject: Re:  Digital Intermediate anyone? Now part of the DS  Crusade

BINGO!!!

All this could be translated  word-by-word into compositing and FX world ... just substitute DI with VFX  and off you go ... and on top of it all, complete lack of vision as far as  future of post goes ... anybody can follow but very few can  lead.

I.


On 1/31/06 2:16 PM, "Tony Quinsee-Jover"  <tony(at)hdheaven.co.uk> wrote:
I think you've hit  the nail on the head there Bill when you suggest that Avid's middle  management simply don't understand the market.

How could they?  They have no previous experience in our  field actually DOING what we do (they're engineers, not editors), and they  exacerbate their ignorance by not bothering to visit facilities with an open  mind in order to discover what features we require in order to enable us to  do what we do.  They dictate to the marketplace from a position of  ignorance rather than listening to it from a position of  wisdom.

I read a recent financial report  by Oppenheimer which stated that Avid would "grow sales to its loyal base of  high-end users".  What an absolute joke!  Do they mean the Phony  Nitris sales?  How many of those do they think they can con folk into  buying before the market just shakes its head in dismay and walks into an  Autodesk or Quantel showroom?  The "loyal high-end users" are us  the DS Userbase. We've been doing high-end work for years with a  product that once led the market and then gradually fell behind simply  because the self-same middle managers didn't understand it or its  purpose.

For DS to compete in the DI  market it has to have a DI toolset - basically all the tools we've been  asking for all this time.

Q. Why won't it  have them?
A. Because Middle Management don't understand the  marketplace

Q. Why is DS not being  developed at a breakneck pace?
A. Because Middle Management don't  understand the marketplace

Q. When was the  all-time best quarter for DS sales?
A. The same quarter that middle  management killed it - Q1 2005

Q. Who said  publicly that "there is no money to be made in high-end equipment"?
A. A  member of middle management

Q. Why aren't  Avid falling over themselves to enhance and develop the DS toolset?
A.  Because middle management think that's unnecessary....

With Avid's share price dropping slowly but consistently every  quarter, if senior management don't soon take a long hard look at the bad  decisions being made by their middle managers then the shareholders  will.

Avid used to be an exciting and  innovative company - I was blown away by V1 Media Composer when I saw my  first demo.  But that was twenty odd years ago.  Avid have  forgotten how to lead and now limp along lamely getting ever closer to the  back of the pack.  Why?  Inadequate middle  management.

Erm.....

Geez Bill.... you didn't tell me this ranting was  contagious...

/<soapbox  off>

T :)

---

From:  DS-List(at)googlegroups.com [mailto:DS-List(at)googlegroups.com]  <mailto:DS-List(at)googlegroups.com%5d>  On Behalf Of Bill Admans
Sent: 31 January 2006  18:12
To: DS-List(at)googlegroups.com
Subject: RE: Digital  Intermediate anyone? Now part of the DS Crusade

Wozy,

DS does support DI workflows to a point, but to be honest, it  is limited in workflow efficiency when compared to competitors. This is less  an issue of design and development and more an issue of some folks within  Avid's middle management who have publically stated that "there is little  money to be made in the DI business" and then stopped the Montreal  development team from implementing their planned improvements. Obviously,  these folks don't very much because DI has become a major revenue earner for  many facilities in the leading market centers. So much so, that profits from  DI based projects is overtaking traditional HD in some facilities. I guess  they don't get to see much DI work in rural Massachusetts. These people  should get out in the real world more.

Looking at it another way - how would DI add to Avid's bottom  line?
DI based systems generally sell at a premium price when compared  to their HD equivalents.

• DI   requires mass storage capable of high bandwidth, real time  performance. This  storage sells at a premium to all other kinds of  storage.    
• DI   and file based workflows are an emerging marketplace in the  electronic arena.  Traditionally, features were assembled manually  from negative and now they are  being assembled digitally. This means  DI is an entirely new market sector that  Avid could and should  exploit.
• The   type of installation required for a full scale DI operation is  similar in  scale to a medium sized broadcast operation. Look at how  the broadcast  division of Avid has added to the bottom line in the  face of an eroding post  production marketplace due to completion  from Apple.
  

Oopps - I got  caught up in a rant.

Cheers, Bill  A

 
 
 

-----Original Message-----
From:  DS-List(at)googlegroups.com  [mailto:DS-List(at)googlegroups.com]  <mailto:DS-List(at)googlegroups.com%5d>  On Behalf Of Wozy
Sent:  Saturday, January 28, 2006  11:46 AM
To:  DS-List(at)googlegroups.com
Subject:  Digital Intermediate  anyone?


 

Has anyone been working on DI   projects with the DS?  Any feedback on how the DS holds   up?





Wozy



Warrenfilm Studios   Ltd.

 
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