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I have finished a number of longform projects in HD
namely features and feature length documentary films as well as a raft of
commercials and other forms of programming. Like many on the list I was and
early adopter of DS I still have a brown box under my desk as the sacrificial
email/internet mule.
I was one of the first to go HD certainly the first
in S.A. in fact we had a feature on the big screen 3 months before the first
Star Wars HD production.
While DS has some serious short comings which I
believe like the rest of you are fixable this could be the greatest product
in the world.
If there was the will to finish it. Avid seems to
be running scared buying companies to cut down competitors, they have felt the
heat from Apple in the middle market where they have lost marketshare hand over
fist. It is easy to see the attraction of going after the broadcasters with
shared storage architecture solutions. Broadcasters don't by tools every year
they don't upgrade regularly because they don't compete with other facilities.
So when you have sold your big solution to the broadcaster you may not sell
to him again for five or ten years.
The "High End" is called that because that is where
you have keep up to have the latest most efficient toolset available.
Discreet/AutoDesk have survived doing nothing but this they don't sell servers
to broadcasters. Quantel nearly went to the
wall by backing the broadcast business and now they are back in the High End
film business and maintaining the server/news/sports systems giving them a
balanced product line. Avid are on a slippery slope to hell they are backing a
15 year old media composer interface over newer more efficient ways of doing
things, that's like Quantel trying to sell a Harry (remember those) with a new
grading and paint module. Wake up Avid, stop insulting the market, you are
selling solutions to some of the most innovative and techno savvy people on the
planet. Putting a new outfit on an old tart (Phoney Nitris) does not fool
anyone.
The real irony is that despite the huge lack of
marketing support and development this product is thriving for the first time
clients are seeing the value of DS in all areas facilities want them. The only
drawback is the lack of DI for film work which prompts a re-think at the
eleventh hour. HD is big news but equally so is DI to ignore this is
suicide.
If there is a policy maker at Avid with a brain
DON'T KILL DS it will lose you all those clients they will vote with there feet
not for our sake but for Avid.
Do the right thing the kudos you will gain by
continuing the development cannot be bought at any price. If the market realises
that you are a company that listens to your clients they will support you for
all the right reasons reward the loyalty not only from the users but the
many people who have worked on the development in the past.
Don't leave the door open for Apple if they
come up with anything close to DS you will never sell another NLE and all they
need to do is join the dots between SHAKE,FCP & some grading tools. DS
has the pedigree to withstand this SymPhony will not thrive for
long.
We all believe in this product its time you showed
the same faith after all we are the people who by you products which makes us
shareholders too.
Continue to ignore your customers and soon you
won't have any, remember Chyron, CMX and Ampex are you ready to add your
name to that list.
They also developt tools there clients did not
need, because they kept on making shiny new dresses when everyone was
wearing trousers.
I could go on but if you don't get it after
this then you are indeed to stupid to be in this business I suggest you try
crashing a fast food empire after all you have to give people what they want its
not difficult.
I guess this means I am disappointed.
(soap box neatly stowed)
Graham
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Tuesday, January 31, 2006 1:42
PM
Subject: 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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