-
AE competitor
-
[Walter Soyka] “Then three years passed between Apple’s acquisition of Nothing Real in 2002 and the announcement of Shake 4, the first version with optical flow, in 2005. How far along could Nothing Real have been on optical flow when Apple bought them? Surely the Nothing Real team, the people themselves, was more strategically important than that IP.”
This could all be true, however, maybe some of this ended up many years later in projects like the iPhone camera. Or maybe Apple just wanted to learn other approaches. Or they were on a buying spree and wanted to take a few companies off the market and out of the hands of other potential competitors.
Look at Blackmagic Design. They are amassing quite a valuable portfolio of IP that may or may not ever find it’s way into a new product.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
[Tim Wilson] “And certainly by the time the EOL came to pass, I don’t see how anyone, anywhere, no matter how much they loved D|S, could say with a straight face that it still had a place anywhere but in their hearts. Certainly not in the market, and imo it wasn’t Avid’s fault.”
I considered DS in early 2012. DS artists’ passion for the platform made it tempting, but I was really surprised when I dug in to it a bit. It wasn’t just that new products appeard — DS just never kept up. The product was lacking in some really important areas like file-based workflows and a 3D space for compositing/design.
I could be persuaded otherwise, but I don’t see how DS’s failure isn’t at least partially on Avid. DS was years ahead of its time when Softimage launched it, but years behind when Avid EOLed it. I don’t believe Avid management really understood what they had with DS, and I don’t believe they made the investment in DS’s architecture that would kept DS relevant, let alone competitive.
DS is like the Ghost of Software Yet to Come: a cautionary tale that shows a dim future for your favorite mature application unless its developers make a change. I’m pretty sure Dickens had things like FCPX, Flame’s 20th Anniversary Edition, and After Effects CC 2015 in mind when he sent Scrooge to see a poulterer about a turkey.
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn] -
[Walter Soyka] “I could be persuaded otherwise, but I don’t see how DS’s failure isn’t at least partially on Avid. DS was years ahead of its time when Softimage launched it, but years behind when Avid EOLed it. I don’t believe Avid management really understood what they had with DS, and I don’t believe they made the investment in DS’s architecture that would kept DS relevant, let alone competitive.”
There was also a very definite culture clash between the Tewksbury and Montreal operations and management, which didn’t help matters.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
[Walter Soyka] “but I don’t see how DS’s failure isn’t at least partially on Avid. DS was years ahead of its time when Softimage launched it, but years behind when Avid EOLed it. I don’t believe Avid management really understood what they had with DS, and I don’t believe they made the investment in DS’s architecture that would kept DS relevant, let alone competitive.”
Bingo! Give this man a prize. I saw DS at NAB before v1.0 was released and found it very intriguing. After a trip to Nashville to visit with Bill Hite, I was hooked and had a system in my shop soon after (actually got the system that I demoed down in Nashville). I beta tested versions 2-4. It was way ahead of anything that Avid could offer. As soon as Avid bought the product everything stopped. Then Avid said that DS would be their HD solution and the howls from the MC/Symph crowd could be heard coast to coast. So Avid backed away from that. Avid had no clue what they had in DS and the pro-MC crowd in Tewks won out. Damn shame, as the company could have been playing in the high-end finishing world, but through ignorance and arrogance missed that opportunity. IMHO (DS-biased too)
Scott Witthaus
Senior Editor/Post Production Supervisor
1708 Inc./Editorial
Professor, VCU Brandcenter -
[Scott Witthaus] “Damn shame, as the company could have been playing in the high-end finishing world, but through ignorance and arrogance missed that opportunity”
I think there’s a lot of blame to go around. From what I heard on the inside, Montreal also dragged its feet implementing the product roadmap, yet was more than happy to implement little features not on the roadmap. Part of the culture clash.
For awhile, it was in fact Avid’s only HD product, so it’s not like it didn’t get a chance. However it was offered at a price that was in the Autodesk and Quantel range and those products were perceived as better. Being a “Flame artist” carried weight. Being a “DS artist” didn’t. There’s only so much room at the top at that price and DS was the odd product out.
Of course, I’ll freely admit that Avid jacked up the price unrealistically, but that is only because at the time they believed in the product. When I first saw DS in the very beginning, it was $80K turnkey. After Avid, the SD version was bumped up to $120K. Then the HD model was $300K. Seems to me that was trying to be opportunistic, but it was justified compared to the heavy iron alternatives. That happened right at the same time that low-cost options entered the market.
The core issue is that DS was good as a short-form box, not a long-form box. Avid is generally viewed as a long-form product company at the high-end and that’s the market they were pushing DS into. Obviously part of the miscalculation.
Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
I bought Shake shortly prior to its demise. Will it was a great piece of software it was never given a chance to develop. Now that Fusion is available for Mac at a reasonable price there would be no point on keeping Shake around. Fusion is easy to transition over to for anyone with experience with a node based compositor or Resolve since it s node based. Even without exposure, Fusion is still easy to learn though a slight learning curve is involved.
With that said I doubt Fusion would disrupt After Effects or Nuke for that matter. Just my two cents.
-
[Oliver Peters] “However it was offered at a price that was in the Autodesk and Quantel range and those products were perceived as better. Being a “Flame artist” carried weight. Being a “DS artist” didn’t. There’s only so much room at the top at that price and DS was the odd product out.
“That was an Avid issue. Jacked the price with no development. It was a no-win situation.
Scott Witthaus
Senior Editor/Post Production Supervisor
1708 Inc./Editorial
Professor, VCU Brandcenter -
Well, if you remember, at that time Avid also had another competing compositing product in Illusion. I think it’s fair to say that some of those purchases were misguided.
Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
Since Ae is used for animation, this seems relevant:
Toonz, 2D animation software used for Futurama and films including Princess Mononoke, Anastasia, and Balto, is becoming free and open-source this weekend.
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn]
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up