Trouble in FCPX plugin land – motionVFX investigates Pixel Film Studios

[Michael Phillips]

Certainly not condoning violation of copyrights or any intellectual property but it is interesting at a high level what the industry is going through at this time. As a holder of several patents, I see violations all over the place. It is up to the company to pursue legal action at the cost that it entails. There are so many rules and strategies associated with it that in the end, it’s the lawyers that end up winning. 😉 I find that patent filing and granted patents are mainly a defensive counter move when being sued for patent violation as well as the right to do the process yourself. In the example in this thread, it is pretty clear with a difference matte between the layers that the similarities of “grain and noise” are identical.

That aside, it was ineresting to me to see how many employees these companies have to create the product offerings and the pressure from potential customers who want everything for free or hardly nothing. That only works when you have something that it is attached to that is of greater value to sell, protect, or grow market share. For example, Redcine X Pro from Red is free. Resolve is free but Grant has a great philosophy to back that strategy up and an ecosystem to back that up with what is available now as well as whatever he has in mind in the future. Apple has it with FCPX – between hardware, operating system, iTunes only purchase, etc it is it’s own singular ecosystem. I would not be surprised if Apple only allowed plug-ins to be installed into FCPX via iTunes in the future as a strategy, getting an ensure 30% of that revenue as well.

As the prices drop, volume sales must go up to stay in business. motionVFX has 15 employees. Each one making enough salary to make a living, raise a family, perhaps buy a home. But the new mentality of free to no cost because it’s software is fascinating and concerning at the same time – content is fast becoming that way as well and you’ve seen the stories of how much money the artist actually gets in the back end. There are more distribution platforms out there for all this, but marketing costs, competitive pressure all lead to a difficult endeavor, be it software products or content. There is truth to the saying; “there are a lot of first time filmmakers, not a whole lot of second time ones.” And getting a distribution deal does not mean you’re making a living. I’ve lived that one first hand as a content creator.

Michael

[Bill Davis]

The age old nexus where commerce and morals intersect.

Interesting to see a solid bit of the “intellectual property” argument from the content creators perspective.

It’s certainly becoming a brave new world where the digital clone/download thing changes things so rapidly.

Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.

[Helmut Kobler]

This is truly outrageous. I’ll pass it along.

——————-
Los Angeles Cameraman
Canon C300 (x2), Zeiss CP.2 lenses, P2 Varicam, etc.
http://www.lacameraman.com

[Simon Ubsdell]

Truly appalling – if indeed it is true, which it certainly appears to be.

motionvfx do outstanding work across the board and don’t deserve this kind of thing.

As Helmut says, make sure this story gets passed around.

Simon Ubsdell
http://www.tokyo-uk.com

[Mark Dobson]

Being inspired by one product to create an alternate one in the same area is often the way it works in music and the arts. Paul McCartney was inspired by Pet Sounds and that led to Sgt Pepper. (Which led to the Stones most abysmal album Their Satanic Majesties Request)

But slightly altering an existing product and simply re-branding it is theft. And probably quite lucrative as well. With the standard FCPXPlugin at $49 you only need to sell 500 units to make $12,250. Multiply that by 10 other products and you have got a nice little business with very low overheads and staffing costs.

But then you get lazy and forget to cover your tracks like a recent mugger arrested by police following his footsteps in the snow.

And it must be very difficult to get legal with another international internet business so probably the best outcome that Symon Masiak can hope for is that once the people who have ripped off his products have been outed and shamed they will desist.

The other way is for everybody to totally boycott the offending company. Word spreads very fast and this could be highly effective.

[Herb Sevush]

[Mark Dobson] “Which led to the Stones most abysmal album Their Satanic Majesties Request)”

Satanic Majesties is a very underrated album. At that point in time every Stones album was a reflection of the Beatles Album that proceeded it and while not up to the level of Beggars Banquet, Let It Bleed or Exiles, it isn’t nearly as execrable as something like Goat Heads Soup. Besides, it had the great 3D cover and on the inside a maze that had no solution – both a prefect accompaniment to whatever hallucinogens the album was made to be listened to.

Why don’t we sing this song all together
Open our heads let the pictures come
And if we close all our eyes together
Then we will see where we all come from

Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
—————————
nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf

[Lance Bachelder]

Shameful! I was wondering how Pixel folks were able to release plug-ins at such a furious pace. There marketing is impressive and I was happy to see more FCPX plugs hitting the market… but sadly, now we know the rest of the story. (stole that from Paul Harvey)

Lance Bachelder
Writer, Editor, Director
Irvine, California

[Mark Dobson]

[Herb Sevush] “it had the great 3D cover and on the inside a maze that had no solution”

Yeah that was good but the only song that has stood the test of time is ‘She’s a Rainbow’. Brian Jones used to live nearby in AA Milne’s old house . . . until he took his final swim. The house is up for sale at the moment and not shifting, partly because weird people turn up at all times of night and day to visit the shrine. When the pool was re-tiled a while ago the old tiles ended up on ebay.

[Hank Perkins]

It is sad to see this happen. As a small potatoes newcomer to the FCPX realm, we saw this saturation of film grain/dust/vintage film/etc stuff early on. We decided to focus on motion design. Hopefully, more creative ideas will come to the FCPX arena soon. It cannot just be a revolving door of newcomers selling the latest light leaks $10 cheaper than the last guy!

I hope events like this do make the community and developers see the need and demand for more originality.

Best,

Hank

http://www.tangentfx.com

[Steve Connor]

[Simon Ubsdell] “motionvfx do outstanding work across the board and don’t deserve this kind of thing.
“

Absolutely agree, I use their templates all the time.

Steve Connor
‘It’s just my opinion, with an occasional fact thrown in for good measure”