Dave Navarro
Forum Replies Created
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I am trying to understand why shooting in 60i and 30p are both interpreted by After Effects as 29.97p
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According to a preview I saw on the Lynda.com site, ZW still has a huge edge over 3D in CS4. Particularly in terms of speed and workflow.
Time will tell…
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I downloaded the latest demo and got the info from the license there.
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There was a rumour that it was 64-bit, is it true?
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Mike,
Basically it’s a web application for a specific industry. Occasionally I get sales to consulting companies and such outside the industry, but the appeal is mostly limited to (I’d estimate) about 200,000 companies worldwide. At least a third of which are existing customers.
I built my own DVDR duplication machine with an old computer loaded with Linux and 5 DVD burners. A set of 5 discs takes me about 10 minutes to burn and I am currently burning 200 discs a week (the product fits on a single disc). I buy printable media and I have two printers for labeling. The whole process takes me about 5 hours a week. Granted, occasionally I can skip a week when sales are slow.
About 70% of shipped products are upgrade discs purchased by existing customers who prefer a new disc instead of just downloading updates.
I change the image at least once a month with new features or bug fixes and new media that we create. Occasionally I’ll do 2 or more changes in a month when warranted.
The amount of time it takes to deal with all of it is seriously eating into my schedule. I can either hire a part time person to do it for me, or, preferably I can use a service to handle it for me.
I have two contractors that work for me to help me work on the application and create new media content. I don’t want to have to “hire” anyone, even part-time. The additional costs for insurance and accounting outweigh the benefit for me at the moment. The contractors work from home (not even in the my state, actually) so at the moment I don’t have to deal with employment insurance and tax issues.
As I mentioned previously, I signed up with dvd-fulfillment.com and things seem to be progressing well. I’ll know soon if they’ll be able to handle updates/changes quickly for me. If it doesn’t work out, then I will probably have to bite the bullet and hire someone.
Unfortunately, most of the companies I have contacted all want to create 500 to 1000 products and then warehouse them for me. Shipping from that stock. My main problem with that is the loss of flexibility in changing the image. After that, the cost for the warehousing solution is about 15% higher than if I hire someone to come in and do it once a week on my existing equipment.
It might also be time to seriously consider upgrading my process to a Rimage duplicator for $5,000. But that’s a huge investment for me at the moment.
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No offense Grin, but if you have sold thousands of DVDs and not made any money then I don’t think I want your advice.
I am making a very good profit doing the whole operation myself. It’s just growing to the point that I either have to stop producing new products to sell the old ones, get some help, or outsource.
I want the flexibility of being able to change the product as necessary which is what I have now.
I thought maybe others would be either already doing the same or looking to do the same. I am guessing from the response so far, I was wrong.
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Right now I am doing the replication myself. But it’s starting to grow to the point where I need to outsource it. I had thought about just buying a minimum run of discs for $1000, but it doesn’t give me the flexibility of making changes without tossing the old ones in the trash.
I had hoped that there was an existing business that saw an opportunity to provide this type of service. A company that can do on-demand replication and shipping that was totally automated (I could simply upload an ISO plus artwork and change it as needed). dvd-fulfillment.com comes close, but they aren’t completely automated at this time (any images over a gig you have to mail to them).
I don’t mind paying $10 a disc for on-demand service as long as it meets my needs (I don’t think that’s being a cheap-skate). I just think paying Amazon 45% plus fees was a bit excessive.
I had thought maybe someone else would be doing it already (or something similar) and came here for advice. I didn’t realize that asking what others would be doing would create such hostility. My apologies. Creative Cow bills itself as some place where people can come for getting help. From your responses, I guess that reputation is undeserved.
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If it were for a product that was going to be on a regular store shelf, I could somewhat understand. Especially for a low cost video DVD around $20.
Createspace doesn’t support data DVDs at this time (which is what the product is) and my price point is around $150, and 45% of that plus fees is ridiculous.
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Maybe in the next major release, “importing” new emitters into a master library sorted by category would be possible and not a performance burden.
I find it a lot easier to resort the libraries into the same type of categories as well.
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Thanks. I was more interested in changes regarding moving between PI and AE.
I’ve got your DVD on my wishlist for the next quarter’s budget. 🙂