Assimilate has released SCRATCH RED Pre-Post

[Cüneyt Kaya]

How many know what the real steps are to a DI? How many people are involved in your DI workflow besides a colorist?

From setting up in an empty room to final output, there is a lot more than what some 20 year old can code.

Scratch Pre Post is $55K for a working system, not just software or hardware. I can expect it to be a fast system that would take minimal time to integrate into a workflow. That's more important to some people than buying all the parts and spending time to figure out how to make it work themselves.

If you want just software, there is Color. Apple will eventually get it a lot more stable than it is now with more funtionality.

I can't see why footage can't be edited in RedCode, and brought into Color in RedCode. I'm still on a G5, so I can't really test that theory myself.

You are absolutely right....this will be the future...it doesnt have to be COLOR, can be another...

and its not rocket science to buy the needed hardware and put it together.
but like you said...people would pay for the time they save,by buying a complete ( Hardware/Software) package.

EXCEPTION: Dont underestimate 20 year old people...think of the hackers out there

 

[Chris Parker]

I can't see why footage can't be edited in RedCode, and brought into Color in RedCode. I'm still on a G5, so I can't really test that theory myself.

Bingo. As I have said several times. NAB 2008. Watch this happen. Full REDcode support in FCS as a solution for those low end folks out there. No DI. Just work natively in REDcode all the way through, and output to your format of choice.

NAB 2009 at the latest.

 

[Sanjin Jukic]

I see now that people are missing the point.

It's not about SCRATCH and selling mid-priced DI system to RED customers or whoelse.

Simply it's about RED.

RED wants to sell about 4000-6000 cameras per year for sure.

And who cares about a big DI facilities.

RED wants to remain on the market with a high demand of RED camera products for the next 5-10 years.

The key product NOW for RED is REDCINE.

RED should add to REDCINE "CONFIRM" module that already exists in SCRATCH because as we know REDCINE is build on Assimilator, the DI Platform Service layer .

This "CONFIRM" additional module doesn't have to be a free software.

Should be somehow reasonably priced in a same way as RED camera.

 

[Cüneyt Kaya]

I see now that people are missing the point.

It's not about SCRATCH and selling mid-priced DI system to RED customers or whoelse.

Simply it's about RED.

RED wants to sell about 4000-6000 cameras per year for sure.

And who cares about a big DI facilities.

RED wants to remain on the market with a high demand of RED camera products for the next 5-10 years.

The key product NOW for RED is REDCINE.

RED should add to REDCINE "CONFIRM" module that already exists in SCRATCH because as we know REDCINE is build on Assimilator, the DI Platform Service layer .

This "CONFIRM" additional module doesn't have to be a free software.

Should be somehow reasonably priced in a same way as RED camera.

very good point

after REDCINE GETS this Conform App,
maybe "plugins for redcine" will become a new market.
1st example:right now Output Plug in cineform.

there will be all kinds of plug ins....output/ sec. CC etc.

 

[Lucas Wilson]

As has been said in this thread, if you want to finish a movie without spending a lot of money, you can. FCS2 + After Effects can get you there.

But not really...

Any creative task is enabled by flow. When you're in the flow, whether it's painting, playing piano, sculpting, editing, or coloring - there are those preciously few magic moments when it all comes together, and you're in the moment and it all just works.

Realtime performance is a huge part of that. Imagine if, when you painted, there was a 1-second delay between the time you painted a stroke and the time it appeared on the paper. If you've never worked on a realtime system, then a new world awaits.

But in my world, that costs money. Could we sell SCRATCH for $3K? Sure. And the company would fold in a very short time. What SCRATCH does is *not* a commodity. Join me on Planet Reality for a minute...

Let's say RED has sold 4,000 cameras that will be delivered over the next year. Of that 4,000 - say 60% (2400) are unique owners. Of that, a large percentage are really not an audience for SCRATCH even if it were $3000. But let's be *really* generous - 40% of those owners need a finishing solution beyond what FCS2 offers. (I've done a lot of research - trust me on that being a generous number.) We're now at 960. Add in the circle of post facilities that touch the camera and are not camera owners - again being super-generous - and bring the total number of target customers up to 1,300.

Out of those 1,300 potential customers, we are true Sales Gods and can reach out to and close 60% of that number. 780.

Now - that software is priced at 3,000. That's a 2.3 million haul. Cool! Except... that's not enough to keep the company going for very long. Whoops! And the more you raise the price - the steeper the dropoff in prospects and people who will actually buy the product.

There is no free money, and the trouble with a pot of Gold is that you have to climb rainbows. And rainbows, as we all know, are unstable and mercurial at the best of times and tend to vanish with the weather.

----------------

Now despite all this, I love this business, I love what RED is doing, and I am more psyched professionally about this opportunity than I have been about anything in a long time.

But there are 3 classes of prospects for post-production software:

1) People who think that any software above $5K is a rip-off and have a suspicion that it is part of some global conspiracy ruled by the Illuminatus.

2) People who understand that things cost money, but don't have the money.

3) People who understand that things cost money, and have or can get the money.

Welcome to my world.

Lucas
-----
Reality Checker
ASSIMILATE, Inc.
LA, CA, USA

 

[M Most]

1But SCRATCH is the ONLY DI software that CAN Color Correct redcode files.
People who will buy a SCRATCH System, will not buy just because of their Data Handling abbilities....because it can handle CONFORM and CC REDCODE NATIVELY. The PRE RED TIME is gone.

People on RedUser, yes. For the rest of the world, there is an awful lot of work to be done that's shot on everything from DVX100's on up, and even more that's shot on film. That's what the DI business is today. I know that people here seem to think things like film production and post production are suddenly going to cease to be as more Red cameras get built, but it's just not the case. Assimilate has a lot of existing customers, and virtually none of them went with Scratch purely because it can read Red files - because frankly, one can do a very good job for a DI using log DPX files, as has been made clear by the few that have already been done (see: Crossing the Line). It is, to be sure, very nice to work directly from the raw files - and I say that as someone who's already done it. But the DI business is not primarily about Red at the moment, and finishing Red shows for film recording is not completely dependent on being able to work directly from the raw files.

SCRATCH should focus on not just beeing a data handler.they want to be used as FULL FINISHING SYTEM. IMO They are capable of doing this right now.

I didn't say that was their focus, and I didn't say that it couldn't be used as a full finishing system. I just said that many of their current users don't necessarily use it that way.

just calm down, i wanna have a good discussion....not a "fight".

I think this IS a good discussion. Discussions are an airing of various points of view. That's what we're doing.

 

[Rudi Herbert]

Lucas,

Quite right you are, however, let me pick your brain on a couple of things.

- Would you not agree that the industry (post + finishing) at the dedicated facility level is still driven to a large extent by prices that are a holdover from times when real time equipment was very expensive? Most gear nowadays can get by without dedicated hardware, and thus it would logical to expect somewhat better prices. Even if, yes, you pay for a highly trained professional whose eye and experience will make the difference, there's just the unavoidable fact that such places also need to cover a huge overhead, with high rents, lots of staff, and let's not forget the capuccino machines (which have gotten cheaper too by the way Going with your rationale, there are the prices that are simply ridiculous to pay, prices that are high but fair where you get a great value and most people (myself one of them) will do whatever it takes to budget for them, and the low prices charged by rinky dink "facilities" where you get what you pay for...Somewhere in there we need a happy medium, a compromise of sorts which means we as authors/creators/producers will endeavor to work with professional facilities so long as said facilities endeavor to trim and lean up their operation so such prices are prossible.

- Real time or not, the truth is that Scratch and other applications are only needed (IMHO) only for very high end work, mostly stuff geared for theatrical projection. If you're creating TV bound material, you do not need that resolution, and you can work on real time on visually lossless format like Cineform on anything from AE, Color, Color Finesse, etc, etc, etc. I've done it, and the results are more than adequate for TV, even for the festival circuit, where your work will never be screened in anything bigger than 20-30 ft wide. So, to the large majority of people out there whose work will rarely if ever be picked up for large scale cinema distribution, paying even the modest price that something like Scratch demands as compared to a Da Vinci or an Inferno, is totally counter productive. Provided these people have the knowledge to do color grading on their own, why not let them go at it on a cheaper platform that will yield great results anyway?

Thanks for your insights,

 

[Cüneyt Kaya]

i like your discussion style.

maybe Assimilate dont even need RED and their Users to get bigger/or survive.

Assimalates 1st interest is not making a possible workflow for redusers. I agree
with that.Like I said before, it would even be a mistake, if they do so by lowering their price.

But from the POV of the reduser, it is a very very good tool to work with the camera.

So there is the conflict.

assimilate needs other costumers (post houses, few individuals)than the average reduser.
Red User need/want Assimilate Scratch, but cant/want pay the price.

Solution will be the way, which the third man showed. Conform APP for redcine...if it is directly from red or 3rd party doesnt matter.

But you cant deny that 4000 reds per year will have an impact to the DI market
How many D20s or Varicams were sold in the same time?

IMO it will be interesting to see how red/or a 3rd party will support the redusers in the Postworkflow ( Greetings and thanks to David Newmann)...and how Scratch will take advantage of their
temporary exclusively situation (supporting redcode) to get some new customers.
i think if Assimilate didnt expect some profits from supporting redcode, hence
why should they have done it.

 

[Chris Parker]

Lucas,

I think I speak for many (at least I hope I do) when I say that I don't want you to respond to questions like this. Why? I think your time is better spent producing great things like Scratch, and REDCine for us. Or better yet, take a well deserved break and enjoy some well deserved time off (somehow I bet that won't happen anytime soon).

I don't think you owe anyone who questions your business practice based on nothing but speculation deserves an answer from you. I'd rather see you take that 5 minutes and have a beer.

I for one would like to thank you for your hard work and dedication to the digital cinema community, and want you to know that not all redusers feel like some, who seemingly want your stuff for free. Not all of us think we know your business better than you either, and feel like WE should set your optimum price point to ensure your sustainability. It must be nice though don't you think to be as wise as some on this forum who can magically come up with a better business plan for you without knowing anything about your business?

And KBerlin, although I feel you do raise very very good points, I think when you called mmmost retarded earlier in the thread, you lost your right to tell him to 'relax' as you don't want to fight.

 

[Cüneyt Kaya]

mmost sorry for saying retarded.

it is a too hard word.

 

[Chris Parker]

I have said it before and I'll say it again. There will be Scratch for the high end DI finishing.

And then there will be REDCine and Final Cut/Color for the lower end 'TV' type work. And then one day, Final Cut/Color and REDCine would be fine for film blowups too (not too soon though IMO).

Think about it. REDCine is in version 1.0 BETA form right now. Think about the advances Final Cut made since Version 1.0. All these missing features will be there one day, and everyone should then be satisfied.

Again, NAB 2008 will shed a lot of light on this topic, and make a lot of things possible that aren't today.

Hey...here's a novel idea. REDCine PRO. An app. that has many of these features people want. Sell REDCine PRO for $499, jam pack it full of features, and you can bet they'd sell thousands of those. One for almost every camera owner, and thousands more for all those 'basement editors' out there.

Now there's an idea to bridge the seemingly big divide.

But again, soon enough, Final Cut/Color will be ALL you need for the lower end projects.

 

[Mark L. Pederson]

There is no free money, and the trouble with a pot of Gold is that you have to climb rainbows. And rainbows, as we all know, are unstable and mercurial at the best of times and tend to vanish with the weather.

In Silesia, an obscure area of eastern Europe, it was said that the angels put the gold there and that only a nude man could obtain the prize.

Just a tip ...

 

[Rob Lohman]

Keep in mind that Scratch is not just a simple software tool. The full suite is extensive and contains lots of modules and things that integrate with a lot of other stuff (HD-SDI out, control surfaces, etc.). That means a lot of testing, certification and support (which is where a lot of the money will go! Not just software engineering and shipping the cd!).

You can already see with the release of REDCINE how people run it on unsupported hardware and guess what it doesn't work (there are of course also some bugs on supported hardware, we're working on fixing those). Can you imagine the support for a $3K package with lots of users who run a million different graphics card combinations? (keep in mind that Scratch runs a lot of stuff on the GPU).

In the end it all boils down to what you can afford and what you can get for that money. There are a ton of options from cheap to very expensive: Color -> After Effects -> Combustion -> Scratch -> the heavy iron stuff.

What's so hard to understand about that? I want my Bugatti Veyron and a nice Aston Martin too, but I'll have to settle for something a bit cheaper I'm afraid...

 

[RivaiC]

In the end it all boils down to what you can afford and what you can get for that money.

Hit on the nail..that's the answer !!

 

[Sanjin Jukic]

In Silesia, an obscure area of eastern Europe, it was said that the angels put the gold there and that only a nude man could obtain the prize.

Just a tip ...

Mark,

SCRATCH (!!?? ha ha he he ) is not any dream of East European poor global look
at the DI market as you would think from your "a poor Manhattan-Brooklyn" point of view.
A global reality is more advanced that one can observe from the former world's center as it was NY.

Mark,

you should consider that you live in a province (NYC),
no matter as it called

LA, Huston, Mexico City, New York, Paris , London, Berlin,
Zurich, Vienna, Rome, Moscow, Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan,
Tokyo, Beijing, Bahrain, Dubai, Cairo, CapeTown, Mumbai,
Bangkok, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Sidney, Wellington, etc.

Get REAL, Wake up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The World is definitely changed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Take a cinema shower!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Anthony Gratl]

It's getting a bit tiring to read all of these posts that refuse to admit the bottom line fact: You basically want free stuff. And for some reason I can't seem to figure out, you seem to think that companies should give it to you because the hardware you run it on is cheap. Of course, even if they did, that wouldn't likely stop you from inundating them with support demands, and bad mouthing them when something didn't work. You have absolutely no idea of the development, support, or administrative costs involved in producing a product - and you seem blissfully unaware of the pricing of the competition as well - and yet here you are purporting to set the price for it.

Uh first off, 3k isnt free. And you're shooting your mouth off telling me I'm some kind of asshole that hassles support teams with some stupid demands and bad mouths them. In twelve years of working on Avids, I spent maybe an hour on the phone with folks in Tewksbury. And you should read my post before painting me with an idiot brush. It's oldschool doughheads like you that end up buying overpriced technology that disappears into obsolesence very quickly. And as far as the pricing of the competition goes, they haven't got the advantage that Scratch does in being able to work natively with Redcode do they? There are further points to my thinking as far as Scratch goes, but reading your post pissed me off, so I'm just going to address that. You've got no respect, and you spout off like you know all.

You want talent to be willing to work with you, and yet you want their tools to be free.

Again, you're just making shit up and writing for the sake of writing. You know what about me or what I'm working on?

Digital intermediate finishing is not exactly a general purpose consumer oriented discipline, and thus has a very limited audience. That audience is professionals who understand what it takes to deliver high end finished elements that are acceptable to technically and artistically demanding clients - as opposed to video editing tools that are used for everything from major studio pictures to home movies and YouTube videos. That makes editing software a commodity, as it targets home users who have nothing to do with a specific industry. You can't compare the two.

Editing platforms are being sold with more and more sophisticated finishing tools, so don't be so sure of yourself. And try not to condescend too much okay Professor DI? I can actually understand difficult conceptual topics, and your writing, albeit poor, kinda gives the impression that you think I'm pretty stupid. Or, you're writing for the joy of writing, known throughout the world by it's real name, lousy.

Percentage wise, compared to its competition, Scratch is about the same as the Red camera - basically about a third of the cost of much of its most obvious competition.

Well no, my understanding is that it's about a sixth of the cost. Dalsa's at least 200k, F23 I heard has around the same, don't know what Viper and genesis cost, but I don't think it's a hundredK. And we wern't talking about hardware, we were talking about software, which is a different animal.

But you're not looking at that. You're looking at a dollar number and complaining because you can't personally afford it.

Uh no, I'm not complaining. Again, you just like to spout off and should probably spend more time analysing than just reacting. My points were directed towards the idea that pricing Scratch out of the average RedUser market leaves it more vulnerable to long term market failure, exhibit a. shake, although it's a great example (coming soon from apple I'm sure) of what will happen AGAIN in the future when it's incorporated into FCP (which by the way, will put mucho pressure on the industry to change again, including Scratch, IMHO).

Well, I'm a private pilot, and I'd like to own a helicopter - but I'm not out there saying that the price of a Jet Ranger should be $3000 because that would be ridiculous.

What's ridiculous is this incredibly misguided analogy. Something more appropriate for your style might be you writing about how I might berate the Red company for charging as much as they do, but you'll notice that I've said nothing about their price, as its fair and totally changes the industry, which is really what I'm talking about, not desperately maintaining the status quo.

Not everything has to be "ownable" by individuals, especially when those individuals don't have a pressing need for it every day. That's why a post industry exists.

No, a post industry exists because a. films and video need to be finished, and they are lensed in a production industry, which dovetails neatly into a post industry and b. there are people out there who have the patience to recycle the same four frames seventy nine times to make sure that the flow is 'right', which, as it turns out, most people can't do that well for long stretches of time.
My contention though, is that the post industry is changing dramatically, and will continue to do so, as I've been privy to witness. And that was part of the point I was making with my post. Which means that when the train comes through, people like yourself might be caught square in the headlights, since you're spending your energy telling me that I've not a clue about this or that, instead of looking at the real history of the post industry in the last few years.

And if some people here would get over their notion that everything has to be free or close to it, and they started understanding why things have the value they do, then maybe they'd understand how a society and an industry can survive. Greed is not a way for that to happen. Paying fair value is.

This society and industry as we know it is on it's last legs period. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news for you. Ever heard of peak oil? Say goodbye to cheap energy. But I digress.
Funny you mention greed and try to pin it on me, as it's been driving this society and industry for a long time, and I don't participate in that model of thinking. I also don't believe in inflated value. And 'fair' is relative to what the market will take as evolution in the industry occurs.

Maybe if you can write a post mmost, that isn't full of disguised vitriol and scorn, we can have a decent chat about the state of things, but try to play nice with others okay? I have a strong point of view, but I respect the right for you to have yours as well. Unless of course, you start talkin' shit. Thanks.

 

[Anthony Gratl]

Man, some people. Mmmost....your post made so much sense. Scratch is ALREADY priced at a very very fair price compared to the competition. Could they sell more copies if they sold it for 3 grand a pop? Sure they could. Could they stay in business doing it? Who the hell knows? Do you evolve? If you are so gung ho about pricing a piece of DI finishing software, go write one yourself and give it away. But do NOT sit there and throw stones at the likes of Assimilate, when you know nothing about them.

Well, I guess that I see the industry as changing, and sorry skipdivils, mmost's post was, to me, pretty condescending. As far as selling more copies goes, I guess I'm looking three to five years down the road, and thinking that imaging and processing is going to get more and more involved from a data point of view. Which means that more and more people are going to be looking for systems that can process a higher rate of data. And a system like Scratch, which looks very cool to me, needs to be more affordable in order to get established at a grass roots level, for the thousands of people with Reds, and the other cameras that will surely be released in the not too distant future. Notice how sony hasn't officially released the cost of the F23? Who's going to buy an F23 if everyone's buying a Red?
Unless I've misunderstood something here, Scratch can run on off the shelf equipment no? At least according to their website, although I haven't spent much time on it yet.

mmmost's point of renting when you need makes so much sense, it is hard to belive you guys are missing that point. You say you want to make movies and finish them for theatrical release, at home. Well guess what, one day in the (not too distant) future, you will be able to, all on a Mac. Hell, i wouldn't be totally surprised to see that day at the next NAB. NAB 2009 at the latest IMO.

Until then however, if you can't afford the 50 grand it takes to get a system, don't whine and moan about it. Just rent from an established post house when you are ready to conform.

Or use REDCine and FCP, and deal with the problems for now.

Well it sounds like you and I agree on the main premise, which is why I wrote about the Scratch software needing to be less expensive to capture the new market of people with reds, and hd finishing needs for the multitudes with their 6000 dollar cameras. As far as whining and moaning goes, I've no time for that. There are solutions out there absolutely, and we'll use 'em all. I was trying to partake in the discussion about the post flow of Red Codec, as it related to Scratch, and me as a soon to be minted with 4K capability producer who doesn't feel the need to crank out stuff with a paycheque being the sole motivation, which is why the high end suites aren't cranking out the kids playing at the beach videos in the first place. But the industry is changing, and changing fast.

 

[Anthony Gratl]

I have said it before and I'll say it again. There will be Scratch for the high end DI finishing.

And then there will be REDCine and Final Cut/Color for the lower end 'TV' type work. And then one day, Final Cut/Color and REDCine would be fine for film blowups too (not too soon though IMO).

Think about it. REDCine is in version 1.0 BETA form right now. Think about the advances Final Cut made since Version 1.0. All these missing features will be there one day, and everyone should then be satisfied.

Again, NAB 2008 will shed a lot of light on this topic, and make a lot of things possible that aren't today.

Hey...here's a novel idea. REDCine PRO. An app. that has many of these features people want. Sell REDCine PRO for $499, jam pack it full of features, and you can bet they'd sell thousands of those. One for almost every camera owner, and thousands more for all those 'basement editors' out there.

Now there's an idea to bridge the seemingly big divide.

But again, soon enough, Final Cut/Color will be ALL you need for the lower end projects.

Okay, this is funny. You've written a post agreeing with mmost that some of us are a bunch of cheapskates, and now you're proposing a software package that will drive Scratch into the ground....and sold by Red. Although I disagree that FCP/color will be only for lower end projects for a long time. MacPro's eightcore's, mixed with Apple's nixing of Shake and rumours of it's integration into FCP, helps form my belief that we'll see massive change in the DI industry very soon once again. Never mind my 3K, you're talking 500 bucks!!!

 

[Edgar Pitts]

Nice post Evolve. mmost comes across as trying to defend the amount he spent on his Scratch system.

 

[Anthony Gratl]

As has been said in this thread, if you want to finish a movie without spending a lot of money, you can. FCS2 + After Effects can get you there.

But not really...

Any creative task is enabled by flow. When you're in the flow, whether it's painting, playing piano, sculpting, editing, or coloring - there are those preciously few magic moments when it all comes together, and you're in the moment and it all just works.

Realtime performance is a huge part of that. Imagine if, when you painted, there was a 1-second delay between the time you painted a stroke and the time it appeared on the paper. If you've never worked on a realtime system, then a new world awaits.

But in my world, that costs money. Could we sell SCRATCH for $3K? Sure. And the company would fold in a very short time. What SCRATCH does is *not* a commodity. Join me on Planet Reality for a minute...

We all work in real time dude. Editing has been like that for a while now on Planet Reality. So we're all aware of it's power and need. I admit that I'm not fully up as to the extent of Scratch's capabilities, however that doesn't change the nature of the discussion in regards to longevity in the market, given that shifts in strategy are happening all the time, and that, given the introduction of Red and inexpensive 4K, the majors will be cranking out alternatives very soon. Think of the HVX200, combined with Hydra, which will give you 14bit and over 2K resolution, combined with adaptors and slr lenses for less than 10K. Which makes me think that the finishing market and demand for Scratch and other systems will also change, as it becomes cheaper to shoot and project higher quality images. And Scratch is a commodity, whether or not you want to paint/sell it like that or not. It's an exchange of goods for money, which enables the buyer to then exchange use of that good for money, thereby commodifing it.

Let's say RED has sold 4,000 cameras that will be delivered over the next year. Of that 4,000 - say 60% (2400) are unique owners. Of that, a large percentage are really not an audience for SCRATCH even if it were $3000. But let's be *really* generous - 40% of those owners need a finishing solution beyond what FCS2 offers. (I've done a lot of research - trust me on that being a generous number.) We're now at 960. Add in the circle of post facilities that touch the camera and are not camera owners - again being super-generous - and bring the total number of target customers up to 1,300.

Out of those 1,300 potential customers, we are true Sales Gods and can reach out to and close 60% of that number. 780.

Now - that software is priced at 3,000. That's a 2.3 million haul. Cool! Except... that's not enough to keep the company going for very long. Whoops! And the more you raise the price - the steeper the dropoff in prospects and people who will actually buy the product.

I guess I see far more than 780 prospective sales for you, given that a 4K projector can be rented and the tens of thousands of people who will be buying very highly capable cameras in the next few years from the various manufacturers will be wanting to project them. Imagine, it'll be, lets have our neighbourhood film festival at the theatre. The kids will go out and shoot, edit in FCP, finish on Scratch, and then project it on the local big screen. That's a possibility for the not to distant future. So I see 780 clients as being a very conservative number. But don't get me wrong. I'm not trying to tell you your business at all. I've never sold a stitch of software in my life. All I know is that's what's cutting edge today is usually ancient tomorrow, a sad indicator of our times, however in software terms, it seems to me that the ones that have stuck around and have made an impact (excluding avid, as they started the whole commercial nle thing) have been relatively inexpensive. And exactly right, the steeper the price, the more the dropoff in business.

Now despite all this, I love this business, I love what RED is doing, and I am more psyched professionally about this opportunity than I have been about anything in a long time.

and i wish you all the success with it. from what i can see from the website, it looks like a great tool.

But there are 3 classes of prospects for post-production software:

1) People who think that any software above $5K is a rip-off and have a suspicion that it is part of some global conspiracy ruled by the Illuminatus.

2) People who understand that things cost money, but don't have the money.

3) People who understand that things cost money, and have or can get the money.

Welcome to my world.

Lucas
-----
Reality Checker
ASSIMILATE, Inc.
LA, CA, USA

Look, I guess when I look at the history of NLE's and DI's and such, most of the systems that were expensive were that for reasons of hardware, or at least, that's where they made their money. I'll admit I look for the good deal, but I do believe in buying tools that are needed instead of renting them, so my two cents are that cheaper high-end finishing tools are just around the corner, and I think that the state of camera development is going to open the demand for that market right up, and that was really my opinion. I could be totally wrong.
I'm not trying to tell you your business at all. Just giving some perspective on mine as one of tens of thousands of independant filmmakers on this planet.
Cheers