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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Smoke news

As a 20 year flame artist I'm pleased to see Autodesk moving into a space where the industry really lives.
 
No app switching, I love that. It's one of my complaints about the Adobe tools; there are so many of them. It's a love/hate thing.

It won't be ready until the Fall though. I'll be investing in something else before then I think. If it came earlier and using it didn't mean duplicate spending within the course of one year it might fit in for me, but Fall might be too late.

Damn this looks so sweet though... I may have to stick with FCP7/Resolve Lite for another year.
 
I've been excited about this announcement. There's no doubt, this is the direction the industry is heading. Better integrated tools, less roundtripping, etc. The key though is that it can still be integrated into other workflows. It doesn't cut itself off from the rest of the world. In a way, it's best of both worlds. The one thing that doesn't change is that those who have a skill set firmly planted in VFX are still going to be the ones getting the best results. You can give editors a super app, but it's hard to give them 15-20 years of experience too. But it does open up new possibilities for small shops like mine, to experiment and perhaps create more efficient workflows at a time when clients are looking for more cost effective ways to work. Also, it might provide ways of doing some preliminary work that can then be given to more capable Smoke artists to work their magic.

I look forward to seeing how this plays out. But this certainly seems like one of the bigger announcements that will come out of NAB.
 
And -

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Greg M said:
I believe you can buy the current version for $3495 and get the upgrade for free. Or wait till June and get a free 90 day trial.
Click to expand...

This significantly changes my plans... Just at the perfect time. It truly is a great time to be doing this stuff!
 
Looks like a truly major upgrade.

Finally there is now Batch, integrated in the timeline. And fortunately it seems that they didn't drop functionalities but only the price. It's now the third time I invested into software that became later available for a fraction of the price (FinalTouch, SpeedGrade, Smoke). Haha. I don't mind. Got the ROI anyway.

Good times! But mastering this version won't be much easier than the current version. I'm not sure how many potential customers will go back to their old NLE after the trial period expired, despite the very attractive price.

And finally, will Flame follow this new paradigm in Version 2014? Or will Flame stick to its old interface and Linux box. And then, what is Apple going to do with the Pro boxes? Smoke on an iMac - not for me.

Interesting times.

Hans
 
I'm excited about this new version. Having run Smoke quite a bit last year, I really like essentially every change they've made. I find it interesting (although not shocking) that Lustre functionality is not part of the package, but from my point of view, Smoke and Resolve make a great and powerful combination in the right hands and the right circumstances. My only issue is the requirement for different video output cards for each (Autodesk is married to AJA, and Resolve, not surprisingly, is married to Blackmagic). At this point, that probably means two separate computers, but perhaps one or the other will open up to, well, one or the other.

I can dream, can't I? :001_unsure:
 
I have mixed feelings about this one. I was at the announcement and they went through this dance about consulting editors about their needs, looking at the big picture blah, blah... And then they go ahead and re- release the same Smoke with almost the same capabilities as before. Yes, new batch is great addition, no more gateway is a relief, BUT the one app paradigm, that was mentioned many times during the presentation and the revolutionary interface, in my opinion, falls a bit short of the promise. Wasn't that the whole point of this update? As a colorist I am very disappointed at the insistence of using old and stale CC and CW. One app? How? Proper grading is still nearly impossible, as before. You'd still need to use Resolve for something like that. I sidn't see any indications, that Smoke uses any CUDA acceleration. You still need to render everything, before you see it in real time. I could be wrong on that though. No indication of any kind of background render. Same as before, hit render and wait for it to finish, just like in the old FCP. What happened to the 3D tracker? Same old point tracker, as before. Autodesk has the technology, but their marketing always get's in the way. As they were putting down AE, AE does now 3d tracking. So, if you need 3d tracking in Smoke, again, another app. Don't get me wrong. I still think, that Smoke is the best in it's breed of finishing apps and a major reduction in price is great too. But, I feel, autodesk overhyped and oversold the new Smoke. Current Smoke users will be overjoed, for a good reason, but I don't feel there is enough interface streamlining to attract many new users. I feel, they had waisted a major opportunity to re-enter the mass market. I hope I'm wrong. Only time will tell...
 
I had the amazing opportunity to demo Smoke/Flame/Lustre about a year and a half ago. My take on the package was that, while Lustre was AMAZING to work with, and Flame had AMAZING potential once you learned how to comp in it, it all seemed INCREDIBLY hard to get into and out of. Like there is a massive wall of information and know-how that you had to scale before you could even get footage into the damn thing.

This may be seen as flame-bating, but it's really just ignorance that I would love to have corrected: What is the point of Smoke? I mean, versus FCP, Premiere, Avid, given the (at the time "massive", now only "large") price differential, I couldn't see what it did that the other standard editing programs couldn't. Or what it did better/smoother than the others. Flame and Lustre, I could see the potential. Smoke, I could not.

Can anyone tell me what I'm missing here? I'm a big fan of "More tools in my toolbox is always a good thing", and would hate to be completely overlooking Smoke because of some misconceptions and a lack of a decent explanation.

EDIT: I often see Smoke referred to as a great, or even the best, "finishing" application. I feel the most ignorant for having to ask: What does this mean? What kinds of things routinely go in to the process of Finishing projects?
 
Nick Pasquariello said:
I had the amazing opportunity to demo Smoke/Flame/Lustre about a year and a half ago. My take on the package was that, while Lustre was AMAZING to work with, and Flame had AMAZING potential once you learned how to comp in it, it all seemed INCREDIBLY hard to get into and out of. Like there is a massive wall of information and know-how that you had to scale before you could even get footage into the damn thing.

This may be seen as flame-bating, but it's really just ignorance that I would love to have corrected: What is the point of Smoke? I mean, versus FCP, Premiere, Avid, given the (at the time "massive", now only "large") price differential, I couldn't see what it did that the other standard editing programs couldn't. Or what it did better/smoother than the others. Flame and Lustre, I could see the potential. Smoke, I could not.

Can anyone tell me what I'm missing here? I'm a big fan of "More tools in my toolbox is always a good thing", and would hate to be completely overlooking Smoke because of some misconceptions and a lack of a decent explanation.

EDIT: I often see Smoke referred to as a great, or even the best, "finishing" application. I feel the most ignorant for having to ask: What does this mean? What kinds of things routinely go in to the process of Finishing projects?
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Nick.
Didn't you post this verbatim couple of days ago?
BTW, with the new verion of Smoke, getting in and out of Smoke got much easier now:-)
 
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