First things first, hats off to team Avid for making what seems to be a remarkable turnaround with this new thinking initiative. This has been the most user focused Avid I have ever seen. We are off to a great start, but I feel I need to offer a word of caution.

DON'T NEGLECT THE INDIE CROWD...

In the wake of New Thinking I have noticed a seemingly overlooked issue. Avid still seems to be turning a blind eye to the small independent ONE SYSTEM NO NEED FOR A UNITY CROWD.

Please understand I am not scoffing at your change. Avid is a big ship and to execute a turn around like this is remarkable. However, I was at the avid customer event in Vegas and I had the opportunity to meet with many of the product developers and ask questions. The one thing that gave me pause in the whole New Thinking dogma was that Avid personal were quick to dismiss AVCHD codecs and Canon's 24F frame rate.

I know I know, what was Canon thinking with their non standard 24F. It is a nightmare, but it is a nightmare that Indie shooters and educators are buying up by the dozens because of the low price point.

And I know AVCHD is the low income equivalent to P2 and SxS, but Indie camera darling Panasonic has bet the future of their DVX camera on it. The new HMC-150 is the HD replacement for the little camera that could. It is an incredible little camera for the money and it is aimed right at the heart of the Market were Avid is always loosing Market Share. Independents and Educators.

At the Avid customer event a very bright Avid engineer remarked to me that AVCHD is not professional and NOT EVEN ON THE RADAR for native support. I understand the thinking; however, if history has taught us anything it has certainly been to let the market decide what is professional. Does anyone remember a little technology called DV? It was the CONSUMER, NON PROFESSIONAL version of its PRO counterparts DVCAM and DVCPRO. It was the consumer wink so that soccer moms and football dads could shoot their little monsters in the glory that is DV25.
This consumer only format eventually prompted a software offering from the biggest most professional grade editor on planet earth. Remember Avid Xpress DV. Avid was a day late and a dollar short on that offering because they were focused on the "Pro" market. Final Cut Pro caught up lots of Avid fans who were waiting on low cost DV only software.

So what I am saying Avid, is if you are really to be the champions of visual story telling and the company who's new thinking forever locked them in film making history books. Let’s let the customers tell us what is professional and let’s adapt quickly to this ever changing market.

I know you only have so many features to get into a release in the given time. But Script sync over AVCHD or Canon 24F. Avid your studio clients are not going anywhere they trust you. Your independent clients are leaving by the thousands because they are an after thought.

Keep New Thinking...But the true measure of your change of heart will only be seen when you are number one again in the minds of the industry. The true challenge of a user focus company is what happens when it works and you achieve all the success you dreamed of. Will the customer still be the focus?

Please understand I am still a huge fan.

Good luck...Give me greatness Avid.

Jason Adams

AGREED!!!

I spoke with an Avid export in the Panasonic booth regarding P2 workflows and metadata and the very, VERY fist thing he asked was "do you have a Unity?" When I answered no, he responeded with, "You need one." So I asked him, what workflow improvements would ONE person on ONE editor see by buying a >$25,000 storage box. "..."

Yes the indies and the educators might not be DS buyers but we are buyers. Apple's marketing approach was simple, and genious. Don't go after Hollywood, no convincing the suits to switch, instead go after the students and the indies. Because one day they will be the suits and they will drive Hollywood into the hands of Apple.

When Avid dropped Xpress Pro and cut the price on MediaComposer, I thought "they get it, they really do get it." Then they showed me an IO box for $7500. ??? What?? I thought they got it? I'm not even sure what they believe the market for the Mojo DX box is. Hollywood? No, Hollywood isn't going to be buying thousands of IO boxes, they want Nitris. The indies, well compared to Apple and AJA/Blackmagic/Matrox who has the "bang for the buck?" The educators, tuition and/or taxpayer funded faciliates with extremely limited budgets, not likely. Frankly, I just can't fathom a customer for the Mojo DX.

When you have already decided to spend that much money on something why not get the Nitris instead? If you can't spend that much money, where do you go?

On AVCHD, Avid is working on it. They don't have a choice. The format may have its consumer ties but it is also tied to the professional market. Just ask Panasonic. An AVCHD camcorder that costs >$4,000? Yeah, I'm buying that to record little Jimmies ball games. This camera is targeted at the educational market and the very small indie market (think Wedding guys). Stepped up a notch we have AVC-I HD. The same codec but now intraframe. This in a camera that costs >$20k. Definately not consumer. So, don't fret we will see AVCHD support.

Charles

Great point.

The
MOJO DX is way over priced. I have a MOJO and I thought it was over priced at 1500 when I bought it. I am now so frustrated with Avid because THEY ARE SO CLOSE TO getting it but they are making the same mistakes. EVERY Customer counts. NOT JUST UNITY CUSTOMERS.

Come on Avid you are almost there. Don't think that a customers value is directly proportianl to the amount of money they have to spend.

I will say this. If Avid makes such a huge noise about how willing to change they are and they don't deliver. The same people they are trying to bring back into the fold will never trust them again.

Give us greatness...and don't think for a minute you are above "slowly going the way of the Amiga."

Innovate...and captivate

One thing to factor in. All of the new hardware you are seeing was put in place (Yes even financed) looooong before Gary and Kirk were a gleam in the board of director's collective eye.

Products and pricing that will reflect the new leadership is still to come. You will see an extremely intensive user-based initiative from Avid this year because that is what the new execs can affect immediately. Product realignments and re-structuring will take a lot longer than one quarter of new management.

MOJO DX is way over priced.

.- The Mojo DX is not overpriced.

Is badly conceived and terribly marketed.

An orphan product, with no market and no appeal.

In my opinion, is a product that shouldn't exist.

Too expensive and limited for the small guy.

Also too expensive (for other reason: the Nitris DX is a better value) and limited for the big guy.

And as you said, if you have a big bag of money to spend, acquiring a Nitris DX is a no brainer.

For a Post house with resources and money, there is no significant reason to acquire a Mojo DX.

But, as BLKDOG said, lets wait.

BLKDOG:

One thing to factor in. All of the new hardware you are seeing was put in place (Yes even financed) looooong before Gary and Kirk were a gleam in the board of director's collective eye.

I wish more people understood this or took it into consideration when forming their opinions about the new hardware. 

Michael

BLKDOG:

Products and pricing that will reflect the new leadership is still to come. You will see an extremely intensive user-based initiative from Avid this year because that is what the new execs can affect immediately.

The new management managed to cut in half the price of MC soft, so why is it a problem making the MojoDX price somewhat nearer its value (half would not be a bad start!)

This is still the "old thinking" - cant price MojoDX with HD I/O too cheap so we dont upset the Adrenaline users who've had to pay $20k for this up to now. Well guess what, they're upset anyway, but at least have a NitrisDX box which is much better value, if you need all the I/O's and DNxHD, than MojoDX. 

Like most of the other "whiners" about Mojo DX, we're a small production company on the edge of going HD, and looking seriously at whether we believe that Avid finally has some regard for smaller users and "New Thinking" is more than a marketing slogan, or whether it's still business as usual and if we stay with Avid we'll always be second class customers.

Mojo DX is not a good sign, and the continuing silence over future upgrade and Avid assurance policies and requirements for MC soft do not bode well either.

Derek Goodall

Goodwood Productions, Los Angeles

derekg:

The new management managed to cut in half the price of MC soft,

Nope, that was in the pipeline for a while

BLKDOG:

All of the new hardware you are seeing was put in place (Yes even financed) looooong before Gary and Kirk were a gleam in the board of director's collective eye.

But it was specifically presented under the New Thinking flag. You cannot blame people for interpreting it as part of the same campaign.

Also, the customer focused program was first already introduced to the user base back in November '07, so before Gary and Kirk were in the picture.

Butcher:

BLKDOG:

One thing to factor in. All of the new hardware you are seeing was put in place (Yes even financed) looooong before Gary and Kirk were a gleam in the board of director's collective eye.

 

I wish more people understood this or took it into consideration when forming their opinions about the new hardware. 

 

Michael

.- We understand that.

But, unfortunately, that doesn't make the Mojo DX looks more appealing.

Lets wait, only time will tell.

With the aim in supporting new formats, I feel that Avid shouldn't wait to have the ability to natively cut whatever new formats come along.  This could take a lot of development time to do properly.  They instead should rush out other capture software that translates the incoming format into whatever format is closest to the already supported formats.  Of course, it should be true to its timecode so you could batch back later on (even if the batching part has to wait until Avid fully supports the format or the batching has to be done on another computer)  I waited a LLLLOOOOONG time for JVC support and it costs me thousands of dollars.  if I wasn't such a loyal AVID user, I would have switched long ago.

"... and it costs me thousands of dollars.  if I wasn't such a loyal AVID user, I would have switched long ago ...."

As a business owner, you should never be "loyal" to something that hurts your business or costs you.  If in fact, you lost "thousands", it might have been better to invest in FCP.  Most post houses now offer both anyway.

But, I agree, it took too long getting here.

Yeah, if I knew it'd be thousands, I would have switched. But Avid kept saying "Next quarter"  "Next quarter.."  That went on for  a couple years.  I ended up losing face and losing clients and investing in non-functional workarounds thinking "Well... I can fix all this in just a couple months.  Mama Avid SAYS so."   They now claim that it wil be supported in June.  I really hope they are not still yanking my chain.  I will say this, my loyalty to Avid isn't what it once was.

So far, I'm pretty happy with "new thinking." Can't wait for the Symphony DX release! I wonder if there's any "new thinking" about pricing on support contracts, Unity or HD boards to upgrade existing Adrenalines?