The Boston Avid User Group has been in existence since 2004. The group began holding monthly meetings in February 2005.

BAVUG is run by a Board of directors that share responsibilities.  Every year BAVUG holds an election for the board positions.  The current board members are:

President: James Burke

James Burke, founder and President of mBlaze, is an international award-winning designer, editor and multimedia producer. He started mBlaze (www.mblaze.com) with the goal of merging video and multimedia technologies to effectively deliver communication messages across multiple mediums as efficiently and affordably as possible.

James began his Avid career as an Avid support technician and was responsible for all Avid systems at trade shows. He is an Avid Master Editor (MEW '98) with over 20 years experience and has been editing on Avid systems since 1992. He has worked in the Boston and New York markets on projects of all types and has toured the country consulting and giving seminars on effects and media management for Avid Editing systems.

Vice-President: Arnie Harchik.  Arnie Harchik has been editing in the greater Boston market for 20 years. He's been on Avid systems since 1995. His resume includes work for FRONTLINE, NOVA, and GREATER BOSTON ARTS. He has received 5 Emmy nominations for "Outstanding Achievement in Editing" for his work on the PBSKids series ZOOM and "FETCH! with Ruff Ruffman."

As Senior Editor on "FETCH with Ruff Ruffman" Arnie helped create the look and feel of the series. He is responsible for cutting studio and field segments of the show, integrating graphics and music and finally onlining the entire series.  Arnie was just nominated for his firth Emmy Award for "Outstanding Achievement in Single Camera Editing" for the PBS show DRAGONFLYTV.  Good Luck Arnie!

Hospitality: Bill Kenney.   Bill Kenney has been an editor in the Boston area for the past 20 years and has been using Avids since 1995.  He has been the principal Online Editor for several PBS series and has earned several awards for technical excellence.  He is currently an independent / freelance editor in Boston and has been part of the BAVUG Board since 2006.

Membership: Kenton VanNatten.  Kenton VanNatten is a freelance editor and has been an Avid editor for over 8 yrs.  Kenton's resume is filled with work from corporate, independent documentary, and broadcast clients, including GAP, Travel Channel, and IBM.  Kenton also served as Senior Avid Editor for over 5 yrs working on a reality-style series for a Boston-based national cable channel.

Kenton currently works at Avid testing various products and customer-related issues in the Software Quality Assurance department.

Recordist: Travis Andersen

Treasurer: Julie Kahn.  For almost 20 years Julie Kahn has edited national television productions for networks including PBS, ABC, NBC, Discovery Channel, Lifetime and Animal Planet.  Her portfolio includes several series as well as films and documentaries.  Nominated twice for an Emmy award for her work on the PBS series Zoom, other programs Julie has worked on have earned a New England Emmy and a Peabody award.  Ms. Kahn was one of the first Avid editors – working on Avid #15 – and was the first Avid Certified Instructor.  Julie lives in Watertown, Massachusetts and is currently working on her own documentary project about a farm in England.

At each monthly meeting, industry leaders and enthusiasts present different aspects of digital production and post production. Members are given the opportunity to ask questions related to the presentations as well as general Avid questions during the "Ask the Experts" section of the meeting.

The Boston group has worked hard at attracting interesting and creative speakers from the community.