Digital Fusion Version 2.0 and Digital Fusion Post, the nt-based nonlinear compositing and post-production software from Toronto’s Eyeon Software, began shipping earlier this month with a whack of new features and plug-ins that promise to give cg artists access to design power once thought the exclusive domain of high-priced systems.

‘Where we’re really going with this is a mid-level compositing system because people are looking for an alternative to high-end systems and nt machines are coming on so strong,’ says Brick Eksten, vp technology of Eyeon. ‘Our goal is to empower the artist, not the studio. The model that’s used in Hollywood right now is, `I have a Flame system, therefore you can trust me.’ That’s always pissed us off because we’re artists, right?’

With a sticker price of $4,995, the feature film-oriented Digital Fusion Post ships with Ultimatte matting technology plug-ins as standard (previously only available on sgi systems). The Post version can handle virtually all film formats with 64-bit color fidelity that runs through the whole program. Digital Fusion V2 costs about half the price and is also resolution-independent with all the new upgrades and can run plug-ins from Ultimatte, 5D and MetaCreations Final Effects.

Eksten boasts a Beta tester and client list for Digital Fusion V2 that includes American shops Blur Studios, Digital Muse and what he calls the model for the new kind of effects house, Computer Cafe of Santa Maria, California, which worked on the upcoming special effects-intensive Disney release Flubber starring Robin Williams.

Among the Canadian Beta testers was Vancouver’s Enigma Animation, where president Mark Rasmussen, who has been using Eyeon software since it ran on a dos version, says the upgrade is ‘pretty significant.’

‘They’ve got the timeline editor now and that’s a key feature for me personally,’ says Rasmussen, whose shop has done effects work for mgm series Poltergeist and Stargate and the mow Creature. ‘The management of your tools is much better, the speeds are much better, the overall management of your resources through the software is better, but the look has stayed the same, which is preferable to us. There haven’t been any dramatic changes to confuse anybody.’

But director/designer Robin Len at Toronto’s TOPIX Computer Graphics and Animation doesn’t share Rasmussen’s assessment of Digital Fusion’s ease of use. ‘We’ve been jokingly calling it Digital Confusion,’ says Len, who is used to working with the stacking metaphor of Flame or After Effects and finds Digital Fusion’s `Flow’ metaphor difficult to get used to.

‘The whole Flow paradigm, it’s a little bit unfamiliar. Often I’ll have many layers in something and I’m not sure how useful the metaphor will be ultimately. It’s a bit premature to dismiss it entirely at this point, because I’ve only been working on it for a few days.’

Counters Rasmussen: ‘I personally like the Flow concept. It allows me to quickly move within the flow and visually I can see very quickly where I am. I will agree it takes a little while to get used to the concept because it’s a very nonlinear process. Maybe some people just can’t get around that, but to others it’s a real benefit.’

Len finds the filter set that comes with Digital Fusion very rich indeed. ‘I find both the filters that it comes with are quite powerful and also the filters that are readily available for it are great. There’s a lot of stuff there,’ says Len, who has been using Digital Fusion ‘to pass stuff through and filter it.’

Len also likes the animation tools on the upgrade. ‘They’re excellent in terms of spline control. I find you have quite precise control over your work to ease in and out,’ says Len, who is using the new software on a test spot topix is doing for a New York ad agency.

topix is running Digital Fusion on a dual processor Pentium Pro with a Hollywood ddr board and 128 megabytes of ram. Len says the speed of the new software ‘didn’t seem unreasonably slow, but it didn’t seem super speedy either.’ However, he adds, the rendering time ‘is comparable to the applications.’

Rasmussen, who runs his Digital Fusion on a Hewlett Packard pro dual 200 system, with plans to upgrade to a $25,000 HP Kayak system in the near future, agrees that speed is always an issue with any software.

‘Speed was an important factor for us. We do want to make this faster,’ says Rasmussen. ‘They’ve done the compatibility with more cards, better interactivity, which is often more of a hardware issue, but they’ve improved on that because they’re now supporting more graphical type boards.’

Eksten suggests that when running Digital Fusion on an Alpha dec system, the 5D plug-ins, which can also run on the Flame sgi system, will run even faster.

‘On an Alpha they [5D plug-ins] run 10 times faster than they do on an Onyx,’ he says.

Eksten says that due to the affordability of the software and its ability to run on an nt platform many shops are purchasing multiple Digital Fusion workstations instead of one sgi workstation and ’empowering more artists, instead of having them fighting over time on the Flame or Henry.’

And while Rasmussen sings the praises of the new software because of its ability to make changes and modifications very quickly without disrupting an entire sequence or body of work (very handy when a client or effects supervisor is in the office asking for changes), he says one feature Digital Fusion lacks is a paint application. ‘One thing I do want to see in there is paint and I do believe that’s coming,’ says Rasmussen.

Len agrees, adding, ‘It doesn’t have a native paint application so I usually end up painting stuff in Photoshop or Fractal Design Painter.’

What may also keep the relatively young Eyeon and its software popular with cg shops is the attentive support they give to their customers.

Says Rasmussen: ‘Probably one of the most important reasons for us to stick with a company that’s bringing in new software like Eyeon is that their support is one of the best in the industry. It’s exceptional. Let’s face reality, no software is perfect.’