Several years ago, post-production and animation/F/X shops would pay large sums to acquire the industry’s premier hardware and software, and wear this like a badge of pride. Companies came to be known as ‘Maya shops’ or ‘Softimage shops,’ or they would promote their expensive infernos or flames. Shops that had the most cutting-edge gear would be perceived to produce the best work, they reasoned.

But the landscape has shifted dramatically. Digital technology has put greater capabilities into more people’s hands, and, given the current economic climate, producers care less about what machines and programs a post shop has than the bottom line.

‘Every time we compete on a project, which is always, it’s ‘How low can you bring your price?’ and our prices are always going to reflect what we pay for the technology,’ says Paulina Abarca, director of development at Montreal’s BIG BANG|Animation & FX. ‘Our overhead is based on our licence fees, or training we need where people come in to update the staff [on new tools].’

In a mid-range market such as Montreal, local F/X shops such as BIG BANG, which services feature, TV and large-format productions, report smaller digital F/X budgets than they are used to.

‘We’re having to get very creative,’ says Abarca. ‘We’re even taking a lot of stuff off the Discreet inferno [HD online F/X system], which used to be the way to go because it gets everything out fast. And now, because the inferno runs about $700 an hour, we’re doing a lot of stuff on [lower-end] After Effects and PhotoShop first. These things take longer, but they make us more competitive.’

Software manufacturers have taken steps to respond to smaller production budgets and the fact that many post shops simply do not have the funds to invest heavily in new hardware and software.

Toronto-based Alias|Wavefront, a division of Silicon Graphics, made waves at the 2002 National Association of Broadcasters conference when it announced it was dropping the price of its Maya Complete software from US$7,500 to US$1,999. Maya Complete is a somewhat scaled-down version of Alias|Wavefront’s high-end 3D animation and F/X system used, along with other applications, on The Lord of the Rings and Spider-Man; the cost of Maya Unlimited, which offers more features for professionals, has dropped from US$16,000 to US$6,999. Software providers once advertised the functionality of their products, whereas a large banner outside the Sands Expo Center proclaimed Maya’s new price structure to NAB2002 attendees.

‘We did independent research, as well as our own, to ask customers what their tool of choice would be if price was no object, and the big issue we had with Maya was that not everyone who wanted it could afford it,’ says Karen Eisen, Alias|Wavefront global industry marketing manager. ‘Although we are trying to broaden the market, we are by no means moving away from the high end. As always, our biggest focus on Maya is innovation.’

She points out that the cost of software licences is only one piece in the puzzle of a project’s post costs. The price drop is less about lowering costs for the production community, she adds, than about making Maya accessible to more people and thereby create a bigger pool of users of the software.

Montreal-based Softimage, a division of Avid Technology, jumped on the price-slashing train last month. The company announced that it had dropped the price of Softimage|3D, its 3D character animation and F/X software, from US$2,995 to US$1,495. (The program was used by Industrial Light + Magic to animate more than 80 creatures in Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones.) The company explains the price drop in terms of allowing users in other professions, such as architectural design and manufacturing, to access the software, but no doubt it is also to compete with the likes of Alias|Wavefront.

Softimage’s new price break does not apply to XSI, the company’s flagship product (selling for US$4,995 to US$8,995), which has disappointed some customers. The company sees itself as holding down the fort on the high end while some of its competitors are getting locked in a pricing trap.

‘We have one customer, [Nashville-based] Digital illusion Studios, a complete Maya shop, that converted to XSI, and they documented a 40% increase in productivity,’ notes Michael David Smith, XSI product manager. ‘That’s a huge savings, far more than two, three or four thousand dollars on a licence. The shops that go for the price [breaks] are going to have more trouble in the future competing with customers that use our software.’

Smith acknowledges that Softimage has a corporate relationship with ILM whereby the makers of Star Wars: Episode II used Softimage|3D V.4.0 on Linux simply to prove the product’s capabilities. Softimage expects most high-end users to opt for XSI.

Montreal’s Discreet, the division of Autodesk that makes 3ds max 3D animation software, the inferno and flame F/X systems and flint for graphics and F/X, is not putting cost front and center in its P&A. (3ds max 5, which will be released at SIGGRAPH 2002 in San Antonio, will sell for the moderate price of US$3,495). Discreet officials at NAB2002 said the company would instead focus on helping existing customers maximize the value of their Discreet products. The company is, however, currently offering a promotion with special financing rates.

Discreet says 3ds max 5, which was already used on Steven Spielberg’s Minority Report, will offer more options without the user having to pay for numerous plug-ins. These new features include a variety of rendering solutions, including a method of simulating high-resolution scenes on low-resolution geometry. The latest releases of inferno, flame and flint offer mixed resolution support and, according to the company, hundreds of enhancements its clients have requested.

To compete with the lower-end products that continue to make a greater impact, such as Adobe After Effects, Discreet offers combustion 2, a desktop 3D compositing, paint and animation tool that runs on Macintosh and Windows.

-www.bigbanganimation.com

-www.aliaswavefront.com

-www.softimage.com

-www.discreet.com