Prime Focus UK invest in Clear, VTR and Blue

Soho high-end visual effects and CG animation boutique Clear, VTR, a leading film-scanning, telecine and digital intermediate (DI) house, plus broadcast editing and audio facility Blue, are to reap the benefits of a multi-million pound investment in Autodesk systems by group parent company Prime Focus UK.
The substantial purchase paves the way for an industry-leading, 2K post-production pipeline, and is central to the Mumbai-headquartered, post-production group’s global strategy to create streamlined centres of excellence for talent and technology, offering powerhouse film scanning and telecine, visual effects, CG animation, editing, audio and DI.
Clear, Prime Focus’ flagship visual effects studio, is upgrading all of its Autodesk visual effects systems, comprising three Autodesk Inferno and six Autodesk Flame systems. Clear and editing/audio house Blue, are upgrading their editing capabilities with four Autodesk Smoke 2007 editing systems between them. All of these new systems will run on the most recent, high-performance hardware to be certified by Autodesk – HP 8400 systems running Linux.
Film-scanning, telecine and DI house VTR, is one of the first UK facilities to take delivery of Autodesk’s high-end Lustre Incinerator DI grading system, which will be deployed on grading commercials as well as feature films.
Along with separate hardware and infrastructure purchases, the new Autodesk systems at Clear, VTR and Blue will form the backbone of London’s most modern 2K, end-to-end, post-production pipeline for film scanning, telecine, visual effects, animation, editing, audio and DI. Installation will be finished by mid-November to coincide with the completion of major building and refurbishment work of the group’s premises in Soho.
Namit Malhotra, chairman of Prime Focus UK commented: “It’s our intention to put Clear, VTR and Blue at the very top of the London market.
"By updating all of our Autodesk systems, and moving them to the high-powered Linux workstations, our clients will benefit from the best 2K performance and workflow, whether it’s for film, broadcast or commercials. The speed and creativity of top-end systems like this will give us a huge competitive edge.”
In addition to its London investments, Prime Focus is also streamlining its facilities in Mumbai in India with a full upgrade to Smoke 2007 editing systems, and the purchase of no fewer than 90 new licenses of Autodesk Combustion desktop compositing software, plus Autodesk Maya and Autodesk 3ds Max 3D modelling and animation software.
Autodesk Media & Entertainment Director EMEA Patrick Jocelyn said: “I am delighted that we have been able to work with our counterparts in India to secure this deal which we signed, rather appropriately, at the International Broadcasting Convention last week. It is of strategic significance for both Autodesk and Prime Focus, and is truly international in scope.”
Autodesk Lustre Incinerator 2007 is the high-end system in the Autodesk Lustre product family. It combines the use of high-bandwidth, cost-effective Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) with an inline cluster of configurable Computer Processing Units (CPUs) to boost system performance and interactivity during digital colour grading sessions. This allows colourists to use multiple complex secondary colour correction layers and effects in real-time at resolutions as high as 2K, which is ideal for high-end commercials projects.
Prime Focus is headquartered in Mumbai, India, and has grown rapidly on the back of the burgeoning Bollywood film industry where it is the largest digital post-production company.
(DS/SP)