AVID is dying a slow and painful death

So, I'm not really sure if any one on this forum uses ProTools at all. Or Media Composer. Or Sibelius. Or the multitude other things that Avid produces. But I thought it may be a discussion worthy sort of topic for this sub-forum. Anyway, Avid was de-listed from NASDAQ, stock has plummeted A bajillion points, and now basically everyone on the intarwebs is saying they're soon going to declare bankruptcy.

How do you think this is going to effect the media industry at large? I mean, almost every professional media studio from just plain ol' recording studios to blockbuster movie studios use ProTools and Media Composer. Are the products Avid provide going to just go by the wayside and another company is going to claim the open top spot? Is another company going to buy the rights in a fire sale? Does anyone care?

Personally, I just got Sibelius 7.0 a few months ago. Now I'm kind of wishing I had known this sort of stuff was going on with the company, otherwise I would have thought twice about it. Apparently, in an insanely stupid move, the founder(s) of Sibelius got fired a year or two ago and they are now working with Steinberg to develop a scoring program. Honestly, I hope so much that Ableton will have the wherewithal to snap up the Sibelius technology and either integrate it into Live or have it sort of like a plugin. But, while there are quite a few academics out there using Ableton these days, it's probably just wishful thinking. I'm guessing Steinberg will try its hardest to get the technology that their employees created.

But... thoughts?

ProTools was the de facto industry standard for many years. Its particular workflow and functionality had a huge impact on the direction that pop music took 15 -20 years ago.

I cannot fucking wait to see it die. I will take great pleasure shitting on its grave.

I use Media Composer at work, never seen such a buggy, unintuitive, bloated, and set-in-its-ways NLE in life. Horrid thing.

I know jackshit about the stock market, but it looks like they're coming back around...

http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=AVID+Interactive#symbol=avid;range=ytd;compare=;indicator=volume;charttype=area;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=off;source=;

  On 2/28/2014 at 9:41 AM, mcbpete said:

I use Media Composer at work, never seen such a buggy, unintuitive, bloated, and set-in-its-ways NLE in life. Horrid thing.

Holy shit yes. I guess I've only used Media Composer 5, and 7 is supposed to be way better, but Premiere is a fucking godsend compared to that shit, even considering the insanely frustrating problems I've had with Adobe. Why it's the industry standard I have no idea.

In my opinion however, Pro Tools is fantastic. Works great for recording and even alright for composition. Other DAWs feel like kids' toys compared to Pro Tools.

I had to use Media Composer for 3 years because it was the standard for my film school. And I got to admit, after you get through bugs it is a hella stable program. The MXF container is unpenetratable, unlike AMA or other program's coding. For big juicy projects (1h 30 movies) Avid is the way to go. Nothing can handle big projects like Media Composer.

Iiiii did not realize people in pop studios "still used" Pro Tools. I thought everyone became all Apple and went Logic or whatever.

Pro Tools, Pro Tools..... Those were the days, when one needed dedicated hardware to run Pro Tools, and whatever dyude in whatever recording studio would be like, "I use Pro Tools", and you'd be like, "This guy is a Pro, and he has the Tools needed." And then nobody cared, and that was the end. Like 10+ years ago, everyone who used Pro Tools used to talk about it like it was magic. They used to talk like that shit was so intuitive and perfect and awesome and no professional sound could ever be accomplished without it. Just by hearing "Pro Tools", it's like already in the brain, a perfectly mixed and loud-but-subtle master would appear from nowhere. Just by looking at the Pro Tools dedicated hardware, you could hear how tight that sound was. Like those people who believed that different hard drives or cables would give them better sound- Pro Tools was like that.

Here's a typical oblique error I get from my daily use with MC -

What do you think the following errors signify:

If you guessed

You'd be right, and I imagine also work for AVID

I've used cubase, logic, ableton, pro tools for composition and recording bands etc and i have to say pro tools 10/11 blows them out of the water as regards sound quality. I think this is due to how the audio is summed in the mixer.

I know it's all about you can make great music with anything but when it comes to recording sound and having a system play it back as it sounds, Pro Tools is way ahead in the game. I hope they don't go anywhere soon

Holy shit, so you're in the "The Pro Tools Sound" camp as well..... Maybe it is real, then. Maybe it is..... real. Then.

Yah, but summing is a magical thing. Doesn't even fucking make any sense. There are birrion dolla summing boxes out there, that all of a sudden turn your tracks into gold. I suppose as with art, etc.: subtlety can be everything.

Harrison mixbus is by far the best for warmth and space but lacks so many required features.

Is 'summing' the digital equivalent of buying uber-expensive phono cables ?

No

  On 2/28/2014 at 12:03 PM, mcbpete said:

Here's a typical oblique error I get from my daily use with MC -

 

What do you think the following errors signify:

 

 

"Line: 2432"

massively bloated fucking C file is what I see

  On 2/28/2014 at 12:03 PM, mcbpete said:

Here's a typical oblique error I get from my daily use with MC -

 

What do you think the following errors signify:

 

 

 

If you guessed

 

  Reveal hidden contents

I had the project set at 25p but was exporting a file as 25i

 

You'd be right, and I imagine also work for AVID

Ah yes. Avid's cryptic error messages. Some of our editors have a bunch of screen caps of the more amusing ones.

I like Pro Tools, but I work in Pro Tools. I have no comparison since it's the only DAW I've worked in. The dedicated hardware idea was kiboshed when Pro Tools 9 came out, so you can run PT on a microwave as long as it has Windows or MacOSX and an internal sound card.

On the future of Avid, if they keep losing money, it will probably be bought by someone like Apple, Adobe, etc. But they can't change the applications very much since Pro Tools and Media Composer are so widely used. If they can finally fix some of the ongoing issues and implement the features people have been asking for for more than a decade, great! I don't care what logo the splash screen has, as long as it's familiar and it works.

gol is rejoicing.

  On 2/28/2014 at 12:27 PM, miim said:

I've used cubase, logic, ableton, pro tools for composition and recording bands etc and i have to say pro tools 10/11 blows them out of the water as regards sound quality. I think this is due to how the audio is summed in the mixer.

 

I know it's all about you can make great music with anything but when it comes to recording sound and having a system play it back as it sounds, Pro Tools is way ahead in the game. I hope they don't go anywhere soon

god fucking damnit

this is why Avid is still in business folks

not interested unless elusive chimes in.

Anyone have any legitimate technical reasons to not like Pro Tools other than its popularity? Here's a few I can think of:

- The immense growing pains of going from a 32bit engine to a 64bit engine. To the point that when you install Pro Tools 11, it will install Pro Tools 10 so that you can still use your RTAS plug-ins while developers port their plug-ins to the new AAX format. I still won't upgrade to PT 11 because of this, though it's getting close.

- The HDX DSP cards have so few ported AAX DPS plug-ins that it's not really worth the price compared to getting a HD Native card.

- The Region List is still a bit of mess since you can't create Region List folders. It's a big list of random clips if you don't rename all your clips.

- It's expensive compared to other DAWs.

- Upgrade and crossgrade are also expensive for the amount of features they introduce. And a good number of those features are bug fixes and features that other DAWs have had for years (clip gain is a good example).

- Their Artist series of control surfaces are so cheaply made for the price. All plastic with faders that just fall off. And they've been buggy since the last software update.

  On 2/28/2014 at 12:03 PM, mcbpete said:

Here's a typical oblique error I get from my daily use with MC -

 

What do you think the following errors signify:

 

 

 

If you guessed

 

  Reveal hidden contents

I had the project set at 25p but was exporting a file as 25i

 

You'd be right, and I imagine also work for AVID

Technically if you knew computer lingo then "Assertion failed: Ame_ProjectTypeUtils::ProjectTypeIsProgressive(GetProjectType()) == isProgressive" could give it away. But what a bunch of crap.

It was only after one of the IT people suggested I try changing the project to interlaced that the error message kinda made sense (but only also because I also have a vague knowledge of C++ too). If it appeared to anyone else in the team it might as well said: Well groobert, tha fancatard kreppen on a clacksy plow. Unsafe in choodle clart or venvetise a pertle huxley? (yes/no/undo/inflate)

i would choose inflate

"Avid had inflated yer grootle. Insave €4800 clermits intil a fantarb blok indetish 6 month frunst abbile guntry sast plow. Drive Formatted. (yes/OK)"

Always save before inflating!

I thought digital mixing was just a weighted sum of the inputs? Is there something I am missing?