IN THIS ISSUE

• 2003 Review
• Recent Orders
• New Product
  

2003 REVIEW
Happy New Year to all of our friends in the industry and we trust that everyone has a positive, profitable and enjoyable 2004.

As anyone in the business will tell you, the last 24 months have seen tough market conditions for most companies. Edifis, whilst improving market presence in UK realised that substantial growth would only come outside of our traditional markets.

Fully aware that we have a popular product line, we set out to increase export sales.

We have exhibited at IBC Amsterdam, InterBee Japan, Satis France and Broadcast Madrid. Over the forthcoming 12 months, we plan to attend and exhibit at more overseas conventions, such as Broadcast Asia in Singapore and Cabsat in the United\Arab Emirates.

Our stand at IBC Amsterdam 2003

High-value system sales were made in new export markets such as Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, France, Hong Kong, Ireland, Lebanon and Romania, whilst we consolidated existing markets with major sales to state broadcasters in Holland and United Kingdom.

A number of HD telecine and restoration systems were also delivered throughout 2003 to post-production clients in the UK.

New products launched in 2003 included

• Deliverance Format Converter
• StillStation HD Still Store for Telecine
• Finaliser Grading & Finishing System.

The StillStation and Finaliser products will be discussed in more detail in this newsletter.

RECENT ORDERS

• VSC Design Ltd - Four off Time Delay Sting units for a major UK broadcaster.
• Television Systems Ltd (TSL) - Graduate Telecine Server for new facility in Lebanon.
• RTE Ireland - Scratchbox Restoration system for state broadcaster
• Thameside Ltd - Two off HD StillStation Still Stores for telecine facilities in Prague and Bucharest.
• Audio Video Consult Ltd - Brick Telecine DDR for telecine facility in Bulgaria.
• IP Solutions Ltd - Sting system for joint edit suite/animation use in Hong Kong.

NEW PRODUCT- STILL STATION

StillStation is a basic functionality, high performance multi-resolution (HD & SD) Telecine Still Store.

It is aimed at telecine facilities that are not yet grading to disk but may do so in the future. Consequently, the StillStation can be upgraded to HD Brick or HD Scratchbox at any time.

StillStation Chassis

The system hardware comprises of one T-Bar control panel and the StillStation 2Rack Unit chassis.

The StillStation chassis is connected to the control panel via Ethernet and the system contains the popular Edifis wipe-pattern software. Frame grabs are accomplished either from the Colour Corrector or Edifis interface.

The system can store up to 10,000 HD frames and is switchable between HD and standard definition operation.

We are taking orders for the StillStation now and are about to deliver units to the first two customers. Call for prices.

NEW PRODUCT- FINALISER
Finaliser is a multi-resolution (HD & SD) colour correction, re-mastering and versioning system.

It is targeted at

• New HD Productions that require grading, conforming & versioning, and
• Existing material that requires regrading, scratch removal and versioning

Finaliser Panel

Some of the issues that Finaliser seeks to address are, the current high cost of tape grading as well as making film re-mastering, both cheap to do and easy to achieve.

Finaliser consists of the following key elements:

• An automated, timeline controlled colour corrector
• A multi-resolution disk server
• An EDL conforming system
• An aspect ratio and format converter
• A Scratchbox restoration system

Using Finaliser, a full grade can be performed for an entire production without the use of a tape transport. Finaliser comes with 6 hours of HD storage as a minimum.

Other important features of the system include:

• Expandable colour corrector layers
• 3:2 sequence insertion
• 25, 24 and 23.976 fps operation
• HD to SD Down Conversion with ARC
• Safe Area Grilles
• 16 audio tracks
• Image colour histogram display
• Still Store

A full system description is available from Edifis for those interested, and demonstrations of the Finaliser can be booked through Edifis or its dealers.

NEW GRAPHICAL INTERFACE

Media Manager Menu

There were already 4 different ways to control an Edifis system; Ethernet, RS422, GPI and HTML.

Client feedback suggested yet another. The requests were for a simple to learn, easy to operate, multiple user interface. The obvious solution was to deliver a Windows and Linux based Graphical User Interface (GUI).

The GUI was beta-tested at a number of different sites (Transmission, Telecine & Animation Facilities) throughout Europe during Autumn 2003 and is now available for existing as well as new clients.

CONTACT DETAILS
Richard Lilley - Sales Director
Edifis Limited
The Old Bakery, Hyde End Lane
Brimpton
Reading Berks
RG7 4RH
Telephone : +44 (0)118 971 2279
Fax : +44 (0)118 971 2239
www.edifis.com