Autodesk Flare Adopted Around the Globe

Press Release from Autodesk, Inc.

San Rafael, June 9, 2009 - Autodesk, Inc. (NASDAQ: ADSK) has announced that its new Autodesk Flare visual effects software -- launched just one month ago -- has been licensed by five post-production companies across three continents. Flare is a creative companion to Autodesk Flame and Autodesk Inferno visual effects and compositing software.

Autodesk's visual effects systems have been used to create groundbreaking entertainment, including Emmy-award-winning television programs and miniseries such as "John Adams," "Mad Men," "Dexter" and "Entourage." Autodesk solutions were also used to create Academy Award winner for Best Visual Effects "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button"; animated movies such as "Monsters vs Aliens," "Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa" and "Waltz With Bashir" and many of the most popular 2009 Super Bowl commercials such as Budweiser "Fetch," Pedigree "Crazy Pets" and General Electric "Scarecrow."

"Autodesk Flare is designed to help our Flame and Inferno customers expand their businesses and handle more projects," said Autodesk Media & Entertainment digital entertainment vice president, Stig Gruman. "As a software-only offering, Flare provides a cost-effective avenue to develop the next generation of creative talent and is a key building block for more productive post-production pipelines."

Award-winning visual effects studio Smoke & Mirrors UK became the inaugural Autodesk Flare customer, purchasing two licenses. Smoke & Mirrors UK CEO Penny Verbe remarked, "We are very excited to be the first company to adopt Flare and embrace Autodesk's new technologies and workflows, as we did in 1995 when we set up Smoke & Mirrors as the first Flame-based post-production house in London."

Within a month of launch, the roster of Flare customers has grown to include Digipost (New Zealand), WRKS bv (Holland), 1000 Volt Film (Turkey), and Lola Visual Effects (United States). In addition, Post magazine selected Flare as one of only five products at the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) 2009 Convention to be awarded a POST PICKS, which recognizes products that represent "the best of the best at NAB" as selected by a team of industry professionals.

Customer Testimonials

-- Lola Visual Effects -- "Our current pipeline is based on six Autodesk Flame and Autodesk Flint systems. After viewing Flare at NAB it was a no-brainer to purchase four licenses. We have enough video input/output and desktop editing functionality with our existing Flame systems and the addition of Flare allows for a dramatic increase in productivity. The fact that the Flare user interface and functionality are based on Flame means there is no new learning curve. It's a perfect solution for our environment." - Thomas Nittmann, Visual Effects Producer

-- Digipost -- "The release of Flare is timely as it coincides with the start of a very busy 18-month period for us. Our purchase of an additional Flame and two seats of Flare will enable our team of artists and producers to collaborate more efficiently by allowing larger teams of artists to work on each shift cycle and improving access for the producers to brief each artist on shot requirements. Artists are less productive working overnight shifts; the availability of these Flare seats should enable us to confine our shifts to more sociable hours." -Gary Little, Managing Director

-- WRKS bv -- "Flare allows us to leverage our existing Flame investment. The toolset is instantly familiar to our Flame, Flint and Inferno artists. Flare makes it much easier for a boutique outfit like ours to finish big jobs on tight deadlines." - Rene Brouwer, Owner

-- Smoke & Mirrors -- "Flare brings the capabilities of Flame at a more accessible price and helps us quickly and easily address our rapid business expansion. The floating license model, unchained from the hardware, allows us to allocate on-demand additional backup systems to our modular suites and extend project teams more manageably." -Mark Wildig, CTO, and Tony Lawrence, Head of Flame

Flare 2010 Feature Highlights

Flare software is a fully compatible creative companion to Flame and Inferno visual effects software, offering a cost-effective solution to help boost productivity, expand capacity and develop talent. Helping to bridge the gap between 2D and 3D, Flare features the creative visual effects toolset of Flame and Inferno, and is intended for advanced creative tasks, such as compositing, sophisticated graphics and interactive design, as well as support tasks such as rotoscoping, retouching and dust removal, project setup and keying. Top benefits are:

-- Software application available with Autodesk Subscription and floating licenses for increased flexibility
-- Based on the Flame and Inferno batch procedural compositing environment, including the Action 3D compositing environment with advanced 3D tools such as 3D Blur and 3D Path
-- Multiple Flare workstations able to work collaboratively with Flame and Inferno
-- Support for a range of formats, including REDCODE RAW, multichannel OpenEXR and Avid DNxHD with Apple QuickTime

In addition to Flare, Autodesk Media & Entertainment has recently launched the 2010 releases of Flame and Inferno visual effects and compositing software; Autodesk Smoke and Autodesk Flint software for editorial finishing and visual effects; the 2009 Extension 1 releases of Autodesk Lustre and Autodesk Incinerator color-grading software; as well as Autodesk 3ds Max 2010 and Autodesk Softimage 7.5 software for 3D modeling, visual effects, animation and rendering.