FXhome Limited
Encyclopedia
FXhome is a visual effects
and video
software developer
registered in 2001 by graduates from the University of East Anglia
. Their current headquarters is at the Henderson Business Centre in Norwich
, UK.
FXhome.com is the website and film-making community created by the same company.
The company's first product was AlamDV, a bespoke
application written entirely in Macromedia Director by Joshua, originally for his stepbrother's use in his film-making degree (also at UEA). AlamDV was a 2D, bitmap-based special effects program for applying stock footage of muzzle flashes and lightsabers to digital video. As development progressed it became clear there was an untapped niche in the home video market, so the company was formed and in 2001 AlamDV became a priced product, sold through the website AlamDV.com as a download (without box). Although a low-key release it was featured on the BBC and gathered an online following.
AlamDV2 was released in September 2001 and managed to attract interest from the local media and a number of minority filmmaking/computer publications. This resulted in inaccurate press coverage that attributed the wrong names to printed photos of the team and frequently mis-spelled AlamDV as "AlarmDV", a typo which caused problems for the company and confusion for customers until 2005 when the community was consulted to pick a new name.
Personal issues led David Cranwell to leave CSB-Digital mid-2002, although he remains close friends and now works as a consultant and tester for the company. Tim Edwards
and Simon Jones
were hired mid-2002 to alleviate the pressures of coding and support. The additional manpower enabled the company to focus on marketing and it was soon noticed by Apple Computer
, who invited them to develop iMovie
plugins. The result was the limited release of a plugin-pack called iPlugins.
2003 saw major changes, including a number of website redesigns that culminated in the rebranding of AlamDV.com to FXhome.com. This was to accommodate the introduction of two new software products: "Chromanator", for compositing
and greenscreen keying and "Digigrade", for digital color grading
.
Chromanator was released in 2004 but the increased popularity of the company and its products caused the 4-man team to be over-stretched. The AlamDV series returned to centre stage as AlamDV3 entered development but Digigrade soon took to the back burner and remained elusive (some of its intended functionality appearing in later FXhome products). With the team working to capacity, updates were rare and vague and led to a temporary rift between the company and some of the FXhome.com community, who had established a loyalty to the AlamDV brand and believed both DigiGrade and AlamDV3 to be Vaporware
.
2005 marked another major change of focus, with the original company's trading name 'CSB-Digital' being dropped altogether in favour of the trading name "FXhome", to match the website's name. AlamDV3 did appear but under a completely new name - "EffectsLab DV" - and its release in Q2 2005 marked the first appearance of the company's current product line.
EffectsLab DV was a completely new program, rejecting most of AlamDV's concepts and all of its interface, while introducing new features and retaining AlamDV's original functionality. Based on a new Common Interface, codename "Charger", AlamDV2's cumbersome 2D sprite
system was replaced by four procedurally generated
'Effects Engines', all capable of creating hundreds of customisable effects.
Updates now came quick and fast, with feedback from the community playing a key role in the addition of new features and tweaks. Next to be redesigned was Chromanator, changing its name to "CompositeLab DV" in the process, cementing the new 'Lab' branding. In late 2005, enhanced versions of both products were released, called EffectsLab Pro and CompositeLab Pro. An entirely new product, "VisionLab HD" was also created and released at the end of 2005, which combined CompositeLab and EffectsLab into a single interface and added additional features aimed at more advanced users. A new feature common to all 3 products, was the ability to create 'Presets', which stored and packaged a user's effects engine or grading settings, for use by other users. FXhome.com now hosts a library of over 1000 user-created presets.
Coder Jack Everitt joined the main staff in Q4 2005, boosting the coding side of the team in preparation for brand new products in 2007 and beyond.
2006 proved to be a pivotal year in the company's history, with frequent software updates noticeably improving the products at each release. The product line was rebranded, with the 'DV' versions being renamed to "Lite" and VisionLab HD being renamed "VisionLab Studio". FXhome also negotiated with European software distributor Softline UK, who released boxed versions of the products for the first time via retailers such as Amazon.co.uk.
In 2007 the company name was changed from Joshua Davies Limited to FXhome Limited. Expert coder Neil Henderson joined the team officially in February, having worked as a voluntary beta tester for several years as part of the FXhome.com community. A brand new product, VideoWrap!, was released in September, which provided easy video conversion to various devices such as iPods, PS3 and the Internet. November saw the release of another new product, PhotoKey, a chromakey compositing tool for photographers. In December EffectsLab Lite and CompositeLab Lite were discontinued and a large update was released for the remaining Lab products, including the addition of a brand new lightning/electricity engine to VisionLab Studio.
2008 began with the introduction of a new range of plugins for Adobe After Effects. Derived from the technology in VisionLab Studio, MuzzlePlug and PowerPlug provided advanced versions of the muzzle flash and lightning/electricity engines. Operations Manager Lucy Burton joined in May to oversee multiple new projects. In September new promotional material was shot in Norfolk to better reflect the capabilities of the latest FXhome products, drawing on talent found within the FXhome community. November saw the release of multiple new products, including PhotoKey 2, a series of tutorial and stock footage DVDs and comprehensive bundles that marked the first time FXhome had sold and shipped physical greenscreens.
2009 and early 2010 saw the expansion of the company to 15 employees.
In 2011, FXhome announced a new video product called HitFilm would be released summer of that year. It utilizes 3D compositing, one of the most requested features in FXhome software.
HitFilm will support imported 3D camera tracking data and a 3D particle system.
The prices for HitFilm Standard and HitFilm Ultimate are given as ₤105 ($149) and ₤285 ($399) respectively.
It has been said, for the time being, that HitFilm is a Windows only product.
, the international community includes an extensive discussion forum, including an online Cinema featuring over 700 movies in which users can view and upload their movies and anyone can view the movies, an IRC chat channel and a large library of user-created presets for FXhome software.
The community also enables the FXhome staff to provide one-on-one support via the chat channel, support forums and tutorials.
Community interaction continues to influence the future direction of FXhome's software development, including the official hiring of community members, such as coder Neil Henderson.
In May 2008 FXhome announced a cooperative short film project, Fracture that is using the resources of the community in its production. Fracture is currently in the visual effects stage of post-production.
As well as these products FXhome also sells a large range of stock footage dvds, image packs and tutorial dvds.
Visual effects
Visual effects are the various processes by which imagery is created and/or manipulated outside the context of a live action shoot. Visual effects involve the integration of live-action footage and generated imagery to create environments which look realistic, but would be dangerous, costly, or...
and video
Video
Video is the technology of electronically capturing, recording, processing, storing, transmitting, and reconstructing a sequence of still images representing scenes in motion.- History :...
software developer
Software developer
A software developer is a person concerned with facets of the software development process. Their work includes researching, designing, developing, and testing software. A software developer may take part in design, computer programming, or software project management...
registered in 2001 by graduates from the University of East Anglia
University of East Anglia
The University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...
. Their current headquarters is at the Henderson Business Centre in Norwich
Norwich
Norwich is a city in England. It is the regional administrative centre and county town of Norfolk. During the 11th century, Norwich was the largest city in England after London, and one of the most important places in the kingdom...
, UK.
FXhome.com is the website and film-making community created by the same company.
History
The company was conceived in late 2000 and was formed in early 2001. Founded by Joshua Davies, Toby Walsh and David Cranwell, the company originally went by the trading name CSB-Digital. The meaning of 'CSB' is still unknown outside the employees of the company.The company's first product was AlamDV, a bespoke
Bespoke
Bespoke is a term employed in a variety of applications to mean an item custom-made to the buyer's specification...
application written entirely in Macromedia Director by Joshua, originally for his stepbrother's use in his film-making degree (also at UEA). AlamDV was a 2D, bitmap-based special effects program for applying stock footage of muzzle flashes and lightsabers to digital video. As development progressed it became clear there was an untapped niche in the home video market, so the company was formed and in 2001 AlamDV became a priced product, sold through the website AlamDV.com as a download (without box). Although a low-key release it was featured on the BBC and gathered an online following.
AlamDV2 was released in September 2001 and managed to attract interest from the local media and a number of minority filmmaking/computer publications. This resulted in inaccurate press coverage that attributed the wrong names to printed photos of the team and frequently mis-spelled AlamDV as "AlarmDV", a typo which caused problems for the company and confusion for customers until 2005 when the community was consulted to pick a new name.
Personal issues led David Cranwell to leave CSB-Digital mid-2002, although he remains close friends and now works as a consultant and tester for the company. Tim Edwards
Tim Edwards
Timothy Edwards is a former English cricketer, who played first-class and List A cricket for Worcestershire and minor counties cricket for Cornwall...
and Simon Jones
Simon Jones
Simon Jones may refer to:*Simon Jones *Simon Jones , Welsh cricketer who plays for England*Simon Jones , British musician, member of The Verve...
were hired mid-2002 to alleviate the pressures of coding and support. The additional manpower enabled the company to focus on marketing and it was soon noticed by Apple Computer
Apple Computer
Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation that designs and markets consumer electronics, computer software, and personal computers. The company's best-known hardware products include the Macintosh line of computers, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad...
, who invited them to develop iMovie
IMovie
iMovie is a proprietary video editing software application which allows Mac, iPod Touch 4th generation, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, and iPad 2 users to edit their own home movies. It was originally released by Apple in 1999 as a Mac OS 8 application bundled with the first FireWire-enabled consumer Apple...
plugins. The result was the limited release of a plugin-pack called iPlugins.
2003 saw major changes, including a number of website redesigns that culminated in the rebranding of AlamDV.com to FXhome.com. This was to accommodate the introduction of two new software products: "Chromanator", for compositing
Compositing
Compositing is the combining of visual elements from separate sources into single images, often to create the illusion that all those elements are parts of the same scene. Live-action shooting for compositing is variously called "chroma key", "blue screen", "green screen" and other names. Today,...
and greenscreen keying and "Digigrade", for digital color grading
Color grading
Color grading or colour painting, is the process of altering and enhancing the color of a motion picture, video image, or still image either electronically, photo-chemically or digitally. The photo-chemical process is also referred to as color timing and is typically performed at a photographic...
.
Chromanator was released in 2004 but the increased popularity of the company and its products caused the 4-man team to be over-stretched. The AlamDV series returned to centre stage as AlamDV3 entered development but Digigrade soon took to the back burner and remained elusive (some of its intended functionality appearing in later FXhome products). With the team working to capacity, updates were rare and vague and led to a temporary rift between the company and some of the FXhome.com community, who had established a loyalty to the AlamDV brand and believed both DigiGrade and AlamDV3 to be Vaporware
Vaporware
Vaporware is a term in the computer industry that describes a product, typically computer hardware or software, that is announced to the general public but is never actually released nor officially canceled. Vaporware is also a term sometimes used to describe events that are announced or predicted,...
.
2005 marked another major change of focus, with the original company's trading name 'CSB-Digital' being dropped altogether in favour of the trading name "FXhome", to match the website's name. AlamDV3 did appear but under a completely new name - "EffectsLab DV" - and its release in Q2 2005 marked the first appearance of the company's current product line.
EffectsLab DV was a completely new program, rejecting most of AlamDV's concepts and all of its interface, while introducing new features and retaining AlamDV's original functionality. Based on a new Common Interface, codename "Charger", AlamDV2's cumbersome 2D sprite
Sprite (computer graphics)
In computer graphics, a sprite is a two-dimensional image or animation that is integrated into a larger scene...
system was replaced by four procedurally generated
Procedural generation
Procedural generation is a widely used term in the production of media; it refers to content generated algorithmically rather than manually. Often, this means creating content on the fly rather than prior to distribution...
'Effects Engines', all capable of creating hundreds of customisable effects.
Updates now came quick and fast, with feedback from the community playing a key role in the addition of new features and tweaks. Next to be redesigned was Chromanator, changing its name to "CompositeLab DV" in the process, cementing the new 'Lab' branding. In late 2005, enhanced versions of both products were released, called EffectsLab Pro and CompositeLab Pro. An entirely new product, "VisionLab HD" was also created and released at the end of 2005, which combined CompositeLab and EffectsLab into a single interface and added additional features aimed at more advanced users. A new feature common to all 3 products, was the ability to create 'Presets', which stored and packaged a user's effects engine or grading settings, for use by other users. FXhome.com now hosts a library of over 1000 user-created presets.
Coder Jack Everitt joined the main staff in Q4 2005, boosting the coding side of the team in preparation for brand new products in 2007 and beyond.
2006 proved to be a pivotal year in the company's history, with frequent software updates noticeably improving the products at each release. The product line was rebranded, with the 'DV' versions being renamed to "Lite" and VisionLab HD being renamed "VisionLab Studio". FXhome also negotiated with European software distributor Softline UK, who released boxed versions of the products for the first time via retailers such as Amazon.co.uk.
In 2007 the company name was changed from Joshua Davies Limited to FXhome Limited. Expert coder Neil Henderson joined the team officially in February, having worked as a voluntary beta tester for several years as part of the FXhome.com community. A brand new product, VideoWrap!, was released in September, which provided easy video conversion to various devices such as iPods, PS3 and the Internet. November saw the release of another new product, PhotoKey, a chromakey compositing tool for photographers. In December EffectsLab Lite and CompositeLab Lite were discontinued and a large update was released for the remaining Lab products, including the addition of a brand new lightning/electricity engine to VisionLab Studio.
2008 began with the introduction of a new range of plugins for Adobe After Effects. Derived from the technology in VisionLab Studio, MuzzlePlug and PowerPlug provided advanced versions of the muzzle flash and lightning/electricity engines. Operations Manager Lucy Burton joined in May to oversee multiple new projects. In September new promotional material was shot in Norfolk to better reflect the capabilities of the latest FXhome products, drawing on talent found within the FXhome community. November saw the release of multiple new products, including PhotoKey 2, a series of tutorial and stock footage DVDs and comprehensive bundles that marked the first time FXhome had sold and shipped physical greenscreens.
2009 and early 2010 saw the expansion of the company to 15 employees.
In 2011, FXhome announced a new video product called HitFilm would be released summer of that year. It utilizes 3D compositing, one of the most requested features in FXhome software.
HitFilm will support imported 3D camera tracking data and a 3D particle system.
The prices for HitFilm Standard and HitFilm Ultimate are given as ₤105 ($149) and ₤285 ($399) respectively.
It has been said, for the time being, that HitFilm is a Windows only product.
Community
FXhome focused on establishing a strong community from the beginning, initially with the AlamDV.com forums. The community increased in popularity and was transferred to the new FXhome.com website in 2004. Now home to over 100,000 registered users, the international community includes an extensive discussion forum, including an online Cinema featuring over 700 movies in which users can view and upload their movies and anyone can view the movies, an IRC chat channel and a large library of user-created presets for FXhome software.
The community also enables the FXhome staff to provide one-on-one support via the chat channel, support forums and tutorials.
Community interaction continues to influence the future direction of FXhome's software development, including the official hiring of community members, such as coder Neil Henderson.
In May 2008 FXhome announced a cooperative short film project, Fracture that is using the resources of the community in its production. Fracture is currently in the visual effects stage of post-production.
Discontinued
- AlamDV
- Chromanator
- CompositeLab Lite
- EffectsLab Lite
- VideoWrap!
- MuzzlePlug
- PowerPlug
- CompositeLab Pro
- EffectsLab Pro
- VisionLab Studio
As well as these products FXhome also sells a large range of stock footage dvds, image packs and tutorial dvds.