Sonic Foundry's F3 Improves Quality, Reduces Cost and Saves Time For Hollywood Studios

Sonic Foundry[R] Inc. (NASDAQ: SOFO), a leading provider of rich media software, systems and services, today announced its media services division has launched F3[TM], a groundbreaking technology that has improved the quality and reduced the cost of processing movies for digital distribution. F3[TM] represents the latest addition to Sonic Foundry's extensive service offering, enabling content owners to manage and maximize the value of their rich media content.
F3 is the first software-based process that makes previously flawed titles acceptable for DVD and digital cable/satellite distribution. With a growing demand for higher quality digital content and increased expectations of technical quality, the demand for picture-perfection has increased, making technologies such as F3 a valuable component in the digital distribution process. The F3 process minimizes Flash Frames (sets of discolored pixels) introduced during the film printing process. Flash Frames have long been a common and annoying problem for theatrical titles destined for distribution in compressed digital formats such as DVD, VOD, Digital Satellite and Digital Cable. The F3 technology applies to newly produced feature product as well as classic titles such as "Dances With Wolves" or "Dr. No" from MGM.
"F3 has produced a better product for DVD and made rejectable materials acceptable to our most discriminating foreign television clients," stated Scott Grossman, Executive Director, Technical Operations for MGM Worldwide Distribution Services. "Traditional methods cost much more, take longer to complete and rarely yield results as impressive as F3."
Capable of being performed in either High Definition or Standard Definition, F3 is a component of Sonic Foundry Media Services' Digital Restoration Technologies (DRT[TM]). These technologies have been used to restore over 4,000 hours of classic content from most of the major studios.
"We have found the F3 system recently created by Sonic Foundry, both in HD and Standard Definition, has been an amazing step forward in dealing with flash frames or mistimes in near real-time," stated Alexandra de la Vega, Technical Operations for Studio Canal Services U.S.
"F3 has established an impressive credit list," states Richard Greenberg, Vice President Business Development for Sonic Foundry Media Services. "Studios have come to see Sonic Foundry Media Services as a source for extraordinary technical solutions. We are pleased to be able to help Hollywood majors meet the challenges of digital distribution with a process that produces better results for about 50% of the cost of traditional methods."