Modern Videofilm Inc., a Burbank-based postproduction company, has acquired a pair of post/effects facilities-EDS Digital Studios, Los Angeles, and Varitel, San Francisco-from Electronic Data Systems, a global information services firm headquartered in Plano, Tx. The purchase price was not disclosed.
Varitel continues to be active in the commercial postproduction arena while EDS Digital Studios core business entails electronic film restoration, digital imaging, DVD authoring and compression, TV postproduction and duplication services.
Modern Videofilm president Moshe Barkat had not returned a SHOOT phone call at press time. Initial word is that the company plans to keep the staffs of Varitel and EDS Digital Studios largely intact, with relatively few layoffs. EDS Digital Studios maintains a staff of 70. Varitel has some 30 employees. Modern Videofilm employs more than 350.
EDS Digital Studios (formerly known as Varitel, Los Angeles) has been in a recent expansion mode. That growth has been centered in its Digital Imaging Group (DIG), an advanced R&D laboratory environment dedicated to new applications of digital technology for image enhancement. For example, DIG has developed proprietary image processing technology that allows for the cleaning of damaged analog material and its conversion to Analog Image Enhancement digital formats. Also under the DIG umbrella are two DVD rooms that concentrate on MPEG compression encoding and authoring for dozens of new and classic film titles. Last year, the DVD operation gained an infusion of some $650,000 in working capital to build a new navigation quality-control room as well as a client quality-control room. The facilitys principal DVD clients include MGM, Trimark and Artisan Entertainment.
