LOS ANGELES — Thinkbox Software (www.thinkboxsoftware.com) has teamed with VFX producer Joyce Cox (The Jungle Book, The Great Gatsby, Avatar) to develop Vero, a new cloud-based application that simplifies the VFX budgeting and cost management processes. The solutions encapsulates Cox’s proven bidding philosophy and methodology into an accessible, easy-to-use interface, that helps estimate and track VFX budgets from script breakdown to shot delivery.
“VFX is often one of the largest chunks of a film budget; however, the current methods for predicting and tracking the costs of VFX shots vary wildly across the industry,” says Cox. “Vero standardizes and streamlines an otherwise overly complicated process, to project and manage the bottom line throughout production as pricing fluctuates with scene changes.”
“We’ve focused on alleviating common pain points in all different areas of production and post, so creating a new, secure system for breaking down and planning VFX is right up our alley,” adds Chris Bond, founder of Thinkbox Software. “I’ve known Joyce for years and deeply respect her expertise, so when she approached us with the idea for Vero, we knew we had to get involved.”
Once logged in, Vero users are able to easily monitor the activities of a project, which are broken into four distinct stages:
- Script Breakdown allows users to import a screenplay file, and the app automatically breaks down the screenplay into scenes and actions. Scenes can then be manually grouped into sequences, and VFX shots can be added to actions manually, or automatically based on action descriptions.
- Budget Room enables users to manually rate VFX shots based on the level of complexity. The producer can then more accurately estimate generic shot costs and begin to layout the VFX production crew and equipment needs.
- Market Place empowers users to create custom bid packages that can easily be shared with interested VFX vendors. Receive and compare preliminary and secondary bids, evaluate designation scenarios, narrow list of potential vendors and apply costs to a VFX budget.
- Contract Room acts as a central hub where bids are awarded and accepted, changes to scope are managed and communicated to vendors and studios, and contracts are archived.
Vero is currently in development, with beta expected to launch this fall. Demonstrations are being held at the Thinkbox Software booth (#449) during the SIGGRAPH conference.