S&M LAUNCH TOY BOX CONCEPT

HIGH-end post production facility Smoke & Mirrors (S&M) have announced the launch of Toy Box, a new facility designed to deliver cost-effective and highly flexible post production solutions to advertising agencies.
The Toy Box concept is unique to S&M and has been developed in direct response to the need of advertising agencies to get more from their post-production budgets in an age of increasing globalisation of ad campaigns and tightening budgets.
Toy Box provides an environment where the latest in advanced, but lower-cost, editing and effects software can be quickly configured as required.
Located within their main Soho premises, S&M have built three new suites dedicated to Toy Box, bringing their total number of suites to eight, plus a new 3D CGI studio.
The new facility is aimed at simpler jobs such as scripts with straightforward treatments and effects content, as well as packs, supers, global versioning, adaptations and lean-up work, but without the unnecessary expense of higher end systems like Flame or Inferno.
Crucially, Toy Box systems can also be plugged into S&M’s main Flame suites, to provide teams of operators working side-by-side on more complex projects. On large jobs the benefit is that many of the simpler tasks can be off-loaded to Toy Box artists, helping to reduce overall costs.
As part of the Toy Box deal S&M are offering script consultation to advise on the most cost-effective way to complete a job. S&M will identify which projects can be completed via Toy Box, and explain how it can be used as a back-up for Flame on more complicated effects projects. Additionally, CakeS, S&M’s remote approval and delivery service, will add a range of new services for remote working in the near future.
Toy Box is the culmination of a comprehensive upgrade of the front-line visual-effects technologies at S&M, which has already seen the implementation of the latest software from Discreet, the developers of Flame and Inferno, and other leading technology providers. (CD)