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Safe Harbor Computers to Exhibit at 2011 IVA Filmmakers Expo

0	Posted by Marc Leitner June 7, 2011

Waukesha, WI – June 7, 2011 – Safe Harbor Computers, a leading supplier to video and 3D animation professionals, today announced that they will be exhibiting at the 5th annual Illinois Videographers Association Midwest Expo, June 28, 2011. Demonstrating unique features of the Atomos Ninja, alongside the power of Safe Harbor’s custom-built Tsunami and Mac Pro workstations, attendees will experience hands-on benefits of the latest hardware and software.

The Atomos Ninja, a rugged and portable 10-bit field recorder for video cameras and DSLRs with HDMI, will be mounted to a Sony video camera for demonstration purposes. The battery-powered unit takes the live uncompressed HDMI feed from a camcorder and saves it to a 2.5" hard drive in the 10-bit ProRes format with 4:2:2 quality, bypassing the compression cameras use when saving HD video to tape or memory card. The captured ProRes files can then be immediately edited in Final Cut Pro without Log and Transfer or any type of transcoding needed. The ProRes clips will also play in Premiere Pro CS5.5 for PC users. Functionality will be demonstrated on both platforms.

Also featured will be Safe Harbor’s custom built Tsunami workstations powered by Adobe Production Premium CS5.5 and NVIDIA Quadro by PNY. The Mercury Playback Engine at the heart of Adobe Premiere Pro CS5.5 is NVIDIA GPU-accelerated, 64-bit native, architected for the future—enabling users to work more fluidly on projects in SD, HD, 2K, 4K, and beyond. Safe Harbor staff and experienced video editor Jeff Pulera will be available for questions as he demonstrates this powerful setup with the Atomos Ninja. An Apple Mac Pro workstation will also be on display with unique configurations tailored to specific editing needs.

Literature, raffle prizes, exclusive show specials and coupons will be available to all attendees at the Safe Harbor booth. Jeff will also be discussing the various performance levels of Tsunami and how Safe Harbor can work with customers to meet specific needs and budgets. Show attendees will be able to visit the booth, talk with video professionals, and learn how the Atomos Ninja, with an optimized workstation from Safe Harbor, helps to maximize production workflows.

This year's IVA Expo features:

• World-class filmmakers
• 6 incredible presentations
• Hands-on trade show
• Live camera/production workshop featuring a live mock wedding
• Safe Harbor demonstrations
• Exclusive show specials
• Much, much more!

More information and registration is available at http://www.ivaexpo.com/.
For an in-depth review of the Atomos Ninja, please visit http://www.sharbor.com/products-xtra/2054.html.
For more information about custom Tsunami and Mac Pro workstations, please visit http://www.sharbor.com/build-yours/.

About Safe Harbor

Celebrating 24 years of business, Safe Harbor has become one of the most trusted resellers in the multimedia industry, providing quality products and outstanding customer service to a wide range of creative artists. With a clean, intuitive, and easy to navigate website, Safe Harbor has built a reliable reputation as an industry leader. Look to Safe Harbor for quality editing and animation software and hardware, as well as for a professional and personable experience.

Safe Harbor's Ready-To-Edit Tsunami Workstations are extremely high-quality, highly reliable systems backed by renowned customer service. All components are brand-name, non-OEM products and carry full manufacturer warranties - proprietary drivers or technology are never used. System boards are certified compatible by capture card manufacturers. Each system must pass rigorous testing procedures and a full burn-in period before it is shipped.

For more information, visit:

http://www.sharbor.com
http://www.facebook.com/SafeHarborComputers
http://www.twitter.com/SafeHarborComp
http://www.youtube.com/SafeHarborComputers

About Illinois Videographers Association

Established in 1996, the Illinois Videographers Association is a non-profit organization dedicated to the continuing education of all videographers from professional to amateur. Monthly meetings on various videography topics and trends are held at The Double-Tree Suites in Wood Dale, IL.

HP Unveils Affordable and Compact Workstations for Professionals

0	Posted by Marc Leitner April 13, 2011

LAS VEGAS—(BUSINESS WIRE)—HP (NYSE:HPQ) today expanded its industry-leading Z Workstation family with the highly affordable HP Z210 Workstation, which is available in convertible mini-tower (CMT) or highly compact small form factor (SFF) options for space-constrained environments.

HP also announced three new HP EliteBook Mobile Workstations, demonstrating its continued investment in the desktop and mobile workstation market, where it holds leading market share, as reported by IDC.(1)

The HP Z210 models, which are ideal for customers in the video editing, MCAD/AEC, education, public sector and image viewing industries, raise the bar for entry-level workstation performance while providing workstation-class reliability at a highly affordable price.

The predecessors to the HP Z210 Workstations, the HP Z200 and HP Z200 SFF, are being used around the world by customers such as Local Motors and Colorado State University College of Business in the United States; Penoles Grupo Bal in Latin America; Centennial College in Canada; Global Logic in Europe; and Infinite Frameworks in Asia Pacific.

"An increasing number of customers in fast-growing market segments are turning to HP Z Workstations to meet the increasingly sophisticated demands of their businesses," said Jeff Wood, director, Worldwide Marketing, Workstations, HP. "The new HP Z210 Workstations meet these demands and demonstrate HP’s leadership in the market."

Industry research firm IDC reported that HP’s market share of the desktop workstation category has grown during past quarters, culminating with a 45.8 percent share worldwide for the fourth quarter of 2010, according to the IDC Worldwide Workstation Tracker, Q4 2010.(1)

The HP Z210 SFF is 65 percent smaller than the HP Z210 CMT. Both sizes offer the choice of high-performance, enterprise-class Intel® Xeon® E3 and second-generation Intel Core™ i3/i5/i7 processors, surpassing PC offerings and increasing overall performance by up to 20 percent over previous-generation processors.(2)

"Built for professionals, HP Z210 workstations with the new Intel Xeon processor E3 1200 family are changing the definition of the entry-level workstation," said Anthony C. Neal-Graves, general manager, Workstation Unit, Intel Corporation. "This processor’s greatest innovation is how it integrates the CPU and graphics engines on the same die. That means visual and 3-D graphics capabilities that were once only available to entry workstation users with discrete graphics cards will now be accessible to anyone with an entry workstation powered by the Intel Xeon E3 family with Intel HD Graphics P3000.3"

The HP Z210 models offer a range of professional graphics options, including 2-D choices from AMD and NVIDIA that incorporate dual graphics card capabilities that support up to four 2-D displays. 3-D choices include next-generation processor-integrated Intel high-definition graphics that lower the entry cost for professional 3-D graphics, and entry and midrange graphics from NVIDIA and AMD.

The HP Z210 Workstations are designed for ease of use, and both form factors feature a tool-free chassis that make them easy to service. Like all HP Workstations, they were engineered with customers in mind and went through rigorous testing and certification with the key professional applications and software vendors that are critical to customer work.

Proven environmental leadership

HP is a leader in reducing the environmental impact of its products, including workstations, often acting first to adopt new solutions designed with the environment in mind. The HP Z210 Workstations offer ENERGY STAR® v5 qualified configurations to help reduce the amount of energy lost to heat and optimize the energy that the system actually consumes. The HP Z210 models provide new carbon footprint reduction technologies with both models featuring HP’s highest-efficiency workstation power supply (90 percent efficient) as standard.

In addition, the HP Z210 Workstations have access to the HP Carbon Footprint Calculator, which allows users to see how they can reduce their environmental impact and costs of computing. Both models also include HP Power Assistant, which provides real-time battery capacity and power consumption information that helps users conserve power.

All HP workstations are more than 90 percent recyclable and the HP Z line is registered as Electronics Products Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT™) Gold, the highest rating available.

The HP Workstation advantage

• HP’s industry-leading independent software vendor program ensures comprehensive workstation testing, tuning and certification across a very wide variety of applications, including advanced product design, broadcast-quality video editing, building information modeling, 3-D movie animation, geographical information systems and medical imaging.

• HP’s highly tuned workstations give customers an experience much like having an engineer in the box with HP Performance Advisor software. This free tool is available with all HP workstations and features an intuitive interface that can help tune the workstation and track system resource utilization.

• The HP Performance Advisor will make recommendations to users on which driver they should use. This type of tuning can result in significantly improved performance and system and software stability. To further ensure stability for its customers, HP certifies drivers for commonly used workstations applications from vendors such as Adobe, Autodesk, CATIA, Dassault, PTC, Siemens and SolidWorks.

Users of HP workstations enjoy additional benefits of HP’s rigorous systems testing and engineering:

• Each HP workstation passes through HP’s legendary quality assurance and testing process, which goes well beyond regulatory and industry standards. As an example, HP’s rigorous three-axis temperature/frequency/voltage testing helps allow for reliable long-term operation for critical components.

• As a result of HP’s acoustics engineering, many customers report they cannot tell by listening if the workstation is even running.

Pricing and availability

The new HP Z210 Workstations are expected to be available this spring. U.S. pricing starts at $659 for the HP Z210 CMT Workstation and $569 for the HP Z210 SFF Workstation.(4)

More information is available at www.hp.com/personalagain.

About HP

HP creates new possibilities for technology to have a meaningful impact on people, businesses, governments and society. The world’s largest technology company, HP brings together a portfolio that spans printing, personal computing, software, services and IT infrastructure at the convergence of the cloud and connectivity, creating seamless, secure, context-aware experiences for a connected world. More information about HP is available at http://www.hp.com.

(1) Source: Worldwide Workstation Tracker, Q4 2010, IDC.

(2) Based on benchmark testing done in HP Labs with workstation market applications the SPECapc benchmarks for Pro/ENGINEER Wildfire 2.0, SolidWorks 2007, 3ds Max V9, Maya 2009 and LightWave as well as the Cadalyst C2010 v5.3 Benchmark Test comparing an HP Z200 Workstation with an Intel Core i5-680/Intel Xeon X3480 processor to an HP Z210 Workstation with an Intel Core i7-2600/Intel Xeon E3-1280 processor. All other system configurations were selected to be as equal as possible.

(3) Intel’s numbering is not a measurement of higher performance.

(4) Estimated U.S. street prices. Actual prices may vary.

HP Unveils Mobile Workstations for Ultimate Performance, Design and Durability

0	Posted by Marc Leitner April 13, 2011

LAS VEGAS—HP announced a new lineup of powerful mobile workstations, ideal for engineering, power-computing and content-creation customers who need the performance of a workstation with the portability and convenience of a notebook.

HP also unveiled the HP Z210 Workstation, demonstrating its continued investment in the desktop and mobile workstations market, where it holds leading market share. (1)

Building on HP’s "FORGE" design framework, the HP EliteBook w-series embodies a timeless construction, with precision-engineered durability features that are designed for maximum reliability and with the environment in mind. The new products showcase HP’s first-ever industrial design specific to mobile workstations, with distinctive features including a radial-brushed gunmetal finish, backlit jewel logo and orange-colored accents.

The mobile workstations also are certified by independent software vendors to run the most demanding professional applications, helping ensure reliable performance for mobile power users.

• HP’s most powerful mobile workstation, the HP EliteBook 8760w offers a 17.3-inch diagonal, high-definition (HD) screen,(2) a choice of high-performing AMD FirePro(3) or NVIDIA Quadro professional graphics and up to 4 gigabytes (GB) of video memory.(4) The EliteBook 8760w also can be configured with three hard drives and RAID 5 support – a first for HP mobile workstations.

• The HP EliteBook 8560w features a15.6-inch diagonal HD display and supports AMD FirePro graphics for 1 GB of video memory or NVIDIA Quadro graphics for 2 GB of video memory. The optional HP DreamColor display on the EliteBook 8560w and 8760w(5) also allows for more than 1 billion active color possibilities.

• HP’s smallest and lightest mobile workstation, the HP EliteBook 8460w, starts at only 4.9 pounds and includes a 14.0-inch diagonal HD panel, in addition to an AMD FirePro 1 GB video memory professional graphics card for true on-the-road video performance.

"As the fastest growing segment of the workstation market, mobile workstations continue to provide value to our most demanding design, animation and engineering customers," said Efrain Rovira, director, Mobile Workstations, Notebook Business Unit, HP. "The new EliteBook mobile workstations announced today combine innovative design with trusted, workstation-class technology to fuel creativity."

Durable design and color-critical display

The HP EliteBook 8760w, 8560w and 8460w include precision aluminum-alloy hinges and cast titanium-alloy display latches for enhanced durability. Sporting a radial-brushed display cover in a new gunmetal color, the portfolio boasts an aerospace design inspired HP DuraCase and is MIL STD 810G tested for drop, vibration, dust and altitude that might arise during on-the-go computing.(6) The HP EliteBook 8760w and 8560w also feature a backlit keyboard for workstation-caliber productivity, day or night.

Additionally, the HP DreamColor display option on the HP EliteBook 8760w and 8560w(5) allows for more than 1 billion active color combinations – 64 times the capabilities of a traditional display – and uses a 30-bit notebook LCD panel to provide a level of color control exclusive to the EliteBook w-series for consistent color appearance from concept, to design, to production. The HP Mobile Display Assistant and optional HP Advanced Profiling Solution enable more precise control, adjustment and alignment of the DreamColor notebook display to ensure predictable color.

On-the-go workstation-caliber computing

Built to deliver optimized workstation-class processing and support migration to 3-D professional applications, the HP EliteBook 8760w, 8560w and 8460w feature second-generation Intel® Core™ i7 and i5 dual- and quad-core processors,(7) offer premium performance and responsiveness with vPro compatibility,(8) and support up to 32 GB of RAM.

With video memory options from 1 GB to 4 GB, the new w-series delivers superior, ISV-certified professional graphics solutions from NVIDIA and AMD for the 8760w and 8560w and from AMD for the 8460w. When equipped with an AMD discrete graphics solution and an optional HP Advanced Docking Station, the HP mobile workstations support AMD Eyefinity Technology for simultaneous support for up to five independent displays.(9)

HP EliteBook mobile workstations also offer a variety of storage capacity options, including SMART SATA, Self Encrypting or Solid State Drives, with up to RAID 5 capability. The mobile workstations are also equipped with a variety of ports, including USB 3.0, eSATA and USB 2.0 charging ports.

Now available on HP mobile workstations, HP Performance Advisor, an intuitive user interface, helps keep applications running smoothly, while optimizing configuration and graphics performance.

The HP EliteBook 8760w and 8560w offer an 8-cell primary battery, while the HP EliteBook 8460w offers 6- and 9-cell options for extended battery run time. All models include an HP Long Life Battery option. The mobile workstations also are compatible with the new HP Extended Life Notebook Battery and HP Ultra-Capacity Notebook Battery, which offer external battery supplies for additional run time.

Productivity tools and components

The new mobile workstations offer HP Professional Innovations, including HP QuickWeb 3,(10) HP Power Assistant,(11) HP Connection Manager and HP ProtectTools,(12) which includes standard drive encryption for data protection. SRS Premium Sound also provides optimized audio settings for voice and multimedia applications and delivers an audio experience for digital content creators or users listening to media-rich content and presenting multimedia-heavy presentations.

Pricing and availability(13)

The HP EliteBook 8760w, 8560w and 8460w start at $1,899, $1,349 and $1,299 respectively, and are expected to be available in the United States in May.

More information about the products, including product specifications and images, is available at www.hp.com/personal.

About HP

HP creates new possibilities for technology to have a meaningful impact on people, businesses, governments and society. The world’s largest technology company, HP brings together a portfolio that spans printing, personal computing, software, services and IT infrastructure at the convergence of the cloud and connectivity, creating seamless, secure, context-aware experiences for a connected world. More information about HP is available at http://www.hp.com.

(1) Source: IDC, Worldwide Workstation Tracker, Q4 2010

(2) HD content required to view HD images.

(3) HP Elitebook 8560w with AMD graphics card will not be ENERGY STAR® compliant.

(4) Up to 1 GB may not be available with 32-bit operating systems due to system resource requirements.

(5) HP Elitebook 8760w with DreamColor panel cannot be configured with WWAN.

(6) 64-bit computing on Intel architecture requires a computer system with a processor, chipset, BIOS, operating system, device drivers and applications enabled for Intel® 64 architecture. Processors will not operate (including 32-bit operation) without an Intel 64 architecture-enabled BIOS. Performance will vary depending on your hardware and software configurations. See www.intel.com/info/em64t for more information. Dual/Quad- Core is designed to improve performance of multithreaded software products and hardware-aware multitasking operating systems and may require appropriate operating system software for full benefit. Not all customers or software applications will necessarily benefit from use of this technology. Intel’s numbering is not a measurement of higher performance.

(7) Some functionality of Intel vPro, such as Intel Active management technology and Intel Virtualization technology, requires additional 3rd party software in order to run. Availability of future "virtual appliances" applications for vPro technologies is dependent on 3rd party software providers. Compatibility with future "virtual appliances", Microsoft Windows Vista and Windows 7 operating systems is yet to be determined.

(8) Support for 5 monitors requires separately purchased HP Advanced Docking Station.

(9) Testing was not intended to demonstrate fitness for DOD contracts requirements or for military use. Test results are not a guarantee of future performance under these test conditions.

(10) HP QuickLook 3 is accessible when the notebook is off and requires Microsoft Windows based systems and Microsoft Outlook. Timing may vary depending on the system configuration. To enable the feature following the removal of the battery, reboot the notebook prior to subsequent use.

(11) Power calculations and cost calculations are estimates. Results will vary based on variables, which include information provided by the user, time PC is in different power states (on, standby, hibernate, off), time PC is on battery or AC, hardware configuration, variable electricity rates and utilities provider. HP advises customers to use information reported by HP Power Assistant for reference only and to validate impact in their environment. Environmental calculations were based on U.S. EPA eGrid 2007 data found at www.epa.gov/egrid/. Regional results will vary. Requires Microsoft Windows.

(12) HP ProtectTools requires Microsoft Windows.

(13) Estimated U.S. street prices. Actual prices may vary.

CWB awards HP, Adobe, NVIDIA for most ideal, cost-effective Film Editing system

0	Posted by Marc Leitner October 21, 2010

(Burbank, California—October 20, 2010) Cinema Without Borders, an independent publication dedicated to international cinema, has announced the HP Z Workstation Series, in combination with NVIDIA Quadro professional graphics and Adobe Premiere Pro CS5, as the most ideal and cost-effective Film Editing system for independent and international filmmakers.

The 2010 iteration of the prestigious Seal of Excellence award, received by the Palm Springs International ShortFest Film Festival in 2008, is bestowed upon HP, NVIDIA and Adobe for offering Excellence in film editing tools.

"Our team of editors, reviewers and experts examined and reviewed an HP Z400 System armed with the NVIDIA Quadro FX 3800 professional graphics card and Adobe Premiere Pro CS5 for over seven months for digital film editing and unanimously decided to grant our Seal of Excellence to HP, NVIDIA and Adobe for providing an opportunity for thousands of filmmakers in the U.S. and around the world to have more room for their own creativity," explained Bijan Tehrani, Editor in Chief of Cinema Without Borders. "We are deeply impressed by the smooth performance and power of the HP Z400 and its affordable pricing. NVIDIA also continues to offer cutting-edge technology to the filmmaker community with the Quadro FX series. Adobe Premiere Pro CS5's Mercury Playback Engine and ease-of-use makes all that was considered impossible in video editing, possible."

"HP continually invests in research and development, innovating on top of our industry-leading workstations to provide an undeniably differentiated experience to our customers," said Jeff Wood, director of Worldwide Marketing, Workstations, HP. "The Seal of Excellence award validates HP’s commitment to providing our customers with the ultimate in power and reliability."

"We worked closely with Adobe to dramatically accelerate post-production workflows for the Mercury Playback Engine using CUDA on Quadro," said Andrew Cresci, general manager, vertical market solutions, NVIDIA. "With this award, Cinema Without Borders confirms that users truly benefit from this breakthrough, real-time video editing solution. We recently launched the new Quadro 5000 and Quadro 4000 pro graphics cards, which are based on our NVIDIA Fermi architecture, so future results are sure to be even more impressive."

"Adobe is committed to helping filmmakers craft great stories and accelerate their post-production workflows," said Scott Morris, director of product marketing for Adobe’s video solutions. "We’re thrilled to see the industry’s reaction to Adobe Premiere Pro CS5 and the Mercury Playback Engine, and honored to be recognized—along with HP and NVIDIA—for shaking up the industry and redefining the video editing process."

About Cinema Without Borders

Cinema Without Borders (CWB) is an online film magazine whose team of multi-national contributors highlights a broad selection of world cinema and emerging filmmakers. Drawing its strength from diverse communities of international filmmakers, film students, film festival organizers and film industry professionals, the Hollywood-based CWB offers a unique online platform for peer reviews and information about movies and film-related events.http://www.cinemawithoutborders.com

ATTO Technology to Showcase Storage Connectivity Solutions at HP Tech Forum

0	Posted by Marc Leitner June 22, 2010

(Las Vegas, Nevada) ATTO Technology, Inc., a global leader of storage connectivity and infrastructure solutions for data-intensive computing environments, today announced that it will be showing its HP qualified storage connectivity products at HP Technology Forum in Las Vegas, NV.

Featured products include ATTO Celerity Fibre Channel HBAs, Xtend SAN iSCSI Initiator and ExpressPCI SCSI HBAs. ATTO products provide HP customers with new opportunities to implement high-availability and high-performance storage connectivity solutions into bandwidth intensive media & entertainment and general IT environments.

The ATTO Celerity line of 8Gb/s and 4Gb/s Fibre Channel Host Adapters have been qualified for use with HP StorageWorks Enterprise Virtual Arrays (EVA) as a high-availability enterprise storage solution for the Mac® market. This solution is designed to enhance workflows and increase productivity by keeping content available in real time for multiple users. Celerity Fibre Channel HBAs feature ATTO’s proprietary MultiPath Director™, a feature-rich solution that provides multiple redundant paths to HP Storage for high-availability access to data. With automatic path failover and load balancing capabilities, ATTO Fibre Channel host bus adapters, with MultiPath Director technology, provide uninterrupted access data and help create a shared storage environment that allows users to efficiently collaborate on projects and consolidate storage resources.

ATTO’s Xtend SAN iSCSI Initiator provides iSCSI SAN connectivity, error handling and security for HP storage systems in Mac OS X environments. It is the first, and most widely-distributed standalone iSCSI initiator that allows Mac users to attach, and load balance, storage connected via an Ethernet-based network. With Xtend SAN, users can remotely access iSCSI storage from multiple servers, increasing accessibility and simplifying storage management, while leveraging existing IT expertise. The combination of Xtend SAN and HP storage systems provides added value for customers whose environments require greater security and automation with features such as a scriptable Command Line Interface, Header and Data Digests, CHAP and iSNS support.

ATTO is also showing ExpressPCI UL5D Low-Profile HBAs that provide high-performance SCSI connectivity for combined with HP MSL Tape libraries. ATTO and HP have teamed together to deliver this solution to HP customers to provide the performance needed for LTO-4 technology.

ATTO will have a sampling of its other product lines on hand for demonstration as well, including SAS/SATA RAID and Host Bus Adapters, RAID storage controllers, the newly-released 10GbE Network Adapters and bridging products that connect disk and tape storage to SAS, Fibre Channel and iSCSI SANs.

"ATTO continues to deliver high-end connectivity solutions to HP customers presenting new opportunities for HP customers to access storage media and digital content using HP Fibre Channel, iSCSI and SCSI storage systems" states Tom Kolniak, director of products for ATTO Technology. "We are pleased to work closely with HP to provide new opportunities for their customers to more efficiently transfer, manage and store their data."

ATTO representatives will be available in the Bronze Sponsorship location of O2 to answer questions and discuss ATTO solutions to meet HP customer needs.

For more information on ATTO solutions for HP visit: http://www.attotech.com/solutions/hp

About ATTO Technology, Inc

ATTO Technology, Inc. is a global leader of storage connectivity and infrastructure solutions for data-intensive computing environments. ATTO provides a wide range of solutions to help customers store, manage and deliver their data more efficiently. With a focus toward markets that require higher performance, ATTO manufactures host and RAID adapters, converged network adapters, bridges, switches, RAID storage controllers, and management software. ATTO solutions provide connectivity to all storage interfaces including Fibre Channel, SAS, SATA, SCSI, iSCSI, FCoE and 10GbE. ATTO distributes its products worldwide directly to Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), systems integrators, VARs and authorized distributors. Contact ATTO Technology, Inc. world headquarters, at: 155 CrossPoint Parkway, Amherst, New York 14068; Phone: (716) 691-1999; Fax: (716) 691-9353; Website: attotech.com.

HP Technology Helps DreamWorks Animation Bring Shrek Forever After in 3D to Life

0	Posted by Marc Leitner May 27, 2010

Palo Alto, Calif. - The power of HP technology and the creativity of DreamWorks Animation SKG Inc. fuse once again as the studio's final chapter to the Shrek film series, Shrek Forever After, hits theatres in 3D. Audiences will experience an army of green ogres, hundreds of dancing witches and all of the original Shrek characters as never seen before—in spectacular 3D. The film's technological breakthroughs are made possible in part by HP technology, which powered the development of the entire Shrek series, from start to finish. For Shrek Forever After, these technologies included HP Z800 Workstations, HP ProLiant blade servers, HP Halo Telepresence Solutions, HP StorageWorks Enterprise Virtual Array, HP StorageWorks X9000 Network Storage Systems, and HP DreamColor displays.

"At DreamWorks Animation we create two to three 3D films a year, and our intention is to ensure that audiences enjoy a higher-quality premium experience with each new film," says Ed Leonard, chief technology officer, DreamWorks Animation. "HP helps us to accomplish this goal by giving our filmmakers the best tools and products so they can be empowered by technology … not limited by it."

"DreamWorks Animation is famous for pushing the limits of innovation to engage with audiences in new ways," says Jeff Wood, director, Worldwide Marketing, Workstations, HP. "HP is committed to a continued investment in research and development to provide customers like DreamWorks with innovations that break through creative barriers to enable the next generation in film."

Production artists at DreamWorks Animation used HP Z800 Workstations to design everything in the film from characters to lighting. According to DreamWorks Animation, the HP Z800 proved to be significantly faster than its predecessor — providing speeds up to 50 percent faster. DreamWorks Animation's render farm for Shrek Forever After, a grouping of computers that work in concert to process animation sequences, was the largest and most powerful render farm ever used in the studio's production of a computer graphics animated film.

The production of Shrek Forever After required nearly 76 terabytes of data and more than 46 million render hours, in contrast to the 6 terabytes of data and near 5 million render hours needed in 2001 for Shrek. In addition to advancements in lighting technology, character development has taken leaps forward with state-of-the art effects and tools in hair.

In Shrek, character hair was kept short, modelled as a solid mass and rendered with multiple strands to create the best look possible. Because of the challenges at the time, Fiona's hair was designed in one long braid with no significant movement. With the latest advancements used in Shrek Forever After, artists have the technological freedom to animate hair that helps define their characters. As a result, Fiona now has fiery locks that flow in the wind to accentuate her new role as a glorious warrior ogress.

Using the most current animation tools, and having them supported by HP's products, Shrek Forever After became a living lab of new technologies being used in remarkable ways. From Z800 Workstations driving story artists using Cintiq tablets, ProLiant BL460c G6 blades for server management, to DreamColor Displays and printers to ensure color accuracy across the studios, HP supports and enables DreamWorks Animation filmmakers from the original idea until a film reaches the screen.

Fun facts about Shrek Forever After

• Beast Fiona's "hair cut" took about nine months of development between digital artists.
• Shrek is seven feet tall, has 22 teeth and his hand is about 13.5 inches from the base of his palm to the tip of his middle finger. His shoe size would be a size 22 (15.5 inches), similar to Shaquille O'Neal.
• Rumpel wears four different wigs in the movie: business wig, speech wig, angry wig and victory wig.
• Rumpel's feet are 6.25 inches long, about the size of an average two- or three-year-old child.
• Reference for the battle between ogres and witches was created using motion-capture technology. Three actors with more than 22 years of combined martial arts experience, including one Aikido instructor and one U.S. collegiate Wushu champion, marked the motion-capture sequence for the actors.
• There were 65 sequences written, recorded and storyboarded over the course of filmmaking. The final film had 32 sequences in picture.
• In the ogre camp, there are 35 torches in 59 shots. That's 2,065 layers of torches, and 4,130 layers accounting for stereo.
• The Shrek Forever After crew generated 74,016 different ogre variations, of which the same 51 were used throughout all the ogre shots.
• There are 430 witches on the dance floor and balconies when Shrek is brought in to meet Rumpel.
• Underwear had to be fashioned for the ogres whose kilts were a little too revealing as they danced to Piper's song. Witches with similar problems simply had their cloth simulations revised.
• Reference for the dancing ogres with Pied Piper was a video of a professional dance troupe with about a dozen members. The choreographer was Michael Rooney, Mickey Rooney's son.
• Fiona's old castle room has 449,166 pieces of particles floating around in the air.