Testimonials - Steve Utaski (Silo Films)

Steve Utaski

After a few career "experiments" including bicycle pedicab driver, landscaper and advertising copywriter. His work has appeared nationally and been recognized by SHOOT Magazine and The Seattle Show. Additionally he directed an award-winning documentary that screened on public television and at film festivals around the world. He lives in Seattle, Washington with his wife, two daughters and cats Bo and Luke.

Letter From Steve Utaski:

I've had an HDPro for several months now and have been thrilled with its performance connected to my Quad Core G5 running Final Cut Studio. At the time I bought my HD Pro, I also acquired a eLane-1ex card mostly out of curiosity. Supposedly the eLane-1ex would allow me to connect the HDPro to my MacBook Pro and edit 10bit or HD source material.

Recently while in the final stages of an edit, my G5 suddenly WENT DOWN with client in the room. While scrambling to try and figure out how to make our deadline I remembered the eLane-1ex card which I had never even plugged in or attempted to use. Necessity being the mother of invention I gave it a shot--with low expectations since we were editing full 1920x1080 HD. I connected my MacBook Pro and booted my G5 in Target disk mode to access the project file and non video elements still on the dead G5. The HDPro showed up on the desktop as planned, and unbelievably, I was editing again within 15 minutes of a catastrophic G5 failure. The MacPro/HDPro combo played the full HD no problem and I was able to finish the job for a very relieved client. As I said, I bought the eLane-1ex card more as a curiosity than anything else since it's so cheep. Much to my surprise and delight it ended up being the best insurance policy I could have asked for.

If you are considering any Caldigit product, I would say you cannot go wrong. The set up is a breeze and completely tool free. And within minutes you can start loading Raid 5 protected media and be editing or compositing trouble free. From packaging, to product, to support that company has done nothing but impress me.