Avid Customers Take Center Stage at 2006 Sundance Film Festival; Company also to conduct series of educational workshops.

TEWKSBURY, Mass. -- Avid Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ: AVID) today announced that a range of independent filmmakers who will showcase their work at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival - and the production team from Park City Television (PCTV) that is producing daily Festival coverage for the Sundance Channel - have chosen to use Avid's industry-standard postproduction systems. During the Festival, which is scheduled to take place January 19-29 in Park City, Utah, Avid will also conduct a series of workshops designed to help independent artists sharpen their storytelling skills with valuable filmmaking techniques and tips.

"Over the past 12 years, Avid has played an important role as an official provider for the Sundance Film Festival, and we are pleased to see the company continue that commitment in 2006," said Ian Calderon, Director of Digital Initiatives for the Sundance Institute. "As hundreds of independent filmmakers converge on Park City over the next two weeks, they'll have unique opportunities to experience some of the best up-and-coming film projects, network with an exceptionally talented peer group, and connect with industry-leaders like Avid - to learn about the latest tools and technologies that can help them improve their craft."

Entries at this year's Festival include a wide range of films, including documentaries, short films and feature-length dramas that were created using Avid(R) systems, such as:

--American Hardcore - by director/editor Paul Rachman, created using Avid Xpress(R) Pro and Avid Symphony(TM) systems;

--Art School Confidential - by editor Robert Hoffman, created using Media Composer(R) and Avid DS Nitris(R) systems;

--Clear Cut: The Story of Philomath, OR - by director/editor Peter Richardson, created using Avid Xpress Pro and Media Composer Adrenaline(TM) systems;

--Come Early Morning - by editor Meg Reticker, created using an Avid Xpress Pro system;

--Dreamland and Foot Fist Way - by editor Zene Baker, created using an Avid Xpress Pro system;

--Forgiven - by editor Shelby Siegel, created using Media Composer, Avid Xpress Pro and Avid DS Nitris systems;

--Friends with Money - by editor Robert Frazen, created using a Media Composer system; and;

--Puccini for Beginners - by editors Susan Graef and Dava Whisenant, created using a Media Composer Adrenaline system.

"The sheer economics of Avid Xpress Pro make it a perfect system for low budget films," said Meg Reticker, editor for the 2006 Festival Film Come Early Morning and HBO series The Wire. "But it's more than that. It offers so many capabilities that make an editor's life easier, like painless conform on higher-end Avid systems and greater stability than other low-cost NLE's."

Zene Baker, who used Avid Xpress Pro to edit two films - Dreamland and The Foot Fist Way - featured at this year's festival, said, "I've cut on many editing systems, but for my time and money, I go fastest on Avid. It's really important to be able to just go into a film focused on the craft of editing and not worry about systems crashing or media not being there. Avid takes the guesswork out of the matchback process and it's unbelievably reliable."

Daily Television Coverage of the Festival

As indie filmmakers gear up to showcase their work at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival, the Sundance Channel will broadcast nationwide daily coverage of the two-week event. Local station Park City Television (PCTV) will be the official programming provider for the Sundance Channel, delivering a 30-minute show each day called "Festival Dailies."

To produce this material - and its own six-and-a-half hours of daily coverage - PCTV has constructed a comprehensive postproduction workflow, which includes five Avid Xpress Pro systems and two Avid Xpress Pro Studio Complete suites for video editing, drag-and-drop 3D animation, titles and effects, 2D and 3D compositing, advanced titling, audio design and mixing and advanced DVD authoring. An Avid Unity(TM) LANshare server will provide Ethernet connectivity, file sharing and data backup and a SOFTIMAGE(R)|XSI(R) system will also be used for specialized 3D graphics and effects. Together, this highly collaborative environment will enable PCTV editors to create, enhance, share, exchange and back up their work under extremely tight deadlines.

Avid Workshops at the Film Center

Avid will also play an active role at the 2006 Festival by offering filmmakers of today and tomorrow an opportunity to improve their craft, through a series of workshops. These include:

--Big-budget Production Techniques for the Low-budget Filmmaker. This workshop focuses on the many production techniques used in traditional filmmaking and how to accomplish them with Avid Xpress Pro software.

--The Art and Craft of Editing. The art of storytelling in film is a critical piece of the editing process. This workshop will focus on how to make editorial choices that help strengthen storylines, while another extension of the workshop will focus on how to select the right sound and music for film.

--The Art and Technology of Filmmaking. In this workshop, Avid teams up with Hewlett-Packard to demonstrate the latest in affordable digital filmmaking equipment for postproduction, featuring Avid Xpress Pro software powered by the low-cost, high-performing HP xw4300 workstation. In addition to learning the basics of working on film-based projects with Avid Xpress Pro software, filmmakers will also get a hands-on look at the unmatched array of features and powerful native HD support within Avid's Academy Award(R) winning editing environment.

All workshops will be held in the Avid Classroom in Workshop Area B at the Film Center, on the Lower Level of the Main Street Mall. For more information or to sign up for classes, visit: http://festival.sundance.org.

Sundance Film Festival

The Sundance Film Festival is the premier showcase for American and international independent film. Held each January in and around Park City, Utah, the Festival is a core program of Sundance Institute, a nonprofit cultural organization founded by Robert Redford in 1981. Presenting 120 dramatic and documentary feature-length films in nine distinct categories, and 80 short films each year, the Sundance Film Festival has introduced American audiences to some of the most innovative films of the past two decades, including sex, lies, and videotape, Clerks, Smoke Signals, In the Bedroom, American Splendor, Napoleon Dynamite, Born into Brothels, and Me and You and Everyone We Know. Beyond the streets of Park City, the official Website of the Sundance Film Festival, www.sundance.org, shares the Festival experience with a global audience through the streaming of short films and filmmaker interviews, combined with current news and box office information.

Sundance Institute

Dedicated year-round to the development of artists of independent vision and to the exhibition of their new work, Sundance Institute celebrates its 25th anniversary in 2006. Since its inception, the Institute has grown into an internationally recognized resource for thousands of independent artists through its Sundance Film Festival and artistic development programs which provide a range of concentrated creative and financial support for directors, screenwriters, documentary filmmakers, composers, playwrights and theatre artists. The original values of independence, creative risk-taking, and discovery continue to define and guide the work of Sundance Institute, both with US artists and, increasingly, with artists from other regions of the world.

About Avid Technology, Inc.

Avid Technology, Inc. is the world leader in digital nonlinear media creation, management, and distribution solutions, enabling film, video, audio, animation, games, and broadcast professionals to work more efficiently, productively, and creatively. For more information about the company's Oscar(R), Grammy(R), and Emmy(R) award-winning products and services, please visit: www.avid.com.

(C) 2006 Avid Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Product features, specifications, system requirements, and availability are subject to change without notice. Avid, Film Composer, Pro Tools, Avid Xpress Pro, Media Composer, Symphony, Nitris, Adrenaline, Avid Unity, SOFTIMAGE, XSI and Studio Complete are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Avid Technology, Inc. or its subsidiaries in the United States and/or other countries. Avid received an Oscar statuette representing the 1998 Scientific and Technical Award for the concept, design, and engineering of the Avid(R) Film Composer(R) system for motion picture editing. Digidesign, Avid's audio division, received an Oscar statuette representing the 2003 Scientific and Technical Award for the design, development, and implementation of its Pro Tools(R) digital audio workstation. Academy Award and Oscar are trademarks and service marks of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Emmy is a registered trademark of ATAS/NATAS. Grammy is a trademark of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, Inc. All other trademarks contained herein are the property of their respective owners.