The Hindu Business Line : Digital designs

The first thing that strikes you about DTX Studios is the bright orange `stick man' motif on the building front. As you enter the studio, located in an upmarket neighbourhood in Chennai, an equally stunning design greets you. All kinds of waste — thermocole, sponge, mica and wires — have been used to create a unique pattern framed by glass.

While you gaze at the interiors and wonder what goes on in here, enters Sriram, the owner. He explains, "We do Web site design, brand presentations, corporate ids, product demonstration software... any creative work, using software such as Flash, Macromedia and Adobe. Our clients are from real estate, banking, auto sector and software companies."

DTX Studios, a multimedia development hub, houses a music-mixing studio, a storyboard execution unit and a complete animation centre. A place where artists lose track of time and get caught in a `creative warp'. Because only one qualification scores here — creativity. "Wield your pencil and wield it well. I want my team to be communicative and creative. I don't care for academic qualification," says Sriram.

Asked about the projects DTX has worked on, Sriram refers to the Web site the firm created for Chennai-based women's-wear brand Natalia. "They wanted a funky but low bandwidth site and we delivered it for them."

When a leading health company in the US wanted a real-time assessment on health tests, DTX jumped at the opportunity.

Normally, test reports have statistics and numbers the common man does not understand. A doctor needs to decode them. "But we used a technology called LISP and put together a complete range of test assessments. The patient can just enter test results and get an assessment," says Sriram.

To build client base, "initially, we approached potential clients, but now they contact us. Today, one wants brand association. They compare our work with competitors and friends and get back to us," says Sriram.

They worked on an interesting e-learning project, "where an American client wanted the pictures of his trainers on the Web site. We obtained full-length pictures of a woman trainer in three angles, developed a three-layered image and animated it. A worker from the studio saw her taking classes and noted even the smallest gesture — the way she nodded her head and folded her hands across the chest. Every single detail was replicated in the animated version on the Web site. So much that the trainer, seeing herself on the site, went on to correct her body language," laughs Sriram.

Interactive gaming is DTX's forte. "We have developed an ISP-based tennis game called Ace2Ace, where people connected to the same Internet Service Provider (ISP) can play the game virtually against one another. Gaming is a big industry in the US. All that one needs is value addition to the existing ISP services. We are also developing cricket in a similar way," he says.

On the launch of such a game he says, "Sadly in India, no one understands technology. Our tennis concept was kept on hold and eventually rejected by four leading ISPs. Whereas in the US, we have a dedicated user base for the game. It's an addictive game and the industry should understand the potential client base. Until then, it's wait time for us and the public," he says.

He says though the company is offered lots of work by the Tamil film industry, "we are not getting into animation for films. Advertisements interest me. We want to partner a leading ad agency to make Web-based promos for clients. We are also open to TV commercials and are now developing the Web site for the largest online bookstore in India."

Sriram says the six-month-old company hopes to rake in about $0.5 million (Rs 2 crore) by the first year. Yet to turn 30, Sriram already owns three companies; the other two being DTX InfoTech Pvt Ltd that provides open source coding software to back-end operations and Launchpad Ventures, a knowledge resource company that works as a corporate communicator to clients.

Picture by Shaju John

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