Digitalsmiths, a 35-employee startup whose video search system is used by film studios and websites, is moving from Morrisville to American Tobacco Campus in downtown Durham.

The company has signed a long-term lease for about 7,000 square feet in ATC, said Matthew Berry, one of the company's co-founders and its chief technology officer.

The company will move into its new space over the Thanksgiving break.

Berry said Digitalsmiths considered locating in American Tobacco three years ago, when the company moved to the Triangle from South Carolina, but couldn't make it work.

Digitalsmiths is one of many companies that has used the economic downturn as an opportunity to move into nicer, more higher-profile office space.

"There's certainly something to be said about the ability to recruit high-level talent and just being where they want to work and being around like-minded people," Berry said of American Tobacco.