Making media asset management work

Charles Yeo, Business Director, Vividthree Productions Pte Ltd

I don’t see a specific trend in media asset management in 3D animation. Every animation studio has its own way of managing its digital assets, and customizing to its need and workflow. Structured online-storage might be the emerging trend for other IT companies, design studios, etc.

What are your particular needs in terms of media asset management in broadcast and digital media applications?

It will be searching, tracking and data security of our digital assets. And most importantly, it has got to be user friendly and equipment with the flexibility to customize and fit into our company pipeline and workflow.

I believe it has to speed up and minimize the steps compared to the past.

With high performance workflow and media asset management technology, it definitely needs to speed up the process of searching, tracking, conversion, easy viewing browser and some with mini easy access widget.

Michael McKay, President activeTV

Solid-state media asset management separates into on-set and post-production workflows with different objectives in each. The processes required to achieve these objectives have brought about several workflow trends.

The needs that are coming about of media asset management in broadcast are firstly the identification and distinction of the delivery from the offline formats. Many producers and directors do not appreciate the effects that compression has on the images. Once the offline media is viewed on a computer screen it will look good enough to them. But when considering the compression, grade and LUT change the image will go through before reaching the TV screens or other monitors on the other end. A considerable amount of detail will be missing from the highlights and darks and the colour gamut will be severely different as to likely change the look and feel.

Delivery to multi platform devices usually requires a variety of compression rates applied to the images. Advancements in media asset management have made it possible to view instantly almost at any stage of the production what an image will look like in its delivery frame sizes and compression rates.

These higher quality formats require faster processors to compress them into the recording format and subsequently large bandwidths to record them to drive or card. With the development of higher capacity hard drives, faster throughput devices and faster processors it is possible to read and write larger files. Solid-state systems offer huge advantages over tape based workflows in media to NLE clip reconnection. As compressing offline media is as easy as setting up a computer at unit base or the production office. Editorial are able to work on rough assemblies of scenes and suggest improvements to coverage if need be.

Sunita Petrus, Managing Director, Superwonderful Films

With the technology that we are surrounded with, we are heading towards a data centric environment. Data-centricity is the next natural step of our evolution and there will be no end to the evolution of post.

TigerTiger has a tight loop that is designed to ensure that the creative vision of a production is helped, not hindered, by the technology. Having said that, it’s all about achieving a seamless workflow. The biggest benefit is turnaround time which definitely helps in terms of creativity as well as the lack of having to make copies or when it comes to things like approval from clients. Another huge benefit is concurrency, or the ability of multiple artists to work on the same data at the same time.

We work with various operating systems and have developed a custom database, archiving and backup process so that our clients experience a seamless workflow. Ultimately it’s about ensuring that the images, sound and service are of the absolute highest calibre. We are always working towards refining our workflow because everything in life changes and we relish that challenge.

The availability of high performance workflow will make the future hassle free. The tapeless workflow will predominate over the next few years. In addition to cheaper storage and faster pipelines we will definitely see standardization, which we will all benefit from.