Assimilate today announced the release of SCRATCH 9.2, which includes significant updates for its color tools, ACES pipeline, EXR metadata handling,as well as performance updates with Metal and Afterburner support for Apple’s ProRes RAW format. Additionally, Play Pro, Assimilate’s renowned reference player, has been enabled to capture RTMP-streams from SCRATCH, ensuring a low latency, fully color-managed image pipeline from colorist to client. Also In response to market needs and users, Assimilate announced the option for users to check out and transfer their product licenses to other machines on their own. Furthermore, adding to the existing monthly and annual subscriptions, Assimilate now offers a new permanent licensing option for Play Pro at only $299 (USD).
New Advanced Features
Via the new annotation-feature in all Assimilate software, users can now conduct review sessions and draw notes and remarks directly on the image, and then create review-reports. Adding to Assimilate’s existing collaboration features, such as remote grading and live streaming to Youtube, Vimeo, and other RTMP servers, a new REST API has been added to SCRATCH, allowing for remote control of the system from any device, such as mobile phones or tablets.
Video-IO support has been greatly enhanced, allowing the use of multiple output devices simultaneously with SCRATCH, as well as output in different resolutions and color spaces. Along with the recent release of Live Looks and Live Assist on-set applications, SCRATCH now features an easy to use Look Matcher, to match grades created on-set to the recorded clips for dailies and post. SCRATCH also allows consolidating looks and renaming them based on the matching clip names. Its known XML scripting capabilities make SCRATCH a central hub for managing on-set metadata and looks, and enable comfortable and accurate pipeline scripting for VFX-houses to integrate into their pipelines.
"Using SCRATCH’s ability to directly stream the grading session to Youtube was a great workflow enabler to start with; however, watching that stream through a browser doesn’t ensure color fidelity on the client’s side. It made perfect sense to offer Play Pro as an easy-to-use stream player for our users’ clients, so we added the functionality to read an RTMP stream to it,” stated Mazze Aderhold, product marketing manager at Assimilate. “With a decent connection, SCRATCH users are now able to stream their grading session with less than a second delay straight to their clients around the globe – either using Youtube, or their own RTMP server. With Play Pro on the client side, the receiving end will be fully color managed as well and able to output via SDI to a reference screen.”
Aderhold added, “Our goal is to always respond to user input with the advanced features they need to stay productive and creative. The newly enhanced streaming capabilities, user-managed license transfer, and updated format support give our users the added flexibility to do their jobs more efficiently.”
Price and Availability
SCRATCH 9.2 is available immediately, starting at $89.00 (USD) monthly and $695.00 (USD) annually. Play Pro starts at $19.00 (USD) monthly, $199 (USD) annually and $299 (USD) for a permanent license. Both products and free trials are available at www.assimilateinc.com.
About Assimilate
Assimilate’s SCRATCH dailies and post-production workflows have proven essential to productivity and creativity in the creation of high-end 2D/3D/VR studio and independent feature films, documentaries, TV episodes, commercials and music videos. SCRATCH is resolution independent, and is first to update support for new formats. Used by DITs and post artists worldwide, SCRATCH is known for its power, stability, speed, groundbreaking and unique feature set, and streamlined workflows for tackling complex projects with ease. The Live Looks and Live Assist tools for on-set production provide the speed and specialized features for on-set live grading, video monitoring and recording. Additionally, in SCRATCH VR, Assimilate offers the only professional end-to-end VR workflow and tools for VR360 / 3D and VR180 / 3D, including stitching, Ambisonic sound, and live streaming. Learn more at www.assimilateinc.com.
