In the just published fourth installment of a series of Sponsored Entertainment & Advertising Technology features, SHOOT delves into the challenge facing the industry to intelligently store, manage and archive massive amounts of material. The huge increase in content has meant dramatically increased demands not just for storage, but also for content to be searchable with metadata, kept in a manner that makes it readily accessible and archived in a way that it can retain its value. Without a properly constructed workflow, even a single project can become hopelessly muddled, with multiple versions scattered or lost throughout a facility.
With the advent of UltraHD TV and 4K, demands for space and management have increased. HDR and HFR are only making the issue more acute. As motion picture studios and broadcast networks have realized the value of repurposing their sizable video assets, they have made increasing demands on their vendors. For every production and post facility, implementing robust systems for storage, maintenance and archiving is no longer an option. It’s an imperative, even for the smallest post or production facility.
This feature, titled “New Challenges, New Solutions in Storage, Asset Management and Archiving,” was published on August 14, 2015, across SHOOT’s digital and print platforms, including SHOOT Magazine, SHOOTonline and The SHOOT>e.dition.
Bernie Walsh, Director of Worldwide Sales for SGL Broadcast, was interviewed for the article.
An excerpt from the SHOOT feature about SGL Broadcast….
Maintaining and retrieving video assets has never been an easy job, even in the tape world. But the complexities have dramatically increased as the amount of video has exploded and, with it, the numbers of versions, operations and retrieval needs. But SGL Broadcast has a solution for that: FlashNet.
“FlashNet is a content management application to manage video from its ingest through editing and archive,” says Walsh. “Whereas large organizations, such as broadcasters, have the money to put a fairly complex solution in place, that leaves out most post houses and other smaller facilities where budgets aren’t there to get a solution that does the job right.”
SGL now offers several lower-cost, entry-level bundles that make it possible for a facility of nearly any size and scope to be able to enjoy the benefits of storage management. “We provide you with the server to run our software on, the connectivity into other parts of your organization, including the storage, production and post, and a tape library where all the material can be stored,” says Walsh. “We also provide a very nice user-friendly interface. So many facilities don’t have any kind of asset management or automation, which makes it very difficult to find assets in the tape library. We make it easy with search criteria.”
For facilities that want a turnkey archiving system, the entry-level FlashPack, with FlashNet at its heart, offers all-in-one hardware and software services and comes with 60-terabytes of storage and 12 months of software support and service.
FlashNet is highly scalable, says Walsh. “The majority of our customers who invest at the low end can still use the hardware they’ve invested in to increase the size of the archive,” he says. “That’s the philosophy behind our software. We have customers we one server and 30 or 40 tape drives. But we have other much larger customers, such as NBC, CBS, BBC and WWE, with 12 or 14 servers and a Petabyte of disc archive and 10 tape drives in a clustered, fully automated scenario. The idea behind the cost-effective bundle lets you get into this world relatively simply and then grow without wasting the investment you already made.”
The FlashNet solution, which is ideal for news and sports, also works well with major manufacturers of production and post gear, including Avid, Grass Valley, EVS and VSN. “If you’ve got a facility with ISIS online storage, we would provide an interface from our software to connect with that Avid environment,” says Walsh. “When someone is finished editing a piece, he’ll select that project and send it to the archive, and we provide an interface that does that, totally transparently to the user.” Facilities can set up the system in different ways, to accommodate multiple projects and editors.
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About SGL Broadcast
SGL is a leading provider of content archive and storage management software to multiple business sectors – post production, news, sports and government. With offices in the USA, UK, Germany, Singapore and Australia.
SGL is able to offer global sales and support.
The company was founded in 1991 and now has clients on every continent. With a mature network of hardware and software partners SGL has developed an unrivaled integration program to be able to provide a truly adaptable and flexible video archiving solution. http://sglbroadcast.com
About SHOOT Magazine/SHOOTonline
SHOOT® Magazine and SHOOTonline® are the leading publication and website for commercial and entertainment production & postproduction; edited for agency, movie & studio creative and production executives, executives at commercial and entertainment production/post companies, TV/Online/Mobile networks, brand marketer production executives, independent filmmakers and artisans including directors, cinematographers, editors, colorists, VFX supervisors/artists/animators, composers, sound designers & mixers. Through its “News” and “ScreenWork” sections, “Columns” and in-depth “Features,” SHOOT publishes timely news, relevant information and a behind-the-scenes look at the best new work and profiles/interviews with industry news makers. In addition, SHOOT reports on the latest cinematography, post & editing technology and equipment. If the work involves advertising and entertainment motion picture content that consumers view on a screen—a TV screen, Cinema screen, Computer screen, Mobile screen or Game screen, SHOOT is searching out who’s doing the most innovative work and what’s coming next. For further information please visit www.SHOOTonline.com®
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