IMF holds the promise of a more streamlined workflow for content owners and distributors looking to create and send multiple localised versions. Ateliere Creative Technologies COO, Bill Admans explains how the company has streamlined the possibilities IMF offers adding their own unique AI technology, filing system and intuitive front end to significantly reduce storage costs and speed up processing.
Sponsored by Ateliere
Many media and entertainment professionals still define the content lifecycle as ‘camera to final master.’ In today’s streaming-dominated world, there’s so much more that happens after a master is delivered to get a title successfully to its destination.
That’s where cloud-native media supply chain and content orchestration platforms, like Ateliere Connect from Ateliere Creative Technologies, are playing an increasingly vital role in the ‘new’ media and entertainment workflow.
Platforms like Ateliere Connect pick up right after post-production wraps, managing the digital supply chain from the finished master to distribution and final delivery. Those last steps are growing more complex, challenging, and time-consuming due to the exploding worldwide demand for content.
When a final master is delivered, it’s not uncommon to have 26 or more versions created. Ateliere Content owners have to accommodate for localisation into multiple languages, but many other reasons exist for version edits, such as compliance and censorship. Plus, a studio might need further cuts for different distribution channels such as broadcast, home entertainment, or streaming.
The sheer volume of titles currently in most content catalogues is making it difficult for content owners to manage, deliver, and monetise their content. Versions build up quickly, taking up more and more storage. It’s a condition often referred to as ’versionitis,’ with the cost of repeatedly storing the same frames adding up quickly.
Making a Case for Cloud
Working with a cloud-based supply chain and orchestration platform helps content owners easily manage their libraries using a componentised workflow. Ateliere Connect combines unique IMF and proprietary
Artificial Intelligence technologies to de-duplicate assets and organise files, catalogue all titles, and group different localised versions with related metadata.
The tangible results — storage reductions of often more than 75% and shortened transcode times per title by 35x – can deliver potential annual savings in the millions. Using a cloud-based platform also eliminates the need to invest in physical storage. Content owners can flexibly shift their costs to an operating expenditures (OPEX) model rather than a capital (CAPEX) basis.
Now, a library is ready for maximum content monetisation. When an order is received, the studio knows exactly which version of a title is available. If a requested version is unavailable, they can easily create one with minimal human intervention, manipulation, or expense.
A New Outlook for the Future
Just as the M&E industry has had to re-define and extend the content lifecycle, it’s equally important to continually re-assess the tools we use to manage, distribute and ultimately monetise content.
Modern digital and media asset management requires a holistic approach to tracking and managing the entire media lifecycle. Media management also involves connecting with business process systems to exchange metadata and information and drive true workflow automation.
Content owners need connected workflows that intersect through cloud-based ‘content hubs’ for creating, managing, and distributing content – from concept to consumer.
Ateliere Connect is that content hub, orchestrating workflows from ingesting, asset management, and transcoding to localisation, mastering, and distribution.
Each platform function is extensible via APIs or BPEL and other standardised exchange formats such as XML, JSON, MXF, and IMF. The platform interconnects with all systems and processes, especially those vital to monetisation, such as rights management and finance. Ateliere Connect also facilitates data transfer to other platforms and systems further down the line.
As the industry’s workflow and production requirements evolve, Ateliere is also advancing our place in the content ecosystem, bringing our expertise to every step of the workflow.
Our vision of ‘From the Concept to the Consumer’ is becoming a reality. Ateliere is innovating cloud-native workflows to automate and orchestrate the content lifecycle from the moment of creation to the moment an audience experiences it.
Staff Reporter
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