Press Releases
acmeworks digital film inc. Leverages BlueArc to Accelerate Apple Final Cut Pro & Video Digitization Workflow
The ability to render in real time removes productivity bottlenecks from SD to HD
SAN JOSE, CA - August 7, 2007
BlueArc® Corporation, a market leader in scalable, high performance unified storage, today announced that acmeworks digital film inc. upgraded their film capture, editing, and conforming technology through the deployment of a BlueArc Titan 2000 storage solution. With BlueArc, acmeworks both digitizes video and works on editing projects simultaneously,which was not possible with previous solutions. The Titan's ability to work in parallel without slowdowns in their workflow is saving ACMEworks at least two hours a day, increasing their productivity.
"Our business is experiencing dramatic growth. The old system wasn't keeping things moving fluidly or keeping up with production. We had to stop work during video digitization and could not render in real time," said Jocelyn Goddard, general manager of acmeworks. "With BlueArc we have improve quality without sacrificing productivity, in fact we have seen it accelerate with BlueArc."
acmeworks Digital Film, a Calgary, Canada based company, is a specialized post-production service company dedicated to digital film recording. acmeworks uses ARRILASER film recorders to flawlessly transfer video and digital data to motion picture film. Companies such as Cartoon Network, Warner Bros. Animation, Universal Cartoon Studio, Stretch Films, Curious Pictures,and Walt Disney TV Animation turn to acmeworks to get their jobs done.
For the purpose of developing a film out archive and meeting the needs of future broadcast in high definition, broadcast media depends on acmeworks' digital film recording ability to flawlessly transfer video and data to film after the programs are aired. acmeworks' editors match the SD broadcast master with the high definition files from animation and production studios and deliver a file out in high definition. At the core of their success are Apple Final Cut Pro workstations and a BlueArc Titan 2000 unified network storage system.
With the demanding task of conforming broadcast masters to HD content, acmeworks was also experiencing a slow-down in the frame rate on their Apple Final Cut Pro workstations. By leveraging BlueArc Titan's hardware-based architecture and higher levels of performance, ACMEworks achieved a threefold improvement in frame rate, reducing wait times for the editors. In addition, during the final quality control check, acmeworks discovered that they are now able to render in real time off the centralized Titan storage, rather than batching it overnight, saving valuable time and accelerating the delivery of ACMEworks' projects. These improvements have helped acmeworks improve their own quality, meet and exceed deadlines and work on more projects simultaneously.
"acmeworks is outputting 30 half hour shows per month. Before we were running the BlueArc Titan, we had to bring down our editing suites for at least two hours a day when we were doing video capture or output to video. It forced us to work long hours in the evenings and weekends," said Goddard. "Now we are able to work on both in real time and get more done during the day."
Faced with very complex files and a large amount of data, the acmeworks team is desperate for disk space. With BlueArc, editors now have more disk space which allows them to load projects far in advance and be prepared for potential problems they could have in production much earlier in their workflow.
About BlueArc
BlueArc is the performance, scalability and simplicity leader in world-class network storage systems and software. BlueArc solutions enable customers to accelerate applications, reduce costs and enable infrastructure consolidation through a unique, patented platform architected well beyond today's market offerings. Information about BlueArc solutions and services can be found at
www.bluearc.com.
