WWe’ve all heard the buzz about Digital Asset Management (DAM)—and some companies are already on the way to realizing a system. But what exactly does it mean? Artesia Technologies, a DAM systems company in Rockville, Md., defines digital asset management as "a set of coordinated technologies and processes that allow the quick and efficient storage, retrieval and reuse of the digital files that are essential to all businesses." But even this definition is not always broad enough.
"The definition is chameleon," points out Michael Schunk, VP/director of strategic planning and business of FilmCore Distribution, Los Angeles and San Francisco, a division of Santa Monica-headquartered Ascent Media Group. "It depends on the person you are talking to and their applications. It’s a huge enabling technology … and it becomes your facility’s infrastructure."
As a result, DAM has become an abused term, sometimes used to describe archiving, other times for shared production. Others believe these applications must combine with others, such as metadata storage and distribution. Companies such as NXN Software, with U.S. headquarters in Venice, Calif., are developing software-based management tools, and manufacturers such as SGI are offering scalable storage options. Large postproduction entities such as Ascent Media and Technicolor Creative Services (with offices in major cities including London, New York and Los Angeles) are developing DAM networks with extensive reach. And companies that began using the Internet and high-speed fiber for review and approvals are starting to use the same infrastructure as the basis for DAM applications.
With so many options, some use the phrase "One size fits none" to describe asset management systems. This brave new world is all about productivity, scalability and return on investment.
Gaining Intelligence
"[Right now] we spend billions of dollars in creation, distribution and media placement," explains Richard Cormier, who is the point person for Ascent Media Group’s Santa Monica-based Media Management Services unit. "But there is no common information system that covers the whole chain from advertisers and media buyers, to production and distribution, even though all of that information already exists—it’s just not centralized and organized.
"It doesn’t make sense to spend those billions without having centralized intelligence so that everyone in the food chain can do a better job," Cormier continues. "The industry has recognized the need for better measurement of what we do, and efficiencies. The most pragmatic way to do this is to get information, organize it, and adapt and react accordingly. That’s why asset management makes sense today. There is pressure on everyone involved to be more efficient."
That’s the goal of an elaborate plan that Cormier is currently developing. He describes it as "high impact, low impact." It is a plan that if carried out would give advertisers far more intelligence, and add efficiencies to the production and distribution process—without disturbing the creative workflow. "That system would also bring to the creative workflow applications that we saw in the past, such as Jazz Media Network. Because the real enabler to those tools is fundamentally an asset management system," relates Cormier, who conceived and founded Jazz in the mid-’90s as a video network for the production industry, designed specifically for real-time collaboration and review and approval of content. It included online support services such as stock footage searches and industry news updates.
"If we look at the food chain and the need to connect all parties, then I believe a DAM system will never be truly deployed in the postproduction environment—it’s too fragmented," Cormier says. "They will eventually participate in ingestion and maybe even metadata processing, but in truth, DAM is closer to distribution than the creative process, even though it will greatly benefit production."
Cormier is in the early stages of assessing how far this vision will extend into Ascent’s existing services from production to approvals to archiving and distribution.
One can see the need for economies when one looks at the vast systems currently in place at Ascent. FilmCore Distribution’s Schunk explains that the distribution unit currently manages commercial content when it comes out of the post houses. "Our task is distribution in whatever format is required for broadcast, cable and radio markets," he says. "Our distribution market is fifteen-hundred television and cable stations, and twelve-hundred radio stations." Material is typically received on Digi Beta, and delivered in Beta SP, Digi Beta, one-inch or digitally.
"We began to create a DAM system managing and repurposing traditional video or audio content within digital formats, primarily MPEG2 for video and MP3 for audio," Schunk explains. These files are sent to a distribution partner or streamed on the Web.
Cormier’s analysis will also include services based on the Internet and high-speed networks, including Ascent’s proprietary Internet-based collaborative and distribution tool Breezeway; and Blade, a proprietary DAM system developed by Ascent in the U.K. That could include a new service that is being beta tested at bicoastal Company 3, which would offer real-time collaborative applications using video over satellite, enabling real-time sessions over distant locations (SHOOT, 5/16, p. 17).
It would also include the FilmCore-developed filmcore.net, a proprietary system for review and approvals over Internet. Schunk explains that the next iteration of the system in development is what he calls Media Tracker, "a brand management tool, meaning that it is used not so much for creative work, but managing finished content. We are also starting to talk to larger clients about ingesting their entire library of masters into digital library," he says.
Thomson
Last month, Paris-headquartered Thomson launched its Technicolor Media Asset Management (MAM) service, offering clients the ability to store, manage, access, process and distribute digital assets globally (SHOOT, 8/15-29, p. 8). The first installations were for longform applications, but the system is scalable and will also be marketed to advertising production clients.
"For the advertising industry, the vision is to offer a central repository that can be accessed by agencies, which will store content and enable it to be reused for creative applications," explains Jean-Luc Moullet, VP/general manger of Technicolor’s Media Asset Management Group, Los Angeles.
Step one is connecting the Technicolor Creative Services companies through a production network.
Step two would be to extend that network to select clients; presently, clients access the system via an Internet gateway. Moullet reported that Technicolor is already talking with some studios about adding access to the production network.
Currently, Technicolor maintains a central Storage Area Network (SAN), used as a repository for project elements, including images, audio tracks and EDLs. A storage and retrieval system, based on IBM DB2 Content Manager middleware and the Ancept Media Server, allows Technicolor to ingest customers’ digital assets, perform searches, preview assets and initiate retrievals for delivery.
Enhanced features allow authorized users, from their desktop, to securely search, manage, view and listen to lower bit-rate proxies and make decisions that require both picture and sound.
Distribution of production assets to Technicolor facilities in North America, Europe and Asia will occur with the Technicolor Production Network (TPN)—an internal, secure, high-speed network currently in the works. So far, Technicolor Creative Services companies in New York, London, Montreal and Los Angeles have been connected.
Technicolor has also developed applications to distribute assets worldwide. Technicolor intends to continue supporting both analog and digital asset formats via physical distribution of traditional videotape or electronic files transmission.
For companies building DAM systems, Moullet encourages open systems, and expects that with continued development, eventually DAM systems from various companies will talk to each other.
Hardware and
Software
Many DAM services will be made up of front-end DAM software, supported by large storage systems.
Among the software vendors are the likes of NXN, whose CEO Gregor vom Scheidt separates DAM into two broad categories: systems focused on storage and retrieval, and systems suitable for production. NXN developed its Alienbrain DAM software with both in mind.
Alienbrain Studio is an out-of-the-box software system that could be used for 2-D and 3-D, for facilities and ad agencies that need to be up and running quickly. NXN’s smallest installation, vom Scheidt says, has only three seats.
Alienbrain VFX is an extremely scaleable system for large facilities (i.e. CG feature production). That is the type of system NXN is providing to Sony Pictures Imageworks, Culver City, Calif. "Storage and retrieval is probably more appropriate for ad agencies," vom Scheidt says, noting that that would include centralizing media and sharing content, review and approvals, version control/tracking, and metadata tracking. He added that that application would move toward rights management.
Why asset management? One reason is productivity gains. "You spend a lot of time searching for content and sharing it. A DAM system is designed to reduce that effort. Our clients are seeing productivity increase an average of fifteen to twenty percent," vom Scheidt says. "Also, facilities are trying to be more responsive to customer requests. [DAM systems] have a more professional infrastructure that can scale up for more business."
SGI
The second part of the equation is the architecture, such as the Mountain View, Calif.-based SGI’s InfiniteStorage system, which is now being rolled out to customers. This scalable storage system supports third-party software developers’ DAM management systems—such as that from Blue Order, Calabasas, Calif.—running on any operating system at a post house or ad agency.
Jim Farney, SGI’s media industry marketing manager, asserts that a successful system will enable sharing, and "make sure everyone is invited to participate."
SGI’s product line includes SGI NAS (Network Attached Storage) 2000, a file served approach that allows complete sharing capabilities using Gigabyte Ethernet connections; although it would support limited bandwidth.
The SGI SAN 2000 and 3000 is a scalable architecture that uses fiber channel connections so users can get the bandwidth they need—even to do 2k in real time, Farney reports. The SAN user could also use NAS connectivity. "Users can start small and scale to the capacity and bandwidth beyond what anyone would require," Farney says. "You could go as high as [storage for] up to nine million features at 2k resolution."
Louise Ledeen, SGI’s director of marketing production, adds that with the SAN, an agency could have direct access to a post house using a wide area network (WAN). SGI also makes accessing media efficient with its Data Migration Facility (DMF) software, which automatically moves media to cheaper storage if it is not frequently accessed. If it is needed, it can still be accessed, just at a slower speed. Ascent’s Encore Hollywood is among the U.S. post houses that were the earliest to install an SGI SAN 3000.
Connectivity
Like Ascent, there are agencies and post houses that are using connectivity capabilities to offer asset management tools through the types of systems originally conceived for review and approvals.
Among them are agencies such as Saatchi & Saatchi and Publicis, which delved into asset management via Beam.TV, a London-based service provider for transporting and storing video over the Web (SHOOT, 8/30/02, p. 1). Beam.TV, a wholly owned subsidiary of The Mill, London and New York, offers review and approval, as well as asset management associated with archiving. The archiving service offers agency employees random access to reels.
BBDO New York, partnered with Artesia and Nevada City, Calif.-based automated media encoding/ delivery firm Telestream to create a custom DAM and workflow automation system (SHOOT, 4/18, p. 19). This service allows BBDO employees—from their desktop—to access, utilize and repurpose material while working collaboratively with co-workers and clients.
GTN, Oak Park, Mich., is starting to connect agency clients to its proprietary system. Essentially, GTN has developed a software front end for its WAMNET (headquartered in Egan, Mich.) high-speed managed network. The features offered by the system include: asset preparation, metadata management, a managed searchable database of linked assets, storage, keyword search, thumbnail viewing for rapid review, various flavors of play out (i.e. QuickTime), 24-hour access to material, the ability to stream or download media, and a secure login.
However, when approaching a subject this vast, there is one aspect that all the execs SHOOT spoke with agree on: They predict that DAM will become a revenue generator for a facility, and some believe it will be key to survival. "My belief is that in another two or three years, [facilities] will have made the transition, or will have a difficult time competing," opines SGI’s Farney, a former post exec at now defunct post house Pacific Video Resources. "[A DAM system offers] a huge competitive advantage. Anyone who is a major competitor will have to move in that direction."
