Sohonet has acquired 5th Kind, a cloud-based video collaboration platform for the film and TV production industry. Over the last decade, 5th Kind has helped thousands of creatives streamline their increasingly complex workflows with a cloud-based asset management and discovery platform that enables key stakeholders to securely collaborate at global scale, across the entire content lifecycle.
Sohonet’s real-time remote collaboration technology and world-class media network combined with 5th Kind’s near-time dailies review functionality and powerful asset workflow platform will provide a secure, integrated and scalable collaborative experience for filmmakers. The pairing will unlock significant opportunities for productions to reduce costs and timelines, especially as more creative workflows centralize assets and workflows in the cloud.
“Content creation today is increasingly global, complex and data intensive,” said Chuck Parker, CEO of Sohonet. “As Sohonet becomes a creative-centric asset hub and workflow management platform, we are focused on connecting industry talent with the tools and resources they need, to the many places that they now work–on set, on-prem facilities, at home, private, public or hybrid cloud infrastructure locations.”
On what changes this will bring to the industry, Parker noted, “With more than 60 production facility partners supporting high-speed on-set communications for over 700 soundstages at premium locations across the globe, we believe we will soon deliver on the much-discussed efficiency and effectiveness of cloud-first workflows by enabling the near-time upload of original camera files (OCF) from the production’s video village directly to the cloud.”
Parker added, “Productions will no longer be required to spend time and energy on a bifurcated workflow where proxies created on set for editorial and full resolution video assets are sent to the post partner via hard drives. By delivering the OCF directly into public, private or hybrid cloud repositories, productions can choose to anchor their postproduction workflows in the cloud. This allows their postproduction partners and creatives from around the world to collaborate quickly and cost effectively.”
“Real-time collaboration between often geographically dispersed creative teams is a critical success factor for driving efficiency and generating commercial returns,” said Joe Zaller, founder of Devoncroft Partners, a market research and strategic consulting firm in the M&E Industry. “So, it makes sense that Sohonet would seek to expand its services by adding 5th Kind to its portfolio.”
Parker concluded, “As we integrate 5th Kind capabilities more deeply into Sohonet, we are excited and energized about the opportunity to provide our connected storytellers the power of asset search, identification and workflow orchestration as they navigate and mitigate the complexity of today’s content creation workflows.”
Rom-Com Mainstay Hugh Grant Shifts To The Dark Side and He’s Never Been Happier
After some difficulties connecting to a Zoom, Hugh Grant eventually opts to just phone instead.
"Sorry about that," he apologizes. "Tech hell." Grant is no lover of technology. Smart phones, for example, he calls the "devil's tinderbox."
"I think they're killing us. I hate them," he says. "I go on long holidays from them, three or four days at at time. Marvelous."
Hell, and our proximity to it, is a not unrelated topic to Grant's new film, "Heretic." In it, two young Mormon missionaries (Chloe East, Sophie Thatcher) come knocking on a door they'll soon regret visiting. They're welcomed in by Mr. Reed (Grant), an initially charming man who tests their faith in theological debate, and then, in much worse things.
After decades in romantic comedies, Grant has spent the last few years playing narcissists, weirdos and murders, often to the greatest acclaim of his career. But in "Heretic," a horror thriller from A24, Grant's turn to the dark side reaches a new extreme. The actor who once charmingly stammered in "Four Weddings and a Funeral" and who danced to the Pointer Sisters in "Love Actually" is now doing heinous things to young people in a basement.
"It was a challenge," Grant says. "I think human beings need challenges. It makes your beer taste better in the evening if you've climbed a mountain. He was just so wonderfully (expletive)-up."
"Heretic," which opens in theaters Friday, is directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, co-writers of "A Quiet Place." In Grant's hands, Mr. Reed is a divinely good baddie — a scholarly creep whose wry monologues pull from a wide range of references, including, fittingly, Radiohead's "Creep."
In an interview, Grant spoke about these and other facets of his character, his journey... Read More