The document discusses how new technologies like file-based workflows and cloud computing are revolutionizing media production and distribution by enabling more efficient content management. However, many media companies still struggle to take advantage of these opportunities due to challenges around large file sizes, specialized software, and a lack of integrated platforms. Fully configurable cloud-based media management platforms are emerging that can help companies overcome these barriers by providing end-to-end remote access and automation of workflows from ingest to delivery.

1. The Muddle in
the Middle Series
A Nativ Whitepaper/ www.nativ.tv
Workflow and
Collaboration:
Working smarter, cheaper and faster

2. In the new world of multi-platform TV and film,
harnessing content and cost-effectively managing
its production and delivery offers huge opportunities
for content owners and brands. Whether it is
branded content or feature length films, it has never
been more important to reach new and existing
consumers any place, any time.
Despite this, many media companies have a difficult time exploiting that opportunity. As demand for
high quality content increases so too do the file sizes and the complexity of managing and delivering
it to a myriad of platforms.
Fortunately, new technological advances like file-based workflow and the cloud are revolutionising
the way production, post-production and distribution companies manage, repurpose and deliver
content. Although these advances by no means solve every problem, new platforms are maturing
and stepping up to meet the challenge.
2 A Nativ Whitepaper/ www.nativ.tv

3. What is Workflow Anyway?
In the convergent world of digital production and Internet technologies, workflow is increasingly hyped
but often poorly defined. Workflow is not a new concept and in its most abstract sense simply refers to
a sequence of tasks carried out in a specific order. In terms of video it means the flow of content
through well-known stages - ingest, editing, approval, transcoding, and so on.
Effective workflow orchestration should ensure a sequence of steps is accurately followed to avoid
confusion, remove errors and ensure that critical business processes can be tracked and optimised over
time. In the world of TV and film, a meaningful workflow must seamlessly orchestrate the interactions
between enterprise resources (storage, transcoding, network etc.) and groups of people. One without
the other offers advantages in terms of operational efficiency but tracking people and resources
together is critical to enjoying operational efficiencies, cost-control and ultimately savings.
Laying the Groundwork for File Based Workflow
A couple of long term technical trends have enabled the
emergence of file based workflow in TV and film.
1.
The switch from tape to file – Improvements in video compression, cheaper storage and greater
bandwidth have enabled the transition to multi-platform viewing. Although this transition has been
gradual, these technology advances have revolutionised the TV viewing experience and in recent years
we’ve seen an explosion of cross platform VOD and OTT services. As these same technical advances
mature, they are also offering huge advantages further up the supply chain and disrupting the old ways
of working in production, post-production and distribution.
Despite the hype though, not every element of production and distribution can be switched from tape
to digital file overnight. As file sizes continue to grow, tapes and drives are often the only option for
delivery and long term archiving, so physical media will be around for some time to come. However,
many aspects of the content supply chain are now managed entirely through file-based workflows
and there are options for seamlessly integrating tape-based and file-based workflows until the move
towards tapeless is complete.
2.
The switch from hardware to software – Many tools for manipulating video and audio content that
previously ran on expensive specialist hardware have now been transitioned to more cost-effective
software, which runs on commodity hardware. This has been an important transition as video server
software, which used to be cabled into a company’s specialist infrastructure, can now be run on site
or in offsite datacentres, with support for “service orientated” software integration.
The combination of the switch from tape to file and the emergence of commodity IT over specialist
infrastructure has meant that the world of video management is now open to thousands of software
developers globally. Specialist video functions can now be integrated into wider business systems and
can reside within commodity IT enterprises either offsite or onsite.
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4. Why is File Based It’s a No-brainer, So Why
Workflow So Important? Does it Seem so Hard?
During the time of tape and specialist physical infrastructure, Implementing file-based workflow automation should be
workflow could be mapped by tracking a tape number or by a no brainer, but the “cost-barrier” for entry and the risk of
the sight of people walking between different departments implementation is often extremely high. Integrating workflow and
transferring content on tape and “metadata” on print-outs. In a asset management software into an organization often requires
digital world these workflow steps can be carried out automatically purchasing various specialist software components and then
using software which removes the greater cost of manual labour, paying an integrator to do the work. Such a task can cost 100s
increases throughput and improves time to market. of 1000s of dollars and roll on for months, if not, years. Also
the risk of failure is extremely high as the market moves quickly
A number of factors make file-based workflows more
and standards are not always adhered to. So although many
important than ever:
companies want to benefit from file based workflow automation
Economics – There is less money around, so companies in order to cut costs and handle more scale, the upfront
need to avoid overspend on media management and investment required is often unviable.
workflow. This can only be brought about by replacing
expensive hardware and manual labour with automation
software running on commodity infrastructure.
The Dawn of Cloud: Marketing
Hype or a Brave New World?
Change – The video ecosystem is going through rapid
change. Not only are viewing habits changing but standards
and formats are changing. From file formats and metadata In many ways cloud represents both hype and a brave new world.
to delivery mechanisms and video platforms - being able Although the name seems new the concept relies on a number
to adapt workflows quickly and easily is the key to survival. of technologies that have been quietly evolving and maturing
over a long period:
The holy grail of filed based workflow is a process that is
IaaS and SaaS – Technology shifts in the video domain
automated as much as possible and orchestrates seamlessly
have come at a time where data centre technologies have
between software and people. Tasks that were previously
also advanced rapidly from hardware to virtual infrastructure.
carried out manually, such as file transfer and encoding, should
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Software as a Service
be fully automated and reference content and metadata in
(SaaS) paradigms are springing up everywhere and bring with
tandem to ensure that each workflow step has context and
them interesting opportunities around managing video content
meaning. Once a workflow has been designed it can be run
workflows in the cloud.
and refined completely automatically, thus offering lower
operating cost, reducing the number of people required and Virtualisation technologies – These enable users to deploy
increasing throughput. In the ideal world highly skilled people software to data centres without worrying about physical
work on specialist, creative tasks and everything else is carried location, hardware costs or network technologies. Investment
out by automated software. in an expensive specialist solution is no longer the only option.
When implemented correctly, automated filed-based workflows Elastic computing – These models offer interesting options
lower the cost and complexity of handling greater volumes of to the world of video management. Some workflow elements
content. They increase visibility, lower cost and improve time can be processor intensive and long running but may only occur
to market. They remove spikes in human resource and replace sporadically. So why have lots of expensive hardware hanging
them with scalable software running on commodity hardware. around for that once-a-year spike? Being able to ramp up on
This leaves more money for the creation of great content demand and then immediately ramp down is the way to go. This
rather than the management and delivery of it. Such cost is the real Holy Grail: pay for the automated workflow processing
savings in the area of post production and distribution mean on commodity infrastructure and only when you need it.
content owners can be more agile and benefit from smaller
deal opportunities where previously high post production and
distribution costs prevented them.
4 A Nativ Whitepaper/ www.nativ.tv

5. Cloud and Collaboration: The
Future of Media Management
and Workflow Operations
What’s clear is that at the same time cloud technologies are Using cloud based media management and workflow services
taking off, the world is becoming an increasingly flat place. In a that are accessed through a web browser and reside in the
global marketplace, work often goes to the territory where skills cloud is clearly the way to go and in many circumstances offer
are readily available and it can be done most cheaply. Many a multiplying effect. Where people are involved they can interact
workflows span several organisations – production companies, from anywhere in the world, whether that be Hollywood or
post production houses, freelancers – and because of this, Hyderabad. This offers huge cost savings by removing manual
distance working is now a must. It’s necessary to have a solution labour, automating workflow and scaling to meet demand.
that can in some sense be owned by a single company but Leveraging a workforce that spans different time zones also
accessible by many different people from other organisations offers huge advantages in terms of time to market.
and geographical locations.
A connected world means that people can use the internet to
collaborate in near real time and different people in different
offices can work together using web-based platforms. With
this in mind media management solutions require more than
just asset management and workflow, they need to offer
collaboration – the ability to communicate, share and connect
through a single “hub”.
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6. Making Cloud Work in the
World of TV and Film
With all the benefits offered by software based workflow Billing – Many assume that the cloud means low cost
and cloud computing, why isn’t the entire TV and film supply computing. In fact cloud means you pay for what you use.
chain running in the cloud? Many industries already benefit If you use a lot of network processing and storage, you’ll
from cloud based computing but not so much TV and film. pay a lot of money. Many organisations don’t like nasty
These industries are perhaps furthest behind in capitalising shocks when it comes to billing so favour owning their own
on cloud and there is good reason for this. The reality is that infrastructure rather than the unpredictable cost of cloud.
today this opportunity is hindered by a number of significant
factors that need to be overcome: Collaboration – Few existing video software solutions
support the notion of collaboration through a single hub.
File Size – As one moves up the supply chain from consumer There are plenty of cloud collaboration solutions around
video playback to film and TV production, the files get bigger – but not many are truly video-centric.
in fact enormous. Often the cost and time constraints for moving
media files from local storage into the cloud are so huge that One-size fits all solutions – Some existing cloud media
it makes no business sense at all. Until network connectivity platforms have limitations as they are somewhat hardwired
and costs improve, elements of the supply chain will be out of applications. They offer “one size fits all” solutions that
bounds to cloud services. Also, many media operations that work lack the configuration options to make them truly beneficial
on large files require vast amounts of I/O and local connectivity. for every content owner, large or small. Platform as a
Many commodity cloud services simply can’t offer this amount Service (PaaS) is really in its infancy within the worlds
of throughput within their own infrastructure. of production and distribution.
Software – There are many discrete software components Fortunately, new technologies are removing some of these
(from transcoding and storage to simple editing and shot barriers and opening up opportunities for SaaS-based
logging) in the cloud that offer benefits to video content owners. models in TV and film.
These components, although extremely valuable, are hard to
harness as they represent mere ‘islands’ of functionality that
are hard to reach when considering intergrated workflow and
advanced media management. In addition, to benefit from true
economies of scale when it comes to SaaS licensing models,
video software needs to be inherently multi-tenanted and
support on-boarding of many customers. Many legacy video
software solutions are not cloud-ready and simply installing
them in the cloud results in non-scalable, incoherent solutions.
6 A Nativ Whitepaper/ www.nativ.tv

7. Taking Control: The Need for
a Single Software Platform
Building workflow and MAM systems in house is expensive These aren’t mere “islands of functionality” but sophisticated
and risky. At the same time islands of functionality in the end to end platforms that can be accessed from anywhere,
cloud are often difficult to embrace. Media management and any time. They enable media companies to capitalise on file
workflow platforms, designed from the ground up to live in based workflow automation and enjoy the costs savings of
the cloud, have been developed to overcome these challenges. a more scalable operation.
The answer is a platform that is completely configurable, The customer can effectively start with a blank canvas and
where new applications and processes can be tailored within configure the platform to control access and roles; workflow
a generic platform and offer: design and task allocation; resource access (from transcode
and QC to storage and network protocols); metadata structure
• Integrated remote ingest and delivery and hierarchies; and events and reporting.
• Enterprise asset management
• Social and collaboration features
• Workflow design and orchestration Conclusion
• Content repurposing and distribution
It is clear that advances in technology are offering huge
• Frame-accurate, web-based logging opportunities for content owners, post production companies
• Advanced VoD and OTT packaging and delivery and distributors to lower costs and respond more rapidly.
However attaining these goals is being held back by limited
network connectivity and the lack of mature cloud based
media management. Luckily, in both cases, things are
improving and opportunities to work smarter, quicker and
more cost effectively in the cloud are now emerging.
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8. Contact us to take back
control of your content
t: +44 207 580 9488
e: info@nativ.tv
: @NativLtd
www.nativ.tv