Media Shuttle

Founded in 1916 and having developed over 800 standards and engineering guidelines, SMPTE is perhaps the ideal organization to create a documentary on the evolution of video technology over the past 100 years. They are currently in the early phases of shooting, mostly in the U.S., Canada and Europe, with months of sorting through historical footage, filming and editing ahead. “This documentary will shine the spotlight on the unsung heroes who are the inventors and perfecters of what is arguably the most important communication tool in the history of the industrial age,” said Producer Randall Dark.

Signiant and Modern VideoFilm, one of L.A.’s top independent post production facilities, today provided new insight into the worldwide file-based workflows that underpin the creation of award-winning feature films and hit television shows. Post production companies of all sizes rely on Signiant’s file transfer software to move their large digital assets quickly and securely between teams distributed around the world, and Modern’s latest work takes the scale and reach of distributed finishing to new levels.

There was nothing “user friendly” about the early Internet. By today’s standards — where most people abandon a website that takes more than three seconds to load — the early Internet moved at a glacial pace. And, it was so technically esoteric, few people aside from computer experts and scientists understood how to use it. FTP, the Internet’s basic protocol for transferring files between systems, was invented in 1971 with its base specifications standardized during the 1980s. Even though FTP is still used today, its speed and user experience betray its legacy protocol status.

Local Hero was established during the dawn of professional digital filmmaking nearly a decade ago, during what Wahlquist called “the RED camera revolution.” The RED was the first all-digital camera appropriate for Hollywood sets, and was responsible for ushering in a new generation of filmmakers. They were smaller, tighter teams with all the skills and technology needed to craft cinema ready feature films, without all the heavy infrastructure of their predecessors.

We’re always curious to see patterns of large file movement among different industries, so a recent surge in sports teams and leagues using our SaaS large file transfer solution, Media Shuttle, definitely caught our attention. Over the past year, teams from the NHL, NFL, NBA and the IRB (International Rugby Board) have purchased Media Shuttle, mainly to send game footage to news stations, but also for internal transfers, documentary filmmaking, and training and scouting purposes.

Software security and User Experience Design are both popular subjects in tech media, but they usually draw different audiences and the important space where they overlap gets far less attention. After all, except for high-profile cyber breaches, software security is not nearly as trendy as “UX”. And thank goodness for the trend. Though we’ve come a long way, this 2007 Dilbert comic still holds some hilarious yet painful truth about how much we still need to improve user experience in regard to security measures.

On Oct 1, 2014, all U.K. broadcasters met a key milestone established through an industry-wide partnership: they were ready to receive digital program content via a single common file delivery format. As a key provider of enabling technology in the industry’s move toward end-to-end file-based workflows, Signiant has been instrumental in the practical implementation of this initiative.

With Valentine’s Day upon us, we’ve been reflecting on our lives and the people we love. We know it’s a bit mushy, but we really do love our customers and wanted to share a few reasons why.

Within Media & Entertainment, those responsible for the technology future of their companies are facing a dilemma. Cloud solutions provide what might be the only answer to escalating data amounts within an increasingly agile industry. But security fears inhibit many from taking advantage of SaaS and other cloud technologies.

Operational policies and procedures are key to the security of any SaaS offering. Signiant operational policies and procedures are established in accordance with industry standards for service organization controls. Connectivity between the production service environment and Signiant business operations is restricted in accordance with least privilege and defense-in-depth principals. Fully independent production and development Media Shuttle environments are also maintained. This blog highlights some of the operational controls in place for production elements of the cloud environment.

When most of us think about television, what immediately comes to mind is the latest show we’re addicted to or perhaps how destructive too much of it can be on the developing brains of our youth. But TV has long played a role at the center of democratic, free speech and social movements across the globe, depending on the level of government control over the medium.

When you are in the midst of the tedious editorial process of a big project, the security of your files as they pass among the various players on your team isn’t something you want to think about. Signiant designed Media Shuttle as a file sharing solution that is especially conducive to the flow of media production and post-production with a technical backend as rigorous as your IT team.