SDVI - Rally Access Workstation
Category Cloud
SDVI’s Rally Access Workstation is a fully managed solution for editing in the cloud with Adobe Premiere Pro. This new addition to the company’s Rally media supply chain management platform enables anywhere, anytime access to hosted edit workstations and content in the cloud, dynamically managing associated infrastructure deployment so that media organizations can scale their edit capacity easily and cost-effectively within an automated media supply chain.
Rally Access Workstation is a significant development for the platform — and for the industry — because it enables tight integration of Adobe Premiere Pro into the media supply chain without incurring data movement in or out of the cloud. While Rally users could already utilize Premiere Pro locally for their supply chain editing, this new capability expands access to industry-leading editing software running in the cloud and makes utilization as simple as starting a work order.
Detailed Description of Product/Technology:
Rally Access Workstation makes it possible to run an instance of Adobe Premiere Pro on a cloud-based virtual workstation with all content (high-resolution and/or proxy) preloaded in the bin, as well as markers on the timeline corresponding to workorder items that need attention, as identified by automated processing upstream in the supply chain. Because content stays in the cloud, users avoid latencies and egress costs commonly associated with on-premises edit workstations.
By implementing Adobe Premiere Pro workstations in the cloud with Rally Access Workstation, Rally users reduce the burden of maintaining and scheduling physical edit suites. Rather than manage numerous costly machines on premises or in remote-work environments, Rally users can quickly connect authorized editors to high-end edit software and the content they need, accessible with their preferred device, via a web browser and internet connection.
With Rally Access Workstation, media organizations can instantly scale up access to address peaks in demand or to free up space in on-premises edit bays for other, more creative work, and scale down just as quickly when those resources are no longer needed. Rather than continually manage infrastructure as needs change and work endlessly to maintain and schedule a fleet of physical edit workstations, media organizations can leave the heavy lifting to Rally.
What technological advancements does this product/technology represent?
Moving manual activity into the cloud, Rally Access Workstation represents the next step in fully migrating supply chains to cloud. Manual edits are an essential part of media supply chains, and Rally Access Workstation brings them to the cloud — along with automated transcoding, QC, and so on — in a fully managed way. Only with Rally Access Workstation can users automatically spin up a licensed Adobe workstation, fill the bin, make edits on the timeline, and hit submit, and the supply chain carries on all in the cloud.
In this edit-in-the-supply-chain model, manual edits are part of a fully managed engagement that integrates human tasks and automated jobs, supported by automatic infrastructure provisioning. Thus, upon starting a workorder, an authorized editor automatically spins up a licensed instance of Adobe Premiere Pro on a cloud-based virtual workstation with all content (high-resolution and/or proxy) preloaded in the bin. Identified by automated processing upstream in the supply chain, markers on the timeline correspond to workorder items that need attention. With all media and metadata ready for immediate work, the editor makes edits on the timeline, hits submit, and the job is complete.
The edit session runs in the cloud and, as with every other step in the Rally-managed supply chain, the infrastructure needed to support that task is composed on the fly to support that activity. This is true for one editor taking on one workorder item, or for hundreds of editors working simultaneously to ensure timely fulfillment of a massive content preparation project. The edit runs in the cloud along with every other step in the supply chain. All these operations are managed on cloud-based composed infrastructure, so media organizations are using only the resources they need, when they need them, in a supply chain that’s optimized from end to end.
What market need does this product answer and how does it meet that need?
By enabling media organizations to move edit tasks to the cloud along with other essential processes, Rally Access Workstation meets the market’s need for greater efficiency in content preparation and delivery.
Media operations departments often deal with a wide range of inputs and outputs, first as they receive content from multiple sources and then as they prepare that content for delivery to an ever-growing universe of destinations. During this process, they can leverage automated transcoding, audio leveling, technical QC, and other tasks on elastic cloud-based infrastructure. But edits to content that’s not quite right have been another matter, remaining a manual, on-premises job.
To use a familiar editing tool, such as Adobe Premiere Pro, to complete edit tasks, an operator typically has to interrupt the supply chain and bring the content (or a proxy of it) to a local workstation. Once the on-premises edit is complete, a new asset can be rendered in the cloud using the EDL, and then the supply chain continues. This hybrid model has been effective, thanks to the integration of time-based metadata into the edit tools via customized panels. But migration of the entire process in the cloud yields dramatic gains in terms of efficiency and scalability that help media organizations be more productive with their existing resources.
With this new feature, Rally allows users to achieve unprecedented flexibility, with personnel taking on edit tasks anywhere and any time, and it harnesses the scalability of cloud resources to supply just the infrastructure to support that work, whatever the scale. Incorporating editing and other key processes into an end-to-end cloud supply chain managed by Rally, the platform’s robust orchestration and smart workorder management help media organizations connect processes and streamline workflows across their operations.
