Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/83694
Storage n n n n technology analysis reports and articles, including the "Digital Entertainment" series focus- ing on data storage and the creation, distribution, and reception of entertainment content. Schlatter is the product marketing executive/brand evangelist at G-Technology by Hitachi. He has been with G-Tech since 2005 and has worked to support the unique needs of the entertainment industry while gathering information for next-generation products. Danielson, along with his product team at Digital F/X, won an Emmy for Technical Achieve- ment for the development of the video workstation. Prior to leading NetApp's worldwide mar- keting for the media and entertainment industry, he launched Omneon's broadcast-specific Media Grid storage system, and at Silicon Graphics he developed solutions for more than 100 of the leading editing, compositing, animation, and graphics application companies. Let's jump right in. In the near future, what will the storage requirements be for studios? Coughlin: As the resolution and frame rate of video content increase, the total quantity of content storage as well as network bandwidth needs increase. Also, as multi- camera projects increase due to stereoscopic and even free viewpoint workflows, the to- tal storage and bandwidth requirements will continue to expand. Movie projects can accumulate total con- tent storage of several pet- abytes in size, and this will increase with time. Schlatter: When it comes to storage, larger film studios are really looking for capacity, performance, and sharing. The higher-resolution films produced nowadays are increasing the amount of space needed to store them, and in larger production studios, you have multiple people working on the same project at the same time, which means that being able to collaborate and share these files with one another quickly and easily is extremely important. Smaller studios are more about getting one workstation set up with faster storage that then can be shared to other users. [Apple's] Thunderbolt benefits smaller production studios because it provides quick storage transfer rates using new Apple gear and direct-attached storage. Danielson: The storage demands for media companies are increasing at an unprecedented rate, with the adoption of digital cameras and on-set, file-based workflows and the proliferation of delivery platforms. On the production side, video formats such as 3D stereoscopic and 48-fps shoots are driving up bandwidth and capacity needs, which is why we have focused on increased bandwidth and non-disruptive scalability for our production storage systems. Bandwidth drives productivity by reducing file transfer times and the number of file transfers needed to move content through the workflow or pipeline. On the distribution side, with anywhere, anytime access, the strategy for monetizing older as- sets is becoming clearer. This opportunity, along with the evolution of object stores and the cost reduction for terabytes, is building the case for deeper digitization of library assets. As a result, global distributed content repositories are emerging. With this trend, object store technology will become more important. We will also see continuing interest in the analytics of consumer behavior for the Internet, broadcast media, film content, and other formats. Therefore, storage architectures that accelerate big data analytics will be another focus. 10% MAGNETIC TAPE 21% HARD-DISC DRIVES 20% OPTICAL DISCS 37% 12% FILM recording media in professional video cameras. Percentage of various You mentioned Apple's Thunderbolt high-speed I/O technology. What impact do you foresee this technology having on the industry? Schlatter: Thunderbolt breaks performance bottlenecks and enables laptop expansion by bringing PCI Express (PCIe), the system bus found inside the computer, to the outside. This will allow Thunderbolt-enabled systems, like Mac laptops, iMacs, and Mac minis (and soon, PC August/September 2012 43 o S c r u : e h T e 1 0 2 2 o C g u n i l h A o s s a i c s e t e R p o r t .