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Collegiate Sports Media Streamlining Production with Frame.io and Airtable
Company Situation
The company operates within the collegiate sports media production space, supporting multiple university athletic programs. Their team consists of numerous editors and content creators distributed across various university campuses, each working locally with access to university-hosted athletic servers. The operation handles large volumes of video content, including practice footage, B-roll, and finalized episodes, managing content for dozens of users with plans for expansion.
Existing Workflow
Currently, each university team accesses raw content stored on athletic servers or local hard drives. Editors perform cuts locally on their machines for speed and efficiency, then upload finalized video cuts to a cloud-based review platform. This platform is used for collaborative review, feedback, and approval by athletic departments. Approved assets are linked within a project management tool, and automated emails are sent summarizing deliverables with asset links and thumbnails. The process relies heavily on manual steps to connect the review platform with project tracking and delivery tools. Archival footage is stored in the cloud but at a high cost due to recent pricing and service model changes by the review platform provider.
Issues with the Existing Workflow
High Storage Costs: The review platform no longer offers cheaper archival storage, forcing the company to keep all footage in expensive "hot" storage tiers.
Manual Integration: Currently, linking review platform assets to project management tools and triggering delivery emails requires manual effort, which is time-consuming and prone to errors.
Seat Licensing Flexibility: The company faces challenges in scaling user licenses cost-effectively because they must pre-pay for many seats that might not be immediately used.
Content Migration Complexity: They need to migrate archival footage from the review platform to a more cost-efficient long-term cloud storage provider but lack a streamlined, automated method to do this.
Geographically Distributed Editing: Editors work locally on university campuses with direct server access, complicating centralized cloud workflows.
How Shade Would Change Their Workflow
Shade can seamlessly integrate with the company’s existing tools, automating the transfer of review platform assets to project tracking and delivery systems, eliminating manual steps. Shade’s platform supports flexible user seat management, allowing the company to scale licenses according to active needs, thus optimizing costs. Shade also offers automated archival workflows that can connect with long-term storage providers, enabling the company to offload costly “hot” storage to more affordable “cold” storage solutions on a scheduled cadence. Additionally, Shade’s collaboration features, including timeline-based commenting integrated with editing software, would enhance feedback loops and reduce friction in the review and approval process.
Benefits
- Significant reduction in cloud storage costs by automating archival migration to cost-effective storage.
- Streamlined workflows through automation of asset linking and delivery communications.
- Flexible seat licensing to align user access with actual staffing needs, avoiding overpayment.
- Enhanced collaboration with integrated timeline-based feedback within editing software.
- Improved scalability and efficiency across distributed editing teams.
- Reduced manual workload and error potential in content review and delivery processes.
Technologies Used
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