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Avid Powers Workflows with the Cloud AT NAB2017, AVID ANNOUNCED a strategic alliance agreement with Microsoft Corp. to cooperatively develop and market cloud-based solutions and cloud services aimed at the media and entertainment industry. As part of the agreement, Avid has chosen Microsoft Azure as its preferred cloud hosting platform, and will develop and launch a range of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) offerings powered by the Avid MediaCentral Platform. The foundation of the alliance is a comprehensive, multi-year strategic agreement in which both companies will make significant mutual commitments and investments in technology, product development and go-to-market efforts. Under the technology and product development cooperation elements of the agreement, to support Avid’s product development efforts and investments, Microsoft will invest additional resources and funding to help accelerate time-to-market for targeted cloud-based solutions and specific Azure-based cloud services for the media and entertainment industry. As part of the commercial cooperation, Avid will offer Microsoft Azure hosting and media services exclusively as an integral part of its own portfolio of cloudbased solutions and cloud services. In addition, the companies will work in close cooperation on the overall go-to-market approach, which will help clients migrate to the cloud easily and more cost-effectively, and allow them to work with both companies seamlessly.
SD to 4K Interface Avid also announced the availability of Avid Artist | DNxIQ, a new hardware interface that delivers extensive format support, from SD to 4K.
The alliance between the companies is expected to deliver a continuous stream of hosting and services offerings over the next 18 months, with the first wave of offerings slated for a phased release during the second half of 2017.
Built in partnership with Blackmagic Design, Avid Artist | DNxIQ is compatible with any Avid Artist Suite solution and many third-party creative tools — including Blackmagic DaVinci Resolve, Apple Final Cut Pro X, Adobe Premiere Pro CC, and more.
MediaCentral
Avid Artist | DNxIQ’s Universal Mastering feature complements Avid’s Media Composer | Symphony Option, providing real-time format and frame-rate conversion on output and playback. The new interface supports SD, HD, 2K, UHD and 4K ingest, monitoring and output. As well as supporting all major NLEs, it also supports Thunderbolt 3 and PCIe for Mac and PC. The new Avid Artist | DNxIQ video interface is available now.
Core Components of Avid MediaCentral in the Cloud include: • Hosted Applications – With cloud-enabled Avid client applications, software can be licensed to run on premises, in a private cloud data center, and in the public cloud for deployment flexibility and increased utilization. • Avid MediaCentral | Cloud UX – This new web-based application offers a completely redesigned and highly responsive user experience for the MediaCentral Platform, making it super-fast and intuitive for anyone to search, browse, access, edit, collaborate, and publish content from any workstation, laptop, or mobile device. • Cloud-enabled Media Suite – Avid Media Suite applications, including Interplay | Production, Interplay | MAM, iNEWS, and Social Media Hub, as well as Maestro and 4Designer, are being cloud-enabled with license options to run on-premises, in a private data center, and in the public cloud. • Cloud Media Services – To give MediaCentral Platform users even greater efficiency, Avid is introducing new media services, including: • Unified Avid Dialogue Search service uses exclusive phonetic indexing technology to enable keyword searches that span diverse libraries of content. • Avid Illuminate automatically verifies captions, video description, and languages in content for fast and accurate broadcast compliance and quality assurance.
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Avid MediaCentral Platform is currently available for certain cloud-based deployments, with further solutions to broaden and simplify cloud deployments coming in late 2017.
Azure provides flexible deployment options between public-cloud, privatecloud or on-premise datacenter.
Avid announced new cloud innovations for the Avid MediaCentral Platform and its suite of tools and workflow solutions. The Avid MediaCentral Platform is now cloud-enabled, and can be deployed on premises, in a private data center, or the public cloud, providing users with the ability to create, distribute, and manage content more efficiently and profitably using one common platform. The move also enables several of the company’s comprehensive set of creative tools and workflow solutions to be deployed in the cloud along with the Avid MediaCentral Platform.
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Enterprise Agreements with flexible Enterprise Licensing, enabling media organizations to enjoy economies of scale by aggregating spend across departments and sites.
• Infrastructure on Demand – The new MediaCentral Infrastructure Management Layer enables organizations to scale resources, add new capabilities, and optimise their storage, computing power, and bandwidth across their entire enterprise. • Cloud-enabled Connectivity Toolkit – With its open architecture and Connectivity Toolkit APIs, MediaCentral makes it easy to connect thirdparty Alliance Partner tools, technologies, and services to the platform to streamline workflows. • Flexible Licensing Options – For greater business agility, Avid is now offering
Pro Tools The forthcoming release of the Avid Pro Tools digital audio workstation will feature a comprehensive suite of Dolby Atmos workflows to enable audio post professionals to work more fluidly in the multi-channel and object-based audio format. New features will include built-in Dolby Atmos panning, deep Avid pro mixing control surface integration, advanced automation with the Dolby Rendering and Mastering Unit (RMU), and more. Pro Tools enhancements include support for Dolby Atmos 7.1.2 audio stems with built-in fold-down logic. There is also on-the-fly switching and automation between surround and object outputs. Pro Tools also synchronises audio and automation punches between input and playback modes in conjunction with the Dolby RMU. And, support for ADM BWAV files, containing object metadata, makes remixing more efficient and economical for repurposing content. Pro Tools with native Dolby Atmos mixing will be available in Q2 2017. Avid Pro Tools is now qualified on Avid NEXIS media storage environment, enabling audio creative teams to can share projects on a centralised pool of media storage. Major new features in the upcoming version of Avid NEXIS include: • High-performance storage groups, with each media pack capable of data rates up to 50% faster at 600MB/s, providing the performance needed for high-volume 4K/UHD, HD, and bandwidth-intensive media workflows. • Capacity to play back over 215 streams of DNxHR-encoded 4K media at high quality, or almost 1,400 streams of DNxHR-encoded 4K media at standard quality. • Scalability enhancements that double the capacity of Avid NEXIS | Enterprise systems to support up to 48 media packs across a single scale-out networked system. Customers can mix and match a combination of Avid NEXIS | E5, E4, and/or E2 engines, providing nearly 3PB of storage capacity and 28GB/s of high-performance bandwidth. The Pro Tools software version, which adds optimised workflows for Avid NEXIS, will be available late Q2. The new version of Avid NEXIS is available in Q2. Visit www.avid.com