CASE STUDY

ScreenScene - On the Scene with Facilis Shared Storage

Screen Scene is the biggest and most experienced post facility in Ireland and the UK. Since opening its doors in 1985, it has post produced thousands of hours of television and features for the local and international marketplace. Currently, Screen Scene is working with HBO to post produce a new show called Game of Thrones. This is HBO’s biggest production outside the United States, and is scheduled to debut early 2011.

By 2008, Screen Scene was well established in Ireland’s post production community, but they needed a more efficient post production workflow and felt it was time to bring their storage network to the next level. “We were always efficient, but we constantly look to maximize efficiency, who doesn’t?” explained Chief Engineer of Post Production Greg Tully. “Previously we were using Avid Unity and it was causing too many roadblocks for us. We needed a simple online and shared storage solution to properly grow as a business.”

With growth in mind, Greg and his post production team evaluated Facilis TerraBlock, Editshare and Apple XSan. Screen Scene decided to go with TerraBlock and purchased their first 24 terabyte TerraBlock 24D. Since then, their storage investment has grown to three TerraBlock 24D servers, with a total of 60 terabytes of storage space.

• Founded in 1985 in Dublin, Ireland.
• One of the largest post production facilities in Ireland.
• Focuses on advertisements and television shows; most notably the upcoming series Game of Thrones - for HBO.

“We needed to improve our digital intermediate workflow; once the Facilis TerraBlock was installed, our whole post production process was much sharper,” said Tully. “For the HBO project we began exporting footage directly to the TerraBlock and produced high resolution footage quicker across all our editing teams.” Currently, Screen Scene uses one TerraBlock for offline editing, a separate TerraBlock for graphics work, and yet another for online editing and color grading work. The Dublin facility now boasts almost 50 editing bays, including grading, finishing and sound rooms.

The Scullery, a new video effects area within the facility, recently opened and houses 20 seats for video effects editing. As Screen Scene’s operations continue to expand, the company couldn’t be happier with Facilis TerraBlock as their shared storage solution. “In two years with TerraBlock, our production staff has praised how easy to use the system is, and how quickly it can conduct footage playout. We have had very few issues and their technical support staff has been great to us,” said Tully. “I could see adding more TerraBlock's down the road, our workflow has improved dramatically since installing the first three.”

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