FilmLight streamlines media streaming and indexing with Nara

The developer of the Baselight staging system, FilmLight, will show at NAB 2024 its new Nara tool that provides instant access to media from anywhere in the world, streamlining workflows, collaboration and review processes.

The core of Nara is its ability to decode and play natively a wide selection of media no need to transcode to proxy files. Its streaming engine minimizes bandwidth usage, while its advanced indexing system ensures fast data recovery.

Among his main features They include: a web user interface, which reflects the security protocols of the facilities; transmission with color precision; a complete back-end index; and unprecedented codec support (including RAW camera formats, intermediate formats such as EXR, as well as IMF, DCP and other complex deliverables).

Sam Lempp, head of business development at Nara, emphasizes that this new solution "truly connects creative teams. From editors, colorists, visual effects artists, cinematographers and directors to clients and marketing directors, Nara accelerates and simplifies collaboration tasks, such as progress reviews, approval and compliance processes, allowing creatives to focus on what they do best."

Managing accessibility to multimedia files is a constant challenge for facilities, which must guarantee the content security and, at the same time, facilitate efficient workflows. Nara offers a controlled access to media files through a web browser that allows you to browse a wide range of image assets with maximum security. Each file is presented with a thumbnail and associated metadata for quick and informed access.

Nara too solves decoding and preview problems of assets. Files encoded with proprietary or high-bitrate codecs are typically not compatible with conventional media players or file browsers, and raw or uncompressed formats require high-performance computing resources to play. Nara's web-based media streaming offers color-accurate playback and HDR capability for large file volumes, allowing users to stream media directly to their browsers.

Without an efficient indexing system, browsing storage takes a long time and makes it difficult to locate specific files quickly and efficiently. The Nara Mean Index provides media-specific metadata for quick search and access. Users can quickly search by metadata - such as timecode, target, codec, color space, encoding, resolution - and very quickly browse a selection of thumbnails. The sophisticated index also allows users to accurately view, copy and share metadata information with other team members, facilitating workflow and review processes on and off-site.

Darren Woolfson, technical director of Molinare Creative Group, the London-based post-producer who participated in Nara's beta phases, comments that "the secure environment our media is in can present difficulties for other team members trying to view, check and listen to content. Identifying the correct asset can also be time-consuming and finding a player that plays the asset's codec, converted to the correct display color space, can be difficult."

"Nara's background indexing, along with its familiar user interface, allows us to find content quickly. We can simply browse directories or create advanced searches based on media metadata. Once found, virtually any file format can be safely displayed in the correct color space from a web browser almost immediately," he adds.

Nara can be deployed in a storage network installations in the data center or in the cloud. It is fully scalable and can be installed on the client or delivered as a complete turnkey solution.

“Many solutions today require multiple product solutions, with various subscriptions, hardware requirements and integration periods,” concludes Lempp. "Nara streamlines this offering, facilitating its integration and simplifying its management. And it is accessible to everyone, not just Baselight customers."