Editing on the Cloud is here for consumers, coming soon for Pros

[Dan Brockett]

Hi all:

YouTube has introduced cloud editing for consumers YouTube Introduces A Cloud-Based Video Editor - PSFK

I wrote an article that will be in next month's issue of HD Video Pro Magazine on global remote editing workflows. Let's just say that some heavy hitters like AVID are investing heavily in editing over the web and other kinds of really amazing remote workflows. Soon, you may not have to buy a MacPro ever 10 months to stay state of the art for editing. It is coming, it's just a matter of when it actually arrives

Dan Brockett

[Jeff Greer]

What about bandwidth, getting video data to and from the cloud?

Unless you have a very big data pipe, it won't work.

Jeff

[Dan Brockett]

Hi Jeff:

I am not sure about the YouTube product but as far as the pro stuff coming down the pike, you are editing full res, full frame rate video on your AVID system, located in your edit bay or someone elses edit bay. All you will need to edit over the web is a decent high speed connection because you are not moving the full res material over the pipes.

Same with iChat Theater Preview, it just needs to be clear enoughand responsive enough to work with, it doesn't always need to be full on-line resolution to cut a project. What if you off-line edited in real time remotely, then were able to download just the full resolution clips needed for "on-line" overnight? That could be a very viable workflow for short formats like commercials, web and promos. That is the genius of some of these new pro solutions, they can function today with today's high speed lines. Eventually, you will be able to simply edit off of a server that will contain your high resolution video. At some point, the high speed access we have will be large enough to handle up to full resolution uncompressed HD.

If you want to sign up for and can afford Sohonet and use Aspera Software's products, you can access up to 1GB per second editing TODAY! But most people cannot afford and do not have access to those products. But all of this technology will fall in cost, complexity and exclusivity soon.

Dan

[Mark Goldberg]

Originally Posted by Jeff Greer

What about bandwidth, getting video data to and from the cloud?

Unless you have a very big data pipe, it won't work.

Jeff

Looking at my own work in HD, which I edit in Vegas and release in several forms, I see the time coming when even HD results come from Internet sources as opposed to viewer-played discs or local files. Of course that still leaves the job of uploading the source material, but for short programs that won't be too bad. Longer shows or more voluminous shoots will obviously require a down-time upload, something like the rendering we do now.

[Jad Meouchy]

You'll see something pretty interesting in this space in about 9-12months... YouTube's editor is a nice step in the right direction, but they have a lot of catching up to do.

[David Parks]

Originally Posted by Dan Brockett

Hi Jeff:

What if you off-line edited in real time remotely, then were able to download just the full resolution clips needed for "on-line" overnight? That could be a very viable workflow for short formats like commercials, web and promos. ,....... At some point, the high speed access we have will be large enough to handle up to full resolution uncompressed HD.

Dan

Dan,

I have to respectfully disagree with the notion that pro editors will work in a "cloud" approach to remote editing.

In the commercial/corporate space we've been spoiled by editing in on-line quality, I started out on Avid i 1994 and it was a pain, (especially long form) to go from offline to online. Clients wanted to see the final version asap. Now for some time that extra step has been eliminated, I just don't see for the near future ever editing offline quality again. Deadlines are just too tight.

Business class speeds are maxing around 20/Mb/s. I can get 6 Mb/s using 4G on my wireless if I get a strong signal. BTW, Clear is an awesome service. Uncompressed HD!! Holy cow no way for at least a decade or more. Uncompressed is like 900 Mb/s. You would still need to compress into some sort of codec like ProRes or DNXHD which still requires upwards of 220 Mb/s, average at least around 175 Mb/s.

I saw the Avid web-based editing demo, and to me it allowed maybe your clients, a director, a producer, or someone and everyone to collaborate with you remotely on a "commitee" approach to editing.

Arghhh. Like editors need more collaboration!!

[Dan Brockett]

Hi David:

Well, bottom line is that we are both hypothesizing, nobody really knows exactly what the future will bring. But based upon interviews with Apple, AVID, Aspera, Sohonet that I have done over the past few months, there are some very interesting hardware and software solutions and ideas coming the pike and the demand, as always in our industry, is for smaller, cheaper, simpler and faster.

BTW, if you have not used them, Sohonet does not use the public Internet so speed rules about the web do not apply and Aspera Soft products do not use TCP protocol, they have the fasp technology that is very intelligent and amazingly efficient in comparison to TCP. I witnessed some amazing speeds over the Internet, but not using the Internet in the traditional way that we are all used to. So, in a nutshell, the technology is almost there, it is just a matter of how long it will take to trickle down in cost and trickle up in accessibility. That is a question that nobody knows the answer to yet.

I am convinced that the old "buying a new heat generating, bulky Mac Pro tower that is outdated within a few months" paradigm is on its way out, I guess it is just a matter of how long that model will take to die is the question.

Dan

[R Geoff Baker]

Well I'm not sure what technology Sohonet uses, but it still is limited to the technology available ... and even in their own bumpf they only indicated 90 to 100Mb/s -- still far short of what convenient editing of uncompressed would require.

Because stand alone tower computing is also advancing, it is a moving target for cloud computing to gain an edge -- years from now, when networking gains are achieved, so too will local computing have moved forward.

I watch with interest, but I don't share your optimistic enthusiasm.

Cheers,
GB

[Dan Brockett]

That's true, it may take decades for this to become a practicality. But I can see keeping your media assets on your own server and being able to edit proxies remotely on almost anything, iPhone, iPad type devices. We have the tech right now to do that, its just that it is going to take a while to change the direction of the huge ship.

As we recall, remember the days when we were doing offline on old AVIDs with tiny "flickering postage stamp" sized outputs (I am talking about the first AVIDs I played with at a Seybold Seminar at the Beverly Hilton so many years ago) yet still going to the traditional linear on-line bay to finish? In a way, I can see that model possibly coming back. People seem obsessed with mobility these days. Mobile computing is changing the entire computing industry. Not saying that I agree with it or like it, but you can see it in Apple's percentage of business changes over the past three years.

Dan

[R Geoff Baker]

Editing using proxies is certainly a solid workflow for some users -- I routinely edit on my Macbook using Final Cut Express using DV proxies for the HD source files. With matched timecode and the 16x9 flag set, I can work with good representation of the source material and hand over a 'completed' timeline as an FCE project file to the finish editor. The finish editor substitutes the source files for the DV ones, and the timeline is instantly recreated in FCP as a full res project. As I spend most of my time on the road and away from the edit suite, the proxy method suits me just fine.

As you say, this option continues to refine as demand and technology allow.

Cheers,
GB