Aiglos here,

I found this rather long article about Media360 and its use in Lord of the Rings…enjoy:

Date: 10/15 07:54 EST

INFORMIX UNVEILS MEDIA360, THE INDUSTRY’S FIRST END-TO-END MEDIA ASSET MANAGEMENT SOLUTION BETA CUSTOMERS AND PARTNERS APPLAUD THE POWER AND Flexibility of Web-Based, Complete Solution

GENEVA, Oct 15, 1999 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ — TELECOM ’99 — Making further strides in helping customers solve their complex business problems, Informix(R) Corporation, the technology leader in enterprise database-powered solutions, today announced Media360(TM), an end-to-end media asset management solution designed to help businesses manage their valuable digital assets throughout the enterprise.

Informix’s Media360 solution addresses the business problems encountered by every organisation that needs to create, store and distribute content. This includes traditional and new media companies, broadcasters, film production, radio, retail, publishing, finance, education, government and brand management organisations.

Weta Weta Ltd., the Southern Hemisphere’s premier visual effects facility, will use Media360 to archive and manage up to 1,500 special effect shots that the company will create during the production of Peter Jackson’s screen adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. Weta has created award-winning special effects for films such as CONTACT and The Frighteners.

After closely evaluating competitive products, the company chose Media360 because it needed an end-to-end system that could handle at least 60 terabytes of model, animation, texture and image data that will be produced over the course of the $260 million, three film project.

“The creation of visual effects for film is a very data intensive process,” said Jon Labrie, Weta‘s chief technical officer. “A shot that passes in a mere 5 to 10 seconds may contain dozens, sometimes hundreds of separate image elements-and each of these elements may be the end result of many other operations. The majority of visual effect shots we will produce for Lord of the Rings will be very complex, and will include computer-generated images that interact with human characters. Weta needed an asset management system that is powerful, flexible, and easily extensible. Media360 is the only solution that met all of those criteria. It’s in a class by itself.”

Approximately 80 Weta artists and 40 production staff will use Media360 to create, manage, and search a library of shots. The Informix system supports complex queries for particular types of shots and images. A key factor in Weta‘s choice was Media360’s object relational capability. Media360’s functionality will accommodate Weta‘s object work model, and allows each department to have a customised view and workflow.

Telecinco Informix has developed a digital multimedia archive with the Spanish TV Company Telecinco that is at the forefront of digital archive technology. Media360 has enabled Telecinco to gain competitive edge by being one of the very first European broadcasters to exploit its digital video assets online.

Telecinco’s archivists and journalists can access video footage and associated operational data with much greater speed and precision, allowing them to use the material more effectively as a result. By deploying this system, Telecinco will also be in the vanguard of companies addressing the needs of future consumer-led video-on-demand services.

“Using this advanced technology, Telecinco has very quickly implemented innovative business processes that allows us to maintain a position at the forefront of European broadcasters,” said Jose Luis Romero, director of Telecinco’s IT division. “Media360 has improved our work processes and provided great savings in both time and money.”

Informix will exhibit Media360 with customer demonstrations throughout the International Broadcasting Conference in the Rai Center, Hall 3, Booth 142.

About Informix Informix Corporation, based in Menlo Park, Calif., provides innovative database solutions that assist the worlds’ major corporations to attain competitive advantage. Informix is widely recognised as the technology leader for corporate computing environments ranging from small workgroups to very large parallel processing applications. Informix’s database server, application development tools, superior customer service, and strong partnerships enable the company to be at the forefront of major information technology solution areas including media and publishing, data warehousing, high performance OLTP, and Web/e-commerce. For more information, contact the sales office nearest you or visit our Web site at www.informix.com.

Thanks to Aiglos for the tip!

For more on Informix and it’s computer capabilities. Read Tehanu’s NZ Exclusive ‘Non-industrial light and magic’.