Around the world, film and video producers create new programmes for which viability depends increasingly on successful exploitation in multiple territories and languages. Timelines often require programmes to be adapted and dubbed even before a final edit has been produced, involving multiple international dubbing studios and other organisations. The objectives of this project are to design and build a prototype workflow management solution, centred around metadata arising from the development of scripts, and supporting the extensive collaboration that ensues as scripts are adapted and dubbed for multiple foreign languages. The partners in the consortium have worked closely with leading international producers of film/TV entertainment and have identified that today's workflows are highly error prone yet no commercial solution exists currently to support this endeavour.

The POSTMARK Project aims to provide a new generation of network services that combine data transfer, data storage and data processing - all with guaranteed Quality of Service - and matched to the performance requirements of data intensive applications.?? POSTMARK is based on Sohonet, which provides network connectivity to over 200 companies in the media industry and beyond, delivering fixed latency paths within an uncontended non-blocking network, with near real-time provisioning of bandwidth up to 10GBit/sec. ?POSTMARK users can provide their own storage and processing resources into the network, which are then aggregated and delivered to other network users (comparable to domestic solar/wind energy generation contributed back to the National Grid). Doing this at the network services level allows a single and simple access point, encourages closer collaboration between network operators and users, enables new business models, and differentiates POSTMARK from conventional cloud approaches that fail to meet the needs of these industries. ?With POSTMARK enabling more competitive costs and the ability to satisfy combined network / storage / processing requirements quickly and securely, post-production houses will be able to attract a greater variety of work, and focus on developing their creative skills, which are the most saleable aspect of their business - and where they are best placed to innovate in their industry.

Awaiting Public Summary