Alex Timbs, Head of IT at Animal Logic explained the decision and process. He said that the team checked in over 475Tb of unique assets for ‘Guardians’ to their digital asset management system. From that point an automated process transferred the assets to Fujifilm LTO tape. They also used LTO tape for transferring data and had a library with over 200 slots, working around the clock.

Each asset was locked until it was moved to LTO and then flagged once the procedure was complete. “The process occurred within two days of locking the asset,” said Alex. “The movie’s assets were backed up every day and we keep them for life - in other words ‘incremental forever’. We also used our virtual tape libraries to the capacity of the LTO tapes, which was fast and efficient.”

Animal Logic also used Fujifilm LTO media to archive ‘Guardians’. They used a process developed for their earlier films. Alex said, “The archive was created throughout the production of the movie and we defined the structure so that we could keep the archive forever. This way, the archived assets can be accessed and used to recreate the original movie or as parts of any sequels. We also archived proprietary information and custom tools created during production.”

Alex explained that  media like Fujifilm LTO tapes works well when dealing with large data sets, mainly for its speed. “We also have a mirrored copy of our primary disk storage that ends up on LTO tape. LTO media is portable, widely accepted and cheaper than active storage. Also, we didn’t experience a single tape failure throughout the entire production.” www.FUJIFILM.com.au   www.animallogic.com