Elemental Technologies Blog

Show Report: Video Processing Critical to Digital Asset Management

Dan — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 22:16:22 +0000

Greetings from Los Angeles, where the inaugural west coast DAM show kicked of yesterday at the Hilton Universal. This is the first time Elemental has participated in a conference like this. Now, why would we exhibit at a niche event more related to storage than encoding? Actually, this is an extremely interesting event for Elemental. Here’s why.

Digital asset management (DAM), in a sentence, is the capture, management and enabling of rich content. Rich content comprises video types, still imagery and compound documents, such as PowerPoint. Video types are now the largest segment of rich content under management today.

A major component of DAM is how a user processes video assets for distribution to multiple devices, and manages and tracks these assets no matter where they may end up.

Createasphere, started as HD Expo in 2001, is the organization that puts on the DAM shows (there will also be one in New York in September). The Createasphere team has done a great job and attendance has surpassed expectations. I think this is indicative of the growing need to manage digital assets, including the distribution and management of video content. This is where Elemental fits into what I refer to as the video supply chain.

The attendees I spoke with confirmed this. At some point, anybody with video has to prepare assets for distribution to multiple points, including post-production, archive infrastructure, broadcast, mobile devices and the Internet. Now, I was under the impression that this event would be attended primarily by broadcasters and content producers, but to my surprise, most of the folks I spoke with today were other companies dealing with tracking video assets and trying to monetize this content while developing strategies to reach more viewers. Providing access to content via IPTV and mobile TV distribution is pivotal to these strategies.

An example of a company with this kind of requirement is Herbalife. Herbalife produces hundreds of hours of video consisting of sales training courses, product overviews and company updates. The company wants to develop a video supply chain that makes this content available to any employee, contractor or affiliate business – anytime, anywhere. Herbalife would also like the option to stream video in certain cases, such as the "CEO's Weekly Address." Sounds like a need that could be met with Elemental’s GPU-based transcoding horsepower.

I also spoke with post-production houses, content delivery networks and studios that are trying to understand how best to monetize assets. It was interesting to note that the creation of multiple video outputs, in particular for adaptive bit rate streaming, is a huge value add for the customers of all key players in the video supply chain. Elemental's products support the creation of mutliple formats and mulitple bit rates better than any other solutions available today.

So, after day one of this new show, we’ve met some really cool companies and obtained promising contacts from a market segment that I honestly did not expect to meet. From my perspective, with so many opportunities, the challenge is identifying where Elemental best fits in the video supply chain.

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Vancouver Olympics Streaming Brings New Meaning to Live Event Viewing

Greg — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 23:23:58 +0000

It's been a long, but worthwhile, wait since the last Olympic Winter Games.
I think this year is especially exciting due to how far we've come technologically in just the last four years, let alone since I was a kid.

I remember bending rabbit ears on my 7" TV, picking up a fuzzy CTV Broadcast of the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary. Being a young hockey player and skier, I was addicted to the Winter Olympics from that moment on, and I've watched every Olympics since.

The evolution of media delivery and consumption over that period is really remarkable, and the Vancouver games will bring more options than ever for tuning in. In the US, NBC has gone to an all-HD production for the first time. They will be broadcasting 835 hours of content on their network. In addition, they will be live streaming about half of that over the Internet, and providing video-on-demand replays of over 1,000 hours of events. NBC is teaming up with Microsoft to present the online streams using Smooth Streaming technology and Silverlight players, which presents an amazing step forward in video quality.

Smooth Streaming dramatically improves the user's experience of watching a live event online. Instead of the dreaded "Buffering..." message that video players might show right before the photo-finish of the 1000m speed skating race, Smooth Streaming allows the player to switch to a lower bit rate video stream when there isn't enough bandwidth available to keep up with the live event.

The user experience of live video on the web is finally reaching the reliability and quality of Broadcast TV, but at a heavy cost to the content producer; every one of those 1,000 hours of content must be encoded at six different bitrates as they are ingested. The current solution for scaling up to events this large is to add more servers, however this is only an option for high-profile events like the Olympics.

Elemental is changing the economics of adaptive bit rate streaming by packing more encoding density in a single server leveraging GPUs to do the heavy lifting. By supporting Microsoft Smooth Streaming (and other adaptive bit rate technologies from Adobe and Apple) in a single unit, our products empower content owners to give their users the same experience that NBC and their partners will be providing us from Vancouver.

As good as the user experience will be watching the Games streamed on the web this year, there is nothing quite like being there live. While I'll be watching the opening ceremony tonight from home, Elemental headquarters happens to be just a short trip up I-5 to Vancouver, so I will be unplugging from the Internet to go cheer on Team USA. See you in Vancouver!

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Announcing Elemental Accelerator 2.2 for Mac

Lisa — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 16:12:22 +0000

Today, Elemental announced the release of Elemental Accelerator 2.2 for Mac, a major update to its GPU-accelerated video processing plug-in for Adobe® Premiere® Pro CS4. With release 2.2, Elemental Accelerator provides CS4 users on the Mac significantly faster transcode speeds through support for GPU-accelerated H.264 and MPEG-2 video decoding, processing and encoding. This release offers the same easy integration with Adobe Premiere® Pro® CS4 as Elemental Accelerator for Windows, while offering 2X-4X performance improvements and time savings over CPU-only encoding solutions.

What's new?

New features available in this release include:

GPU-accelerated decode – Speed end-to-end video processing with GPU-accelerated H.264 and MPEG-2 video decode.
Effects rendering and conversion – Accelerate common video effects and transitions as well as linear scaling and frame rate conversion.
Additional output options – Render and encode H.264 video for Blu-ray disc, Adobe Flash, and portable media players or render and encode MPEG-2 video for DVD and digital broadcast.
Enhanced preset options – Choose from an expanded suite of preconfigured H.264 and MPEG-2 settings to create output for Blu-ray, DVD or web-targeted media.
Multi-GPU support – Divide the workload among multiple GPUs in a single system for an even more dramatic increase in encoding speed.

For more information, check out the Elemental Accelerator product tour video, which shows you how the plug-in works and takes you inside Adobe Premiere Pro to explore the many ways Elemental Accelerator can help you work better and faster!

How do I get it?

Elemental Accelerator for Mac works exclusively with the NVIDIA Quadro FX 4800 for Mac on the Mac Pro platform. It is available through NVIDIA distribution channels and directly from the NVIDIA plug-in store.

If you would like to try before you buy, visit either the Elemental or NVIDIA website to download the trial version of the product.

How do I upgrade?

Release 2.2 is available as a free upgrade to existing customers. Simply visit the updates site and download the latest product package.

Enjoy the improvements available in this new release! As always, we're interested in any ideas or questions you have; you can get in touch with us directly through our forum or by email.

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Top 5 Places for Entrepreneurial Insights

Sam — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 18:43:57 +0000

Recently, I was interviewed by the Oregon Entrepreneurs Network (OEN) for a member spotlight and it got me thinking about how important shared resources are to new ventures. Elemental’s co-founders and I know firsthand how challenging it is to turn an idea for a business into a legitimate company -- not to mention delivering on the commitment of a high ROI for our stakeholders.

Luckily, Portland has some great resources for new firms. Along with the OEN, the Software Association of Oregon has networking events and valuable services for member companies. Then there are other local startups that have built impressive businesses, including Jive Software, Tripwire, and Kryptiq. Many of the executives at these success stories are active in the community and always willing to share their stories and experiences with new companies.

In the hopes that Elemental has something to contribute to the dialog, I thought it would be worthwhile to jot down the places I've gone for advice, wisdom, and inspiration. Perhaps these resources will be useful for others.

Blogs

Redfin’s corporate blog gives an interesting perspective inside the life of a thriving real estate startup. Glenn Kelman, the firm's CEO, has a heck of a lot of fascinating insights on what it takes to build a disruptive company.

Brightcove alumni Adam Berrey shares his experiences as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence in his new blog, "Startup Blender"; this is a great place for advice that cuts to the chase.

Web Sites

Entrepreneurship.org is a portal from the non-profit Kauffman Foundation with a great resource center and forum for entrepreneurs. (Bonus: here's an interesting recent report from Kauffman on the role of startups in job creation.)

Startupjournal.com is a comprehensive guide with information on topics such as financing and PR tools from the experts at The Wall Street Journal.

Connections

Some of the best advice I receive is from peers, colleagues and mentors. Going to events has proven a critical way for me to get connected in the business community. In our neck of the woods, the Oregon Entrepreneurs Network (and it's sister funding organization, the Oregon Angel Fund) has a diverse membership base and organizes numerous events that help foster these relationships.

Involvement

There are lots of cool ways to be part of your local startup community, whether virtual or local. Portland Incubator Experiment (a.k.a. PIE) is an interesting new project that’s the brainchild of techies and creatives (including Sillicon Florist and Weiden + Kennedy) striving to advance startup innovation and promote community. There's also NedSpace, which continues to expand at a rapid clip, and the Portland State Business Accelerator.

For technology startups, the Software Association of Oregon and Sillicon Valley Association of Startup Entrepreneurs are other organizations to consider joining and supporting. Elemental is also a proud member of Entrepreneur's Foundation of the Northwest, which supports important non-profit work.

School of Hard Knocks

I've got an honorary degree from this fine institution. One of the beautiful aspects of starting a company is that you get knocked down a lot. The successful startups are the ones comprised of founders who keep getting back up.

So those are mine. What are your favorite places for information and insights? Please leave a comment, I’d love to hear thoughts from others.

And by all means, if you find our blog to be a useful resource, subscribe to our feed or receive posts by email. You can sign up at the top left side of this page.

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New Year's Resolution: Output Video for Clients Faster

Julie — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 20:47:50 +0000

It's that time of year when we dust off our pile of good intentions and decide how this year will be radically different and dramatically more productive! Well, according to one video editor in Virginia, those don't have to be hyperbolic statements if you follow five easy steps to boost your system. With some essential upgrades to your hardware (and software), you can actually see some of the drama everyone is talking about with Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects, such as video encoding that takes two hours instead of ten and ensures you can actually meet the rush deadline that just came up.

Won Novalis' article, "Essential Ugrades to Boost Your System," for the After Effects user site ae.tutsplus.com presents an incredibly useful upgrade guide to start the year off right. Won breaks it down into five steps complete with supporting graphics and videos, including:

1. Get a Bigger Desk (Memory)

2. Get Lighting That's Easy on the Eyes (Monitor)

3. Hire a Video Specialist With Her Own Office (Video Card)

4. Get More Storage Space (Hard drives)

5. Get a Presentation Room to Review Your Work (I/O Card)

In step three, Won highlights Quadro FX graphics cards from NVIDIA and their diverse uses from high resolution effects to accelerated playback of Flash and H.264 video. We were excited to hear his description of the added benefits of NVIDIA's Quadro FX cards carrying Elemental Accelerator, which Won said, "boasts the ability to utilize the Quadro to dramatically boost your After Effects or Premiere Pro render times." Read the whole article to learn more.

Won told us more about his personal experience using Elemental Accelerator during his daily work as a post-production editor at Adandon Films. Straight from the author's keyboard:

"I don't like slow renders and I don't like spending money on hardware that never gets fully utilized, yet when it comes to production, it is unfortunate that our video cards often sit untapped of their true potential by a majority of the software we use daily. It is a major deficiency. In the short time I've gotten to use Elemental Accelerator I've been extremely impressed with what the software can do to leverage the Nvidia Quadro Card and Adobe's CS4 Production Suite along with it, especially if you are trying to get every last ounce of performance out of your workstation. It is great to see software that takes great strides to remedy the deficiency by leveraging your video card and increasing the value of your hardware investment. I look forward to seeing a lot more from Elemental Technologies and a lot less render time."

If you have yet to try Elemental Accelerator with After Effects as Won suggests, check out our application note and start cranking out content!

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Elemental Continues Growth by Adding Sales Rock Star

Julie — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 17:48:52 +0000

Today, we're excited to announce a recent addition to our executive team: sales and software veteran Daniel Marshall. As our new VP of Sales, Dan will spearhead development of a global sales team and worldwide sales strategy to drive adoption of Elemental’s enterprise-class video encoding products. After 25 years in the trenches of the enterprise storage, media and broadcast industries, Dan has had an influence on every part of the sales cycle. Learn more about his past successes in the news release. Dan has built a legion of relationships in the video industry in boardrooms, trade show floors and cocktail lounges around the world. Oh, the stories he could tell...

When he's not racking up frequent flyer miles like George Clooney in Up in the Air, Dan calls San Jose home (where he also houses his collection of rare comic books and vintage guitars). An accomplished guitarist, over the past 30 years Dan has played everything from folk to heavy metal in music venues around the Bay Area and with such legendary bands as Silk and Steel and Yellow Hurl.

With so much going on in San Jose, what drew Dan to Portland-based Elemental? "I was instantly attracted to key qualities ever-present at Elemental: the company is quite progressive, scary intelligent and most of all, high-energy. Elemental has the same core ingredients as any successful Silicon Valley start-up – great people and great technology," Dan said. We're glad to hear it and to have Dan on board to hit the ground running in 2010.

Be sure to follow us @elementaltech to keep up with Dan and Elemental.

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Smarter Server: Moving from Man-hours to Computer-minutes

Julie — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 01:08:03 +0000

What will it take to create a video processing system that maximizes content output and minimizes management input?

Producing a "smarter server" will take a lot of time and effort, but the seeds of innovation are clearly in the market today. While an industry roadmap is not yet established, Elemental CEO Sam Blackman weighs in on the development potential for a smarter server. Here's an excerpt from the Streaming Media article:

"High-level approaches have already been implemented to improve the media processing workflow. Platform players have long been devoting resources to improve this pipeline. Complete solutions like these often focus on the overall high-level management layer, but this isn’t necessarily the best way to solve the problem for the rest of us. Other approaches for keeping up with the rising demands for online content have created a niche of prohibitively expensive systems that are only applicable to a small group of very large media properties.

A better overall solution is to make the individual components of the system smarter, not just develop a more intelligent overall architecture. In turn, these individual components will be useful to a wider range of content creators, providing them with necessary workflow improvements.

Elements of smarter servers are already appearing, including features like load balancing and grid encoding. But we still aren’t using these encode systems to their full potential. Instead, we remain focused on tailoring system design to match human workflows; the resulting solutions are dependent on manual intervention at far too many stages. Fundamentally, next-generation systems should focus on reducing human touch and increasing system autonomy."

Read the whole piece, "Industry Perspectives: Building a Smarter Server" at StreamingMedia.com.

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Beet.TV Interview: Sam Blackman on how online video is the new black

Julie — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 18:19:31 +0000

Last month at the NewTeeVee conference, Beet.TV spoke with Sam Blackman, Elemental's CEO about the launch of Elemental Server, a new appliance for transcoding HD (and SD) video at "faster-than-real-time" rates and market implications for online video technology and products attempting to satiate the demand for video.

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Elemental Accelerator 2.2.1 Now Available

Lisa — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 20:55:18 +0000

Elemental is pleased to announce the release of Elemental Accelerator 2.2.1 for Windows, an important update to its GPU-accelerated video processing plug-in for Adobe® Premiere® Pro CS4. Release 2.2.1 contains bug fixes and updates as well as performance improvements that every Elemental Accelerator user will find essential.

For those who have not yet purchased Elemental Accelerator but who own a qualified NVIDIA Quadro FX card, a trial version of Elemental Accelerator is now available. You can download the trial version from either the Elemental or NVIDIA website and immediately test drive the performance gains available with GPU-accelerated video encoding.

If you are an existing Elemental Accelerator customer, be sure and visit the Elemental updates site to download and install release 2.2.1. Customers installing from a CD or web package for the first time can elect to update immediately after an initial install.

For users who already own Elemental Accelerator, you can easily upgrade to the newest version:

1.    Launch Adobe Premiere Pro CS4
2.    Navigate to the Export Settings dialog box
3.    Select the More Info tab
4.    Press the Check for updates button

This will automatically direct you to the Elemental Accelerator updates site.

Elemental Accelerator is made exclusively for NVIDIA Quadro GPUs. On the desktop, Elemental Accelerator works with the Quadro CX as well as the Quadro FX 5800, 4800, 3800, 3700 and 1800. On mobile platforms, Elemental Accelerator works with the Quadro FX 3800M, 2800M, 1800M, 3700M and 2700M. Elemental Accelerator is available for purchase as a standalone package from NVIDIA’s Adobe plug-in store or bundled with supported Quadro FX graphics cards from a variety of resellers.

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The Future of TV Predicted at NewTeeVee Live Conference? Maybe.

Sam — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 09:19:31 +0000

Today should be an interesting day in San Francisco. I've been looking forward to NewTeeVee Live conference for a couple months now. I'll admit this is somewhat due to the fact that Elemental is featured as one of ten of GigaOM's "favorite startups," but also because the conference has a terrific lineup. The startups invited were asked to talk about what they think is the "Next Big Thing"; there should be some interesting responses! Elemental is the first company to present, and I'm very curious to hear what the following companies (including some of the most exciting companies in the space like Boxee, Ooyala and Inlet) predict.

Beyond the "Next Big Thing" portion, the schedule features a buffet of intriguing conversations with new media thought leaders and companies. I've been especially looking forward to hearing more about:

what Quincy Smith (CBS Interactive) foresees as the big picture for getting traditional media online,
what Hunter Walk (YouTube) predicts about building market space in uncharted waters (something we're very familiar with at Elemental),
what Andy Mitchell (CNN) and Randi Zuckerberg (Facebook) have to say about the potential for merging the viral phenomena of online communities and online video.

GigaOM says the theme of the day will be TV Everywhere, the proposed authentication system around subscriber online access to premium TV content. This program has been percolating over the last year, including Comcast and Time Warner's pairing to pilot a test program over the past few months. The three-screen experience (TV, PC, mobile) definitely seems like a "next big thing" that's already becoming mainstream, at least according to the incoming customer requests for mobile device support. There should be a lot to learn today about TV Everywhere's prospects and limitations. Knowing GigaOM, there will be ample reporting all day, including webcasts from the conference floor, so be sure to follow the action on the web or on twitter (newteeveelive or elementaltech).

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Turner Launches NBA Mobile Streaming App

Eli — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 01:20:20 +0000

On the heels of my experience streaming the Trail Blazers' first game, Turner Sports announced the release of NBA League Pass Mobile, an Apple iPhone and Google Android app giving users streaming access to more than 40 live games per week. It will also provide scores of other games as well as up-to-date statistics. At $39.99, it's expensive compared to your typical mobile app, but with over 40 games a week for the entire 2009-2010 season, it may be worth it to the big time basketball fan. This is yet another example of the demand for video to be delivered anytime, anywhere. "It's important for us to get our content in front of as many fans as possible," said Bryan Perez, senior vice president of NBA Digital, in Ryan Lawler's coverage of the announcement over at Contentinople. We feel the same way, Bryan!

Speaking of streaming, the Trail Blazer game on Friday night vs. the San Antonio Spurs will be the second online streaming opportunity. I will definitely be tuning in, especially after a very unique customer support experience. Click through to read about it.

The day after the first game, I was attempting to access the stream online, since when I purchased I was assured I'd be able to for the next 24 hours. The stream was down, however, so I emailed RayV customer support and was informed I'd be answered the next business day. That doesn't quite cut it when you only have 24 hours of access, though! Next, I brought up their Live Chat support, but my "approximated wait time" was 89 minutes! Really? Well, I had other things to do, so I left the window open and checked it periodically. About 89 minutes later (they sure can estimate, I'll give them that), a representative finally sent me a message and answered my questions. (Yes, they were having problems with the POR-HOU stream. No, they didn't know when it would be accessible. Yes, I'd be granted access if it became available after the 24-hour period was closed). Satisfied, I went back to my business. About four hours later, I checked again to see if the stream was up. It wasn't, but I noticed the chat window was still open. Out of curiosity, I asked the support person if they were still there. They were! Unbelievable.

I also emailed the Trail Blazers to provide them with the mixed review of my streaming experience. Not only did the team respond and thank me the next day, but I received a refund, the next streaming game for free, and two tickets to an upcoming game! That is some great customer service. Kudos to the Trail Blazers for listening to their fans and actively seeking feedback.

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The Rising Tide of Content

Andy — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 22:17:13 +0000

Matt Smith (from my old haunts at Inlet Technologies) recently wrote up an excellent overview on the rise of adaptive streaming as a disruptive technology and I couldn't agree with it more. Adaptive bit rate architecture embodies innovation because it leverages existing infrastructure while exponentially improving the user experience.

With the adoption of Adaptive (be it HTTP adaptive for the iPhone, Smooth Streaming for Silverlight, or Dynamic Streaming for Flash), we're seeing some classic problems that have plagued online viewers—like the guesswork around plug-ins, data rates, etc...—go away. We're also seeing improved features make an appearance, such as real-time chats and social media connections, which allow the user both a unique and collective experience.

But all this new technology AND the growing popularity is having a tsunami effect on the amount of work content creators now have to deliver.

Can content creators keep their heads above this rising demand? Not with the familiar options that are handy today - the CPU-only workflows will only get you so far. Adding more computers just gives the operators more things to keep track of and eventually efficiency just flatlines as you add more systems. Traditional acceleration avenues exist, but have long been a pariah for being so costly and proprietary. Click through for more.

Ah, but there is a stand out from the standard options: GPU-accelerated video. Now, we're talking about a disruptive innovation that leverages existing infrastructure, while exponentially improving the user experience. Taking advantage of off-the-shelf technology, Elemental has written software that outperforms any CPU-only system on the market today. Our solution, which utilizes both CPUs and GPUs efficiently, also gains the acceleration of massively parallel processing at a fraction of the cost of other hardware acceleration. This is one innovation well suited to handle the demands we're seeing in the market today and for the foreseeable future.

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Trail Blazers' Opening Night Win Streamed Live Online

Eli — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 23:43:29 +0000

Since the Portland Trail Blazers are kind of a big deal around these parts, I was excited to hear that they would be "the first team in the NBA to stream games online." With Major League Baseball showing excellent results from its online streaming (in both the quality and business sense), it's good to see the NBA working to polish their online solution. After my first experience, though, while it's clear the potential is there, it definitely needs work. Click through for the full post.

Image courtesy of Mike Rogoway, The Oregonian

First, there are caveats to the Blazers' streaming. Some of the big ones include:

It costs money: either $3.99 per game or $39.99 for all 15.
Second, the 15 games being streamed are the same 15 that are being broadcast on KGW Channel 8 (Portland's local NBC affiliate). None of the games broadcast on cable are being streamed online. Third, because of NBA broadcast requirements, the team is only allowed to stream games within their broadcast territory, which is about a 150-mile radius. Those outside the radius must purchase NBA League Pass Broadband, which costs between $89.95 and $149.95 depending on the package.
NBA guidelines do not currently permit phone or mobile device streaming, which would be a handy feature.

So for usability's sake, there are some kinks to work out, but I guess you need to start somewhere.

Now for my experience. On Tuesday night, I fired up my Lenovo ThinkPad notebook (2.4 GHz Core 2 Duo, 4 GB RAM, Vista 32, NVIDIA Quadro NVS 140M), but made the mistake of purchasing right at game time since I was mainly curious about the stream instead of actually relying on it (I was also watching in HD on my 40-inch LCD). The site was bogged down so it took quite awhile for anything to process. I had to create an account, install the RayV player software, and launch the stream. Finally, after about 10-15 minutes, it started "loading" and I thought I was up and running. But then I never got a picture. I tried the "Low" bandwidth instead of the "High," but in that case I didn't even get a "loading" message. It wasn't until the second quarter that I was able to reboot my system and get a stream to come through. Finally!

The stream, which was about 14 seconds behind KGW's broadcast, looked pretty sharp in the small window. The stream's bitrate was generally around 1.2 Mbps and when I went fullscreen on my 14-inch laptop, I could see pixels, but it was generally smooth. Overall, I was satisfied by the quality, even when I used a VGA cable for playback on my TV. If it were my only viewing option, I certainly would not have complained. It did need to buffer occasionally and the "Low" bandwidth option was still dead for me, but luckily my connection handled "High" just fine. The audio also cut out for a good chunk of the third and fourth quarters, which was frustrating, and then when it came back it was out of sync, messing up Travis Outlaw's southern drawl in his postgame interview. The RayV player is nice and clean, though. It has DVR options (which I used for a Martell Webster dunk), tells you statistics about your stream, and even has widgets in case you want to plug into Facebook or Twitter.

The Oregonian's Mike Rogoway also documented his experience and gleaned a couple interesting facts from the Blazers' marketing department:

About 500 users watched the game online.
There were two system-wide outages caused by a failure on the team's servers and then a failure at the NBA's servers in Atlanta.

Overall, even with my tempered expectations, I would give the experience a C grade. It was frustrating not getting a stream up until the second quarter and being without audio late in the game. As it stands right now, I would do anything I could to find another means of watching the next game before I would purchase the online streaming option again, instead waiting for others' feedback to see if there was improvement. It will be very interesting to see what kind of strides are made as the season progresses—here at Elemental we'll be paying close attention!

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Announcing Multi-GPU Support with Elemental Accelerator 2.2

Lisa — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 20:06:45 +0000

Elemental is pleased to announce the release of Elemental Accelerator 2.2 for Windows, an important update to its GPU-accelerated video processing plug-in for Adobe® Premiere® Pro CS4. With the release of 2.2, Elemental Accelerator provides support for video encoding using multiple NVIDIA Quadro FX GPUs. Multi-GPU functionality efficiently divides the encoding workload among all supported GPUs in a system, radically increasing overall export speed and performance. A multi-GPU implementation is well-suited to platforms with multiple PCI-E slots available to accommodate more than one NVIDIA Quadro FX graphics card, such as Z Series workstations from HP and ThinkStation workstations from Lenovo.
Supported multi-GPU configurations are:

•    2 x NVIDIA Quadro FX 4800
•    2 x NVIDIA Quadro FX 3800
•    2 x NVIDIA Quadro FX 1800

Although performance improvements will vary depending on GPU(s), video source and export settings, Elemental Accelerator provides a dramatic speed increase over the standard CPU-only encoder when leveraging multiple GPUs. In the following test case, encoding AVCHD 1080p source video to H.264 720p output can be performed nearly six times faster with Elemental Accelerator than with the standard encoder available with Adobe Premiere Pro.

Release 2.2 also expands the lineup of GPUs supported by Elemental Accelerator. The NVIDIA Quadro FX 3700 graphics card and the NVIDIA Quadro FX 3800M, 2800M and 1800M mobile GPUs have been added to the suite of NVIDIA GPUs that will run with Elemental Accelerator, giving more options than ever to video professionals, particularly those creating content on-the-go. For a complete list of supported GPUs, please visit the Elemental Accelerator specifications page on the Elemental website.

In addition, release 2.2 of Elemental Accelerator offers new H.264 and MPEG-2 presets for a variety of target applications, including presets designed specifically for the iPhone and for Blu-ray.

If you are an existing Accelerator customer, be sure and visit the Elemental updates site to download and install release 2.2. Customers installing from a CD or web package for the first time can elect to update immediately after an initial install.

For users who already own RapiHD or Elemental Accelerator, you can easily upgrade to the newest version. To access an update:

1.    Launch Adobe Premiere Pro CS4
2.    Navigate to the Export Settings dialog box
3.    Select the More Info tab
4.    Press the Check for updates button

This will automatically direct you to the Elemental Accelerator update site.

Elemental Accelerator 2.2 is made exclusively for NVIDIA Quadro GPUs. On the desktop, Elemental Accelerator works with the Quadro CX as well as the Quadro FX 5800, 4800, 3800, 3700 and 1800. On mobile platforms, Elemental Accelerator works with the Quadro FX 3800M, 2800M, 1800M, 3700M and 2700M. Elemental Accelerator is available for purchase as a standalone package from NVIDIA’s Adobe plug-in store or bundled with supported Quadro FX graphics cards from a variety of resellers.

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Standing Room Only at Lunch 2.0

Andy — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 18:39:13 +0000

Yesterday, we set a new record at Elemental, thanks to the overwhelming attendance at this month's Lunch 2.0: our conference room's largest meeting to date! There was no need for the HVAC system as 60 or so guests, ranging from software developers to entreprenuers to video industry reps, generated enough heat in our intimate office. Attendees enjoyed a Kettleman's lunch and a demonstration of Elemental's product suite by software engineers Greg and Davy and product manager Lisa. We were thrilled to have such a diverse and interested crowd join us to talk about the opportunities and challenges of online video and video compression. Thanks to all who attended for the interesting conversation and engaging questions both at the event and afterward. Here are some of our favorite tweets:

arih: Thanks @elementaltech for hosting Lunch 2.0! Very cool technology for parallel video processing.

lisacicala: Learning about video compression tools at Lunch 2.0 with @elementaltech.

ike6: Thanks to @siliconflorist for the tip on Lunch 2.0 at@elementaltech! Daily dose of smart folks doing cool stuff in Portland!

We agree. The inventive technology and supportive community is why we love Portland - see you at tech events around town!

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