Backlight’s Commitment to Bringing Creative Visions to Life to be Showcased at the 50th Annual SIGGRAPH Conference

Backlight Creative Product Lines—iconik, ftrack, cineSync, and Gem—will be at Booth #114

Global media and entertainment technology company, Backlight, has introduced several new features and workflow integrations across its creative-centric product lines in time for the 50th annual SIGGRAPH conference on computer graphics and interactive techniques. Backlight’s award-winning solutions—media management and collaboration platform iconik, video game narrative management solution Backlight Gem, and production tracking and review tools ftrack Studio, ftrack Review, and cineSync—will all be available for demo at SIGGRAPH taking place in Los Angeles on August 5-10.

“Backlight’s solutions for creatives deliver the power, efficiency, and depth needed to keep inspiration flowing,” said Mike Green, CEO of Backlight Creative, the division of Backlight that provides software solutions for secure and efficient media management, production tracking, and creative collaboration. “With each new update, we increase user efficiency and organization and reduce the friction that comes from managing resources across different platforms enabling our customers to achieve their creative potential and deliver their media projects on time and within budget.”

New Powerful Tools to Centralize Content from iconik

Backlight has introduced a number of enhancements for iconik that allow its users to extend the media management platform as their central hub for managing content – both internally and externally.

Portal for External Sources: Link Assets is a new feature that allows iconik users to connect to resources like YouTube videos or Google Docs from directly within the iconik platform. Link Assets further integrates with external systems, like a CMS or project management tool, allowing users to link directly to specific tasks, articles, or other resources right from within iconik.

iconik Agent Enhancements:  the iconik Agent now allows external partners who are not iconik users to perform bulk downloads of extensive content in a fast, efficient, and convenient manner via a shared link in a web browser.

iconik <> cineSync Integration Streamlines Collaborative Review: cineSync, the industry standard for high-end, color-accurate media review and approval, now integrates with iconik for media management and file sharing. From the cineSync application, users can browse media in iconik and load that media into cineSync for high-quality, HDR synchronized review and share those files to a collaborator’s machine to prepare for a cineSync review session.

First of Its Kind REST API for Narrative Game Development with Backlight Gem

Now it is easier than ever for game developers working on complex, branching stories to tie their narratives into the game development process with Backlight Gem’s REST API.

This bi-directional API is the first of its kind in any dedicated narrative development tool to conform to the constraints of REST architectural style and allow for interaction with RESTful web services.

The API provides users with an open-ended, customizable, and automatable system for integrating and managing their Gem script content with other tools and mirroring content changes made in other tools inside of Gem.

Smoother, More Efficient Workflow with cineSync 5

The most recent cineSync 5 release is stacked with features that are designed to deliver flexibility and productivity, including working more easily between broadcast and film color spaces.

• Added support for Wacom and stylus for more accurate editing sessions.
• New annotations, such as a Straight line tool to enable the drawing of laser-straight lines with pinpoint accuracy.
• Increased playback speed control at 2, 4, or 8x the usual speed, as well as several slow-motion playback options.
• A more seamless, color-accurate viewing experience with the option to output to the Rec. 709 color gamut.

Improved Workflows with ftrack Studio

The July 2023 release of ftrack Studio elevates user experience with several new features and updates designed to make workflows more intuitive and seamless.

A redesigned My Tasks Scheduler is a handy Gantt chart view that visualizes all tasks assigned to a user across their projects for a more holistic way of understanding project/task timelines, thus improving the overall project delivery process, reducing the likelihood of missed deadlines, and enhancing resource allocation.

The newly added Edit Shared Views via the API feature allows users to programmatically modify shared views, enabling a higher degree of customization in the information they share with teams and increasing collaboration/visibility across projects.

The API Group by Aggregations feature enables customers to perform advanced data analysis by aggregating or grouping their Studio/project data in diverse ways using the API, helping to elevate data analysis and uncover project insights.

Richer Collaboration with ftrack Review

Backlight has introduced several new updates to its media review functionality in both ftrack Review and ftrack Studio, designed to enhance collaboration and feedback workflows. The updates come with many upgrades to the ftrack media review experience that promote efficiency and facilitate better collaborative processes.

Reorder Clips and Switch Versions in a Sequence: Sequences can now be easily updated in a live review, meaning users can adjust their creative flow without changing modes.

Users can quickly reorder clips in a sequence by dragging and dropping assets in the horizontal or vertical playlist.

Users can create simple “context cuts” to see a shot as part of a sequence and to quickly audition different versions of that shot within a sequence to see what works best.

About Backlight

Backlight is a global media technology company that dramatically improves every stage of the video and entertainment content lifecycle – from creation through monetization. Backed by $200M in funding from PSG, Backlight has acquired six leading media software companies since launching in 2021. Video-forward organizations solve their mission-critical business and operational challenges by partnering with Backlight’s two divisions: Backlight Creative and Backlight Streaming. Backlight Creative provides award-winning software solutions for secure and efficient media management, production tracking, and creative collaboration, including iconik, ftrack, Gem, and Celtx. Backlight Streaming provides cloud-based OTT video streaming, content management, media production, hyperdistribution, and monetization software, including Zype and Wildmoka, to the world’s most innovative publishers and broadcasters. For more information, visit backlight.co.