Recap of the Henry Stewart Creative Ops Conference 2024

Welcome to our recap of the Henry Stewart Creative Ops Conference, which recently took place on May 16th. The conference offered a wealth of knowledge across four tracks: creative operations, photo studio operations, design operations, and creative production. Both Kara Van Malssen and Chris Lacinak attended and are here to share their insights and key takeaways.

Overview of the Conference

The conference was packed with sessions that made it tough to choose which ones to attend. Kara opted to jump between various tracks, while Chris focused primarily on creative operations. This approach allowed them to gather diverse perspectives on the evolving landscape of creative operations.

Key Takeaways

1. Creatives Doing More with Less

A recurring theme at the conference was how creatives are adapting to do more with fewer resources. With increasing demands from stakeholders and evolving audience needs, many are forced to innovate within constraints. One notable example came from JJ Pagano of Paramount Pictures, who shared how they reduced the time taken to create content significantly through automation and AI. This shift has led to astounding efficiency gains.

2. Creating More from Less Content

The second takeaway highlighted the importance of creating more with less content. This idea again ties back to efficiency. Several panels discussed the need for a master creative asset that could be repurposed into various derivative forms. Nickelodeon shared how they adapted during the pandemic by repurposing existing content into new formats, such as puppet shows.

3. The Role of AI in Creative Processes

AI was a significant focus throughout the conference. Many speakers addressed the anxiety surrounding job security in light of AI advancements. However, there was also optimism about AI’s potential to streamline mundane tasks, allowing creatives to focus on more impactful work. Dax Alexander emphasized that AI is here to stay and that embracing it is essential for future success.

4. Change Management in Creative Operations

Change management emerged as another critical theme. Dax discussed the cultural shift necessary for adopting AI technologies, stressing the importance of leadership support and clear goals. The idea that change is not permanent resonated with many attendees, reinforcing the need for adaptability in a rapidly evolving industry.

5. The Relationship Between DAM and Creative Teams

Lastly, Tony Gill shed light on the often-fractured relationship between digital asset management (DAM) systems and creative teams. He pointed out that many enterprise DAM solutions do not cater to the speed and collaboration needs of creative operations. This mismatch can leave creatives feeling unsupported, relying on outdated methods to manage their workflows.

Final Thoughts

The conference was a resounding success, with engaging discussions and valuable insights. Both Kara and Chris appreciated the opportunity to connect with industry leaders and peers. The final session, which brought all the moderators together for a recap, was particularly well-received, fostering lively discussion and engagement among attendees.

In conclusion, the Henry Stewart Creative Ops Conference provided a platform for sharing ideas and strategies to navigate the challenges in creative operations today. It highlighted the importance of efficiency, adaptability, and collaboration in a world where creatives must do more with less.

Transcript

Chris Lacinak: 00:01

Kara Van Malssen, welcome back to the DAM Right podcast. Good to have you.

Kara Van Malssen: 00:06

Thank you, thanks for having me back again.

Chris Lacinak: 00:08

And we are here today to talk about a recap

of the Henry Stewart Creative Ops Conference, which the name is a bit deceptive

because it was more than just creative ops.

It was actually four tracks,

creative operations, photo studio operations,

design operations, and creative production.

We both went, this just happened this past week.

It was Thursday, right?

May 16th.

And we both went and it was, I’m not gonna lie,

it was hard to pick which sessions to go to.

We used different tactics there.

Although I had the all access pass,

I wasted it because I spent my whole day

in the creative operations that was chaired by

our friend Thomas Stilling.

And you took a bit different of a tactic.

You jumped around a bit more, right?

Kara Van Malssen: 01:02

I did.

I divided my time between creative operations, creative production and design operations.

So I caught a couple of presentations from each one

and I did unfortunately miss the photo studio operations.

So I don’t think we have anything from that event.

Chris Lacinak: 01:23

In order to frame this conversation,

you’ve given us a big head start here. You’ve just this morning kind of posted your five,

it’s kind of five variations on a theme,

five themes on LinkedIn.

People should definitely check that out.

But I thought we might use that as a way to just walk

through some of the takeaways and share our thoughts

on the conference.

Would you mind sharing your first takeaway?

Kara Van Malssen: 01:49

Yeah, the first thing that came to mind

is sort of a framing takeaway, which was creatives are having to do more with less.

There’s more channels, there’s evolving audience needs.

There’s more demand from stakeholders,

but there’s less budget, there’s less resources.

So there was definitely a theme about getting creative

with those constraints and those demands

and trying to figure out what to do about it.

So I saw that coming up over and over and over again.

Chris Lacinak: 02:24

Yeah, one specific thing I’ll call out,

John Pagano, JJ Pagano, he said people call him, from Paramount Pictures talked about,

they have in the creation of content,

they have gone from taking upwards of 60 minutes

to create two and a half minutes of content,

to taking eight to 10 minutes

to create eight minutes of content.

I thought that was just astounding.

I mean, wild, right?

That’s bonkers, that’s like a ridiculous increase

in efficiency, largely attributed to use

of both automation and AI.

So that was interesting, but yeah,

I think that speaks to what you’re talking about there.

And I just kind of threw out AI there.

I mean, in your interpretation of what you heard,

was that really kind of the linchpin

that that whole doing more with less was,

or were there other ways that that came up?

Kara Van Malssen: 03:18

No, it actually came up in a lot of other ways.

So maybe, we’ll definitely come to AI, ’cause that’s a huge 800 pound gorilla in the room,

in all the rooms.

But no, I think where I started my day

was with the folks from Nickelodeon,

talking about how they had to adapt during the pandemic.

And this is the folks that run their YouTube channel,

and many, many channels, I should say 24 channels,

I believe, globally.

So they had to shift immediately from,

we have no way to access our library,

we have no way to shoot talent in the studio,

we’ve all got to retreat to our apartments, what do we do?

So that was where it all began.

And so they started getting creative

with repurposing content into puppet form

and things like that.

So rather than having live actors, like using puppets

and things like that.

And they did talk about later innovations

in the ability to search and find and repurpose content

from their library,

and that being another way of doing more with less.

So not needing to shoot new content,

a new original material.

And that same theme came up again,

this was also in the same track on creative production.

There was a panel of producers,

and I think the topic was doing more with less.

And so that was just the whole theme.

And there were a lot of different things that came up,

but one recurring theme there was also similarly,

making one piece of content that can be repurposed

many, many times and take many derivative forms.

So that was coming up,

use of archival content again was coming up.

And I actually saw that in the third session

in the design operations room,

which was a presentation from the company Celtra,

which helps people kind of create using atomic content,

as they say, kind of very rapidly repurposed.

Now there’s AI layered into all this a little bit,

but the theme here was,

and even another group I was thinking of it was Hilton.

And they talked about something similar,

kind of a master content model with many derivative assets

and kind of derivative content pieces

from that one kind of highest level creative asset.

So does that resonate with what you heard?

Chris Lacinak: 05:57

Yeah, well, and actually,

as you talked about the Nickelodeon session, I mean, it’s funny because it was at the same time

as JJ Pagano’s from Paramount Pictures,

a similar deal, ’cause he was talking about,

I mean, it was all focused on their YouTube channels.

They have many YouTube channels.

The use of puppets, I mean, all those things,

actually, there was a lot of similar.

We hadn’t talked about that.

So it’s funny to hear that.

But in doing more with less,

I kind of went to like efficiency,

which you gotta ask, well, what’s the outcome?

Did the quality go way down?

Did they hurt their metrics?

Like, how good is it?

And one metric that he gave was that

between March,: 2023 

they went from 1.6 billion with a B

to 2.8 billion watch time minutes.

So not only did they get more efficient,

but they also saw much, much higher response rates

to the content they were putting out there.

But yeah, I did hear that routinely in all sorts of ways

about doing more with less.

Interestingly enough, actually, as I think about it,

even in kind of the,

there was a session on sustainability

as in environmental sustainability.

And they also talked about intentionally

doing more with less as a way of

addressing environmental sustainability to some extent.

They talked about a lot of things,

but that was one aspect of it.

So yeah, well, let’s jump into your second takeaway.

What was your second?

Kara Van Malssen: 07:27

Well, I think we’ve just bridged from one to two

because the first one was doing more with less. The second one is one of the ways they’re doing that

is to creating more with less content.

But that theme is just keeps coming into my mind

and hearing that over and over.

And what you said about the performance of the content

and of scaling and increasing at the same time

makes me think of another insight

from some of the speakers, which was that kind of,

the kind of master creative content

that sort of you create all these derivatives from,

if that’s being created using insight from measurement,

from predictive analytics or from,

to performance analytics to,

so you’re actually informing the new content creation

by what’s performing best out there

and sort of getting smarter.

So it’s not just repurposing for repurposing sake,

it’s actually kind of a work smarter,

not harder type of theme as well.

So were you hearing the same thing

in the sessions you were in?

Chris Lacinak: 08:32

Yeah, absolutely.

I was looking for the term in my notes that came up in the sustainability session

and I knew there was a specific term they use

and it was micro production.

So that was just about it,

asking like, do people really need to be here

at this production or how can we do production

in a way that utilizes as few people as necessary,

only the people required and things like that.

So, and they did reiterate multiple times

that that was not just about environmental

sustainability,

that there was also a bottom line aspect to that,

that was attractive when it came to the financials

of production and operations.

So should we jump to the third?

Kara Van Malssen: 09:11

As we hinted earlier, AI was a very big theme.

I think every session touched on it. I think at this point, if you’re in this type of community,

you cannot avoid talking about it

because one of the things,

trends we’re obviously seeing with Gen AI

is creative output or something that looks like it, right?

The ChatGPT can write, you have DALL-E Midjourney

creating images, video content, et cetera.

And so there’s this, obviously an important concern

is the AI coming for our jobs as creatives.

And so that was sort of touched on by,

I think every speaker that I saw in some way, shape or form.

Chris Lacinak: 09:59

It sure was. It was a big theme for sure. 

Kara Van Malssen: 10:03

Yeah, so you saw the same thing.

Chris Lacinak: 10:05

Yeah, I mean, I think,

and we talked a little bit about this. There were kind of two competing narratives

or counter perspectives.

One was, is AI gonna take our job?

The other one was, boy, isn’t it great?

AI is saving us from having to do all of the mundane work

that is not creative, is not impactful, but has to be done.

So it was interesting, there was that sentiment that

what AI and automation, which I just wanna say quickly,

it’s kind of a pet peeve of mine,

how AI and automation are conflated so much.

They’re very different things.

So let’s be clear about that.

But they are often talked about as being synonymous.

But in this case, I do mean both.

It was talked about,

both of these things were talked about.

Isn’t it great that they can save us so much time

so that we can now do the most impactful work?

I would have loved to have heard some more details

about that, like I love the concept.

I don’t disagree with that.

But I think where the tension still lies is

how exactly will that play out and how true is that?

I think to alleviate some of the folks

that are concerned about, is AI gonna take our jobs?

But I don’t know, what do you think?

Kara Van Malssen: 11:20

Well, your two kind of views on that,

I saw kind of a through line to them, which was the answer to the question,

will, is AI coming for our jobs is no,

it’s coming for the tedious parts

that you never were good at

and never got around to in the first place

or struggled to do, which is your point about automation.

And there was some conflating there.

But I think what people were saying is,

use AI to help with automation.

Automation isn’t just AI driven, obviously.

So there are ways to insert AI tools

to help with certain automation tasks.

And so that was the theme I was picking up on there.

I think a few examples were given

of what the practical uses of those things are,

things like kind of automating delivery

of something once it’s created

and pushing it out to these various places,

things like that, just kind of a little fiddly bit stuff.

I think what Celtra again is doing

to kind of very rapidly take large volumes

of modular assets and then quickly repurposing them

into many, many, many, many different assets

that can be pushed out to lots of different channels

is another example of, I think there’s AI in there,

kind of mixed into that sauce.

So things like that,

that kind of getting more done faster type of track

was coming, that was the kind of thing

that it was being pushed.

But I thought there was one really interesting takeaway.

I can’t remember who said this now,

but they said just be aware that even using AI

for automation will still result in more assets,

more output, more content.

So it’s not like just using AI for automation

is just getting the same stuff done faster.

And if we avoid having it do creative,

then we won’t increase our output, but actually we will.

So I thought that was a really interesting takeaway too.

Chris Lacinak: 13:39

Yeah, there are two kind of quotes or moments

that come to mind for me. One is I thought that the presentation

from Dax Alexander was great.

That was called “The Real Deal,

A Practical Roadmap to Harnessing AI in-house.”

So he’s from a company called Oliver.

And he talked about a lot of things.

He started off by saying,

“The reason we’re here is because it’s a f’ing mess,”

which that’s a good kind of sobering thought

to start with.

And he did that,

he had a slide of about a thousand different products

that fall into different categories when he said that.

So you felt it, you felt it when you looked at it.

But he had a really great framework that they use

around helping guide folks through the use of AI

and all sorts of criteria, what the tools do,

how they work, what the legal agreements around them,

licensing agreements are around them.

Actually, that was one of the biggest things

that came out of it for me,

is the legal stuff is the hairiest part, probably.

And so there’s a lot of analytical frameworks

around use of AI.

And in large corporate settings in particular,

where there’s a lot of probably nail-biting going on

about are people using a dark AI

that’s not been yet vetted and approved by the company.

But the other thing that was relative to that

was Guido Derkx, I believe was his name,

talked about, I mean, he kind of started his talk by saying,

he was sitting around with friends and had the realization,

we were just talking about the AI taking away

all of the mundane tasks that he had the realization,

wait, are we the robots, right?

We’re doing all of the mundane tasks,

all this really boring, systematic, non-creative work.

So that was an interesting and funny twist.

Kara Van Malssen: 15:41

Yeah, I think, so while Dax’s presentation

kind of is the jumping off point for my fourth takeaway, which his message, another one of his messages was,

AI is here to stay, embrace it, wrestle with it,

because you’re gonna need to figure this out.

So I thought his framework that you mentioned,

here’s a very practical kind of four step process

to adoption.

And he really emphasized the culture shift,

there’s resistance, there’s certain people who are,

embracing it, running, let’s go, let’s do this,

maybe recklessly perhaps.

So he’s also got a lot of caution, I think, in his approach.

And then there’s a lot of people, maybe the majority,

who are very apprehensive, nervous,

they don’t understand it,

and rightfully scared and confused.

So he did talk a lot about the culture piece being,

the number one driver,

and that you have to kind of bring people along

in really interesting ways.

But having time, whatever you’re trying to do with it,

to strategy, being a really key piece,

and then having leadership sponsorship

was also a big part of that.

And then his framework was sort of,

I think it was, define what are the goals

we’re trying to achieve here.

I select the right tools based on your use cases,

really get into what those are, pilot, and then scale.

And he had a lot of really interesting anecdotal stories

to share about how they do scale,

if they decide through a pilot, like,

okay, let’s adopt the tool,

how they scale it out to their like 5,000,

I believe, employees.

Chris Lacinak: 17:28

Yeah.

Kara Van Malssen: 17:29

So that was really interesting to hear about.

Chris Lacinak: 17:30

Yeah.

As a side note, that just made me think of the change management conversation.

I’ll just inject a couple of thoughts here.

So there was a session called Mastering Change Management.

There’s a few great things.

One is, there was a woman who worked

for Office of General Services,

Media Services in New York, Kate Schmieding,

rhymes with meeting, I remember that’s how

she introduced herself.

And she had a meeting,

she has a meeting with her staff once a week

called I Hate It Here,

which is in which all the staff members come

and they talk about the things they hate, which I thought,

and someone asked, how do you make that productive?

And she said, it’s not, that’s not what it’s about.

It’s about people being able to vent

and talk about the things that annoy them

and things like that.

So I thought that was just,

that got the room cracking up, that was hilarious.

And she was, I appreciated that contribution.

But the other thing that came out

of that change management meeting was,

or change management session was,

I love it, someone, you know,

some kind of one of the concluding thoughts,

it was also one of the opening thoughts is,

they try to remind their employees

that change is not permanent, it’s not forever.

And I thought, that’s an oxymoron, right?

But yeah, in Dax’s session,

that definitely came to light is,

how do you roll that out through a large organization?

Kara Van Malssen: 18:54

Yeah, and it sounded like, this is not a similar thing,

but they do have sort of a recurring meeting, like an office hours type of thing,

where they, you know, people can come

and it’s somebody that’s new to the technology

that’s actually running the session

and trying to teach it to colleagues.

And they’re, you know, struggling with that as well.

So it’s like, you know, they’re barely half a step ahead

of the other people coming.

So they’re kind of helping people learn together,

but they’ve got the SMEs sort of lurking in the wings

in case they need to jump in.

But that was kind of cool, just to kind of help,

you know, they’re helping each other along

through that process.

Chris Lacinak: 19:36

– Yeah, that is a great idea. It’s a good structure.

Kara Van Malssen: 19:39

– Yeah, I like that, I hate it here meeting too. I mean, that’s a totally different thing.

Chris Lacinak: 19:45

– Courageous exercise as the leader of an organization to engage in, I give her props for that. 

Kara Van Malssen: 19:50

– Yeah.

Chris Lacinak: 19:52

– So the other person who had a framework

and it’s related to your point number five, your takeaway number five was Tony Gill.

He also showed its framework that was,

I mean, we couldn’t see the details of these,

but on its face, it kind of looks similar

to what Dax showed in the sense that it had kind of red,

green, yellow areas of risk and things like that.

But what is your fifth point?

Kara Van Malssen: 20:10

– Well, my fifth point was kind of a message

for DAM professionals, for digital asset management practitioners,

because this group of folks are the ones that are,

the creative operations people are kind of orchestrating

the creation and reuse of the assets

that the digital asset management person is stewarding.

And a lot of the use cases of the creative teams

are not necessarily met by enterprise DAM.

So Tony sort of broke that out and said,

an enterprise DAM solution,

which he also kind of lumped with a marketing DAM,

which is a lot of times where it sits,

it’s very much more of a library kind of solution.

It’s search, browse, download, share, use,

disseminate, measure,

but with rights and security mixed in.

The needs of the creative groups are a lot more,

we need speed, we need edit, we need file lock,

we need version control, collaboration.

And these are all features that are in,

all of the features combined

are in digital asset management solutions,

but they’re not always done well

for the creative production groups.

And within an organization, there’s usually,

not usually, but often one DAM

and it’s the enterprise solution.

And so we’ve seen that with our clients,

that the creative groups are sort of still left out

in the cold, like fending with themselves

on hard drives and whatnot.

And it’s not well integrated into their workflows.

So I think his point was,

there’s been a fraught relationship there

and the DAM community should be looking at this closely

to think how can we kind of enable this creative reuse,

but by meeting the folks where they are.

So yeah, that was one of my key takeaways

from Tony’s talk that I thought was very interesting.

Chris Lacinak: 22:12

One of the questions he raised,

nd apparently at DAM New York: 2023

in the stump of the consultant session

for asking the best question,

was should work in process assets be stored in the DAM?

Apparently still a hot topic

’cause lots of people had lots of thoughts about that.

And he did a hand raise in the room

about who thinks they should, who thinks they shouldn’t,

and who’s in between.

But what were your thoughts on that?

Kara Van Malssen: 22:40

Well, I thought that was funny

because I’ve been on stump of the consultant panel one time at DAM LA.

I was not at the one that he won the thing for on the panel,

but I was in the audience.

And I remember thinking,

what would my answer to this question be?

And he had said that the panel

all either gave the response of yes, or it depends.

And I was like, yep, I would have been one of those,

it depends people.

And, ’cause I think it depends on the purpose

of the DAM system, who it’s serving,

what are the main use cases that it’s helping to enable?

And if your main use cases are spread out

and varied enough that it warrants more

of that library like approach and library system,

then that may be your right solution.

Maybe you don’t have creative production in house,

maybe that’s an ad agency partner.

So therefore that’s not necessarily a need.

But if you do have, especially video production in house,

there is often a need for a two system solution.

And I think he was also pointing to that,

like embrace this, this is,

there’s a photo studio or a video production,

PAM or MAM, so production asset management

or media asset management system,

that’s more gonna have those features

that he was describing, faster edit, version control,

file lock, collaboration, et cetera,

to service them through that edit process

and then push to the final deliverables

and kind of evergreen content to the enterprise DAM.

I think he was advocating for that kind of model.

And I thought that was a really good point.

And I’ve seen that work well in a lot of cases.

And therefore you have a home for work in progress

when it’s in that kind of PAM environment.

Chris Lacinak: 24:36

– That’s exactly where my head went with,

which is over the years in our work, I think here about organizations like HBO, for instance,

like they have a PAM and there is a new,

I’ve heard PAM more recently in reference

to what someone referred to as a product asset management

in addition to a PIM product.

But PAM as in production asset management,

this is an asset management system used for production

and post-production processes

for things that are work in process.

And the final state deliverables that come out of that

is what goes into a DAM that is used for distribution

and access and things like that.

So, and I sat with a group of folks at lunch

and I kind of posed that question

because everybody had been in Tony’s session.

So, and no one else there had heard

of a production asset management system before,

which I think, it may have to do more

with just folks that are more involved

in kind of media and entertainment workflows

where video production has driven that need.

It was so much more necessary to have a PAM

that was separate from the DAM

when you’re dealing with kind of really large file sizes

and maybe more complex operations

than compared to non-video workflows.

I don’t know, I wasn’t quite sure

why I was the only one at that table

that had had that experience.

But do you have any thoughts on that?

Kara Van Malssen: 26:04

– Well, I do think it’s from,

those who are familiar with it are either gonna be from media and entertainment,

production, bigger production companies,

or large enterprises that have had in-house video production.

And I do think this is rooted in the video space.

But Tony was also talking about photo studio.

Chris Lacinak: 26:26

– Yeah, that’s true.

Kara Van Malssen: 26:28

– Kind of PAM-like system.

So, that’s interesting as well. But yeah, we’ve done work with clients in the past

where we helped with PAM implementation.

Then there was a DAM.

Sometimes they call it MAM.

PAM MAM thing gets, I think, confusing.

There’s a little bit of a identity crisis

between those things.

So, some people might be like, “What’s a PAM?

“I’ve heard of MAM.”

So, I think there’s some acronym overload going on.

But it is still larger organizations

or very media-heavy organizations.

What I also thought was interesting related to this

was I was in a panel of producers,

and I asked the question,

“Okay, you’re talking about a lot of content reuse,

“repurposing, using archival, using library content.

“So, what can digital asset managers do

“to better support you?”

And they were like,

“We don’t know what you’re talking about.

“What’s that?”

It was basically their response.

Chris Lacinak: 27:30

– What’s that as in what? What’s “that” in that sentence?

Kara Van Malssen: 27:33

– What’s digital asset management?

A lot of these are from small production companies, independent filmmakers.

And they’re just like,

“I’m over here trying to deal with the files.

“And if you can help, can you teach me something?

“I’d like to ask you a few questions.”

So, it kind of made me realize

those who even know this concept

are in a privileged position to begin with

because you’re in a big company

that has supported this technology and infrastructure

and people that can enable that.

But a lot of people out there

are just winging it on their own.

They’re working in file sharing systems,

hard drives, small RAIDs.

They’re just trying to keep the files organized.

But them as a practice is not present

in many, many, many places.

So, that was also sort of an aha moment.

Like, “Oh yeah, this is not exist everywhere.”

Chris Lacinak: 28:26

– Right, well,

DAM operations exists in all of those scenarios, but whether they’re recognized as DAM operations

and how well they’re serving their users is another question.

Any other final takeaways before we sign off here?

Kara Van Malssen: 28:39

– No, I think it was a great event.

I enjoyed it a lot. And I’d love to go back.

I think it was some very good conversations.

It was extremely active.

The participation was, you know,

kind of, everyone was very engaged.

So, I thought that was wonderful.

Chris Lacinak: 29:00

– Yeah, I agree.

I think Henry Stewart did a great job putting it together. I think that the, all four consultants,

consultants, I think all four moderators,

some of which were consultants,

did a great job.

And we got, you know,

while I said that I sat in Thomas’s

creative operations stream all day,

there was a final session at the end of the day,

which I think was fantastic.

I think Henry Stewart should do this

anytime there’s multiple panels.

They brought all four facilitators,

moderators of those streams together

to kind of summarize, recap, engage with the audience.

And so we got to hear about and see from all of them.

And I thought they were all just fantastic.

Really did a really wonderful job.

And that was a really fun session.

I thought that was a great way to end it.

So, a big shout out and props to everybody involved

in that decision and actually making it happen.

Kara Van Malssen: 29:52

– Yeah, I think, yeah,

the Henry Stewart team deserves a round of applause. All of the moderators, obviously all the speakers.

But yeah, I second that,

the end of the day session where they brought

the moderators together.

And I think the audience was just so engaged at that point.

There were so many questions, the conversation kept flowing.

I think we went right past the time

where the drinks were supposed to start

and people were fine with that.

They were just like, let’s keep talking.

So I think that was wonderful.

Chris Lacinak: 30:19

– It’s a good sign. It’s a good sign.

Kara Van Malssen: 30:21

– It is.

Chris Lacinak: 30:22

– Great.

All right. Well, thanks so much for joining me today.

Thanks so much for the great takeaways.

And as I said, that’s a LinkedIn post

that folks can go check out too.

And yeah, it was fun.

Thanks, Kara.

Kara Van Malssen: 30:34

– It was fun.

Yeah, thank you. 

(upbeat music)

The Importance of Digital Preservation in the Entertainment Industry

Introduction to Digital Preservation

In the rapidly evolving landscape of the entertainment industry, digital preservation has emerged as a critical concern. As filmmakers and studios transition from traditional film to digital formats, the need to safeguard cinematic holdings becomes increasingly paramount. This article explores the multifaceted nature of digital preservation, its challenges, and the vital role it plays in preserving our cultural heritage.

The Evolution of Digital Preservation

The concept of digital preservation has evolved significantly over the past few decades. Initially focused on traditional photochemical films, the shift to digital media has prompted archivists to rethink their strategies. With the rise of digital technology in production, postproduction, and distribution, the preservation landscape has transformed dramatically.

Digital preservation encompasses not only the safeguarding of digital assets but also the management of physical materials. As the entertainment industry embraces digital formats, the responsibility of preserving these assets falls on creators, studios, and archivists alike.

Understanding Cinematic Holdings

Cinematic holdings refer to the collection of films, videos, and other moving image materials that studios and archives manage. This term encompasses a wide range of formats, including traditional film, digital video, and even newer media forms. As the definition of cinematic holdings evolves, so too does the approach to their preservation.

The challenge lies in maintaining the integrity of these assets while ensuring they remain accessible for future generations. Understanding what constitutes cinematic holdings is crucial for developing effective preservation strategies.

The Role of Digital Asset Management (DAM)

Digital Asset Management (DAM) systems play a pivotal role in the preservation of cinematic holdings. These systems facilitate the organization, storage, and retrieval of digital assets, ensuring that they remain accessible and usable over time. The integration of DAM with preservation workflows is essential for studios aiming to maintain their assets’ longevity.

Moreover, the relationship between DAM and digital preservation is symbiotic. While DAM focuses on the management of digital files, preservation ensures that these files are protected from degradation, corruption, or obsolescence.

Challenges in Digital Preservation

Despite the advancements in technology and methodology, digital preservation presents numerous challenges. One of the primary concerns is the rapid evolution of technology and formats. As new digital standards emerge, older formats may become obsolete, rendering archived materials inaccessible.

Additionally, digital files are susceptible to corruption over time, which can lead to data loss. The sheer volume of digital content produced today also complicates preservation efforts, as it requires significant storage and management resources.

Financial constraints further exacerbate these challenges. Many organizations struggle to allocate adequate budgets for preservation efforts, often prioritizing immediate business needs over long-term archival goals.

The Business of Digital Preservation

The relationship between business and digital preservation is complex. Studios and organizations must balance the need for preservation with the reality of financial constraints. While the long-term benefits of preserving assets are evident, securing funding for these initiatives can be challenging.

Moreover, the economic landscape of the entertainment industry, characterized by mergers and acquisitions, adds another layer of complexity. Rights holders may struggle to maintain control over their assets, leading to potential gaps in preservation efforts.

The Cultural Significance of Preservation

Beyond the financial implications, digital preservation holds immense cultural significance. Films and moving images are not merely entertainment; they are artifacts of our collective history and identity. Preserving these assets ensures that future generations can access and engage with our cultural heritage.

Organizations and studios must recognize their responsibility to safeguard these cultural treasures. This commitment to preservation transcends business interests, reflecting a broader societal obligation to protect our shared history.

The Academy Digital Preservation Forum

The Academy Digital Preservation Forum serves as a vital platform for fostering collaboration and knowledge-sharing among industry stakeholders. Formed under the auspices of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the forum aims to address the challenges and complexities of digital preservation.

By bringing together filmmakers, technologists, archivists, and other professionals, the forum seeks to promote best practices, raise awareness, and advocate for the importance of digital preservation within the entertainment industry.

Future Directions in Digital Preservation

Looking ahead, the future of digital preservation hinges on several key factors. First, there is a need for standardized practices across the industry. By establishing common protocols and workflows, organizations can streamline their preservation efforts and reduce confusion.

Second, collaboration among stakeholders is essential. The digital preservation landscape is vast, and no single entity can address all the challenges alone. By working together, studios, archivists, and technology providers can share insights and develop innovative solutions.

Finally, fostering a culture of awareness and advocacy is crucial. Educating decision-makers about the value of preservation and its long-term benefits can help secure funding and support for these initiatives.

Conclusion

Digital preservation is a multifaceted challenge that requires a concerted effort from all stakeholders within the entertainment industry. As we navigate the complexities of preserving our cinematic holdings, it is essential to recognize the cultural, financial, and technological dimensions of this endeavor. By embracing collaboration, advocating for best practices, and prioritizing preservation efforts, we can ensure that our rich cinematic heritage endures for generations to come.

Transcript

Chris Lacinak: 00:00

Hi, Chris Lacinak here, host of the DAM Right podcast.

Just a quick note before we get started to say that it would mean the world to me if you rated and subscribed to the podcast on your podcast platform of choice.

Thanks so much, I really appreciate it.

Welcome to the DAM Right podcast.

In AVP’s Operational Model for DAM Success, there are seven components.

Yes, one is technology, the most commonly discussed aspect of DAM.

However, I would argue that the most important component is people.

First and foremost, DAM’s value is in its ability to serve users.

Additionally, what are processes, measurement, governance, continuous improvement, and technology without skilled and talented people behind them?

The central component, and what I would argue is the second most important, is purpose.

Purpose is the fuel that keeps those skilled and talented people focused and driven to produce results and impact.

Today I’m joined by Andrea Kalas, a true pioneer in the field that brings humanity and purpose in abundance.

Andrea’s personal journey takes us from winding nitrate film in UCLA’s “dirty” Film and Television Archive, more on that later, to working on the cutting edge of digital asset management at Paramount Pictures, with stops along the way at DreamWorks, Discovery, and the British Film Institute.

Andrea’s background is not only fascinating, but offers a robust expression of digital asset management fully realized and evolved.

You’ll delight in hearing about Andrea’s personal journey.

But the reason I’ve asked Andrea to join me today is to talk about one of her latest ventures in which she’s serving as project co-chair for the Academy Digital Preservation Forum, formed under the auspices of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

The mission of the forum in part reads, “With the ascent of digital technology in the production, post-production, distribution, and exhibition of motion pictures, and the concomitant decline in photochemical cinematography and practical disappearance of film projection, we want to engage with those with the greatest stake and influence to ensure that digital preservation is successfully achieved.

Filmmakers, studio executives, Academy members, archivists, operations professionals, technologists, and other practitioners charged with implementing digital preservation.”

Join us as we grapple with questions around defining the entertainment industry today, the business side of digital preservation, and whether we should trust the entertainment industry to take on the challenge of preserving cultural heritage.

And remember, DAM Right, because it’s too important to get wrong.

Andrea Kalas, welcome to the DAM Right podcast.

Thank you so much for being here today.

I really appreciate it.

Andrea Kalas: 02:33

It’s great to talk to you, Chris.

Chris Lacinak: 02:35

I’d love to start just by having you tell us about your background and the path that you’ve taken to get to where you are today.

Andrea Kalas: 02:43

Well, I think, you know, it really all starts with the UCLA Film and TV Archive.

When I was in graduate school at UCLA, I saw a little post on a board, a job board, saying that there was work study positions at the UCLA Film and TV Archive.

And I had come to UCLA to the grad program there knowing about film restoration that was just sort of beginning and knowing that the UCLA Film and TV Archive was there.

So I was excited that it was easy to just get a part-time job there while I was going to school.

And I remember I called and Jerry Golden, who’s a wonderful person still working in the field, was the guy hiring.

And he goes, “You know, this job isn’t, it’s not on the campus.

It’s out here in Hollywood, you know, and it’s a little dirty out here.”

And I was like, “Where do I sign?”

And that time at the UCLA Film and TV Archive was just pivotal for my career because it was, you know, there weren’t programs then.

There weren’t programs in, you know, moving image archiving at that point.

So there wasn’t an option for me to go to grad school in that.

But in a way I didn’t have to because I had people like Bob Gitt, you know, who we used to nickname the Pope of Preservation.

We had Martha Yee, who was incredibly important in figuring out how library science could be applied to moving image archiving.

Literally she was dealing with like early MARC cataloging software that was made for books.

So she was constantly figuring out how to put a square peg in a round hole for moving image materials.

And Eddie Richmond, who was the curator of the archive at that point, who was really figuring out how you manage an archive, how you deal with that.

And Bob Rosen, who was the head of the archive and really a visionary in so many ways in terms of how archives could really intervene in culture in a significant way, in history and the importance of that.

So to me that was incredibly fortunate that I was there at that moment with people who were figuring it out and figuring out how moving image archiving could actually work.

So that’s, you know, that made me really, in my opinion, made me a really good archival professional out of that experience working there.

So yeah, I started off as a work study student and my job was inspecting nitrate.

Nothing that a student would do now.

But it was great.

To me, I loved it, even though it was in these dirty vaults and opening cans, it was a little risky.

But I got to look at all the cans and see like, what is that?

What are these things?

Why don’t we know more about them?

Like that curiosity and the pleasure of archives, which is being near these assets.

And I realized, yep, I’m in it for the long term.

This is what I want.

This is what I want to do.

Chris Lacinak: 05:54

It sounds like you had an all-star team of colleagues there to help you really learn the trade and understand not just the technical stuff, but it sounds like also kind of the value.

Andrea Kalas: 06:03

And they were willing to take a risk on me.

They were willing to, you know, give me sort of more.

So I got offered a full-time job eventually there, you know, preserving newsreels, which was another incredible education because, you know, it was a small thing.

It was still figuring it out.

So I had to do everything from, you know, justifying why I would preserve one newsreel over another with, you know, complex justification.

Then I had to sit at a bench and wind through each newsreel and actually inspect and repair, take it to the lab, see it preserved, then gather all the information together for somebody to catalog it.

You know, so I had to do the whole soup to nuts.

And that was a great.

And the fact that I was just given the rope to do that and figure it out, obviously with everybody’s support and help, but that they gave me that responsibility was just fantastic.

So that was another great, you know, step forward.

Chris Lacinak: 07:02

Yeah, that’s a great start.

So where did you, what did your career look like after that?

Andrea Kalas: 07:06

So after I preserved newsreels for a while, I worked within the UCLA Film and TV Archives Research and Study Center and they had just opened it up.

And it was really the first time where, and a lot of archives were like this at this point, where it was fine to just preserve them and, you know, sort of keep the doors closed, but actually opening it up and providing people to have a place to actually research and watch and, you know, use the archives was relatively new.

And we were on a university campus where these materials could obviously be of great use to students, to researchers, to for classwork.

So we opened up the Research and Study Center and there I really started, and I already had an interest in technology and computers because, you know, universities were some of the first to get computers, you know, so we’re talking about mid 80s, late 80s here, right.

So early on.

And so I was already fascinated with them.

And so, you know, the idea that we could use computers to help with providing access to materials that’s carried, you’ll see that carried through my entire career.

And so we did this project where there was a communications professor who had taped news materials off the air for years.

So he had decades of these materials.

And the only thing that was there was like CBS News on March 2nd.

You know, that’s all the information we had about what was on the recordings.

So we did a project around because we taped a lot of stuff around Tiananmen Square.

We did a project where we actually took the closed caption broadcast signal off the tapes and dumped them into a database so that people could search over terms and things like that.

And and that’s something that’s very common today.

And we see that all the time.

It’s used in all sorts of different search technologies now.

But that was early on that we were sort of.

Chris Lacinak: 09:07

That was groundbreaking.

Andrea Kalas: 09:09

It was big.

Yeah.

So I did a presentation on that at the Association of Moving Image Archivists.

And there was a woman who named Karen Weber, who had been part of AMIA for a while.

And at that point in her career was working with the company CGI that made, you know, you know, visual effects, software and hardware.

And they were working with DreamWorks and they wanted to create a digital archive for animation.

And so she said, oh, this person has a kind of idea about how technology and archives can work together.

Let’s, you know, let’s recommend her for this this job at DreamWorks.

And so that’s that’s how that happened.

I went from UCLA to DreamWorks.

And it was that was another.

Chris Lacinak: 10:08

It had to be a pretty big cultural shift.

Andrea Kalas: 10:10

That was that was like, whoa.

Yeah.

I went from, yeah, just sort of university to Hollywood.

And and it was that was fascinating.

Absolutely amazing.

I mean, I was an archivist hired before there was anything to archive.

Yeah.

Right.

That’s, you know.

And so helping create a digital archive from nothing for animation was just was fantastic.

And I just you know, I just spent my time getting to know all about animation, which was fantastic to get to know and the complexities of that and getting to know the artists and how it worked and how animation worked and how that, you know, animation it was really sort of also almost production assset management.

Right.

They needed an archive during production.

But we were also figuring out how then to have these kind of off ramps from that into a more, you know, sort of long term repository.

And also I was looking at collecting up actual physical materials like all the backgrounds were painted, you know, so and they’re unbelievably beautiful.

But, you know, works of art, making sure that we, you know, handle those well and archive those well as well.

And also in those early days of DreamWorks and was DreamWorks was going to be this huge studio, right?

It was going to have it was a music area.

There was television.

There was so starting to actually become go outside of animation and build an archive for all of those things.

So so that was fantastic to be able to do that from scratch, from nothing.

Right.

Build it out of nothing when things can be ready when the materials actually came into our.

Yeah.

So and and and be around just amazing technologists, too, because animation’s always been on the forefront, certainly of entertainment technology.

You know, they’ve always been the ones who have been out there first figuring out file based workflows, figuring out, you know, I mean, you know, great stuff.

Like I remember, you know, we were going from physical ink and paint to digital ink and paint.

So that was being that was a transition that was happening while we were making a movie, which was amazing.

But one thing I remember so clearly was like when the you know, with physical ink and paint, you had to keep a cap on the number of colors you would use because you needed to have a set number of colors that everyone would consistently use.

You had to keep those paints the same color.

Right.

You couldn’t you know, and all of a sudden with digital ink and paint.

You could have this whole all sorts of different palettes that came out.

I remember the animators heads kind of exploding a little bit like, oh, wow, this is so different.

When technology was cool.

Right.

It’s like when technology was our friend, you know, it was really that era of, you know, the sort of expansiveness of how it could support, you know, creativity.

So that was so fun to be around.

Chris Lacinak: 13:23

Was there any production that you recall specifically while you were there that was in that transition point into this?

Andrea Kalas: 13:31

Yeah, it was the Prince of Egypt was the first big movie that we were working on.

Chris Lacinak: 13:36

Okay.

Andrea Kalas: 13:37

And it’s a beautiful, beautiful film if you ever get a chance to watch it.

You know, it’s basically it’s the Moses story.

It’s a Ten Commandments story, but in animation.

And you know, just I think that was what I, you know, remember so fondly about it is just the beauty of it and how how much artistry there was in watching that happen.

It didn’t turn out to be the most, you know, the most popular of the early DreamWorks animated films.

You know, Shrek came along closely thereafter.

That was a huge, huge moment.

Interesting.

Yeah.

But but Prince of Egypt was really a rallying point for everyone that worked there in the beginning and how, you know, because we were figuring out the entire pipeline, the workflow, everything as the movie was being made.

So and, you know, it really bonded that group of people, we’re still friends with a lot of those people to this day.

Yeah, it was such a unique, you know, environment.

And what was great for me was, and I think for everyone there was, you could talk to anyone.

You could walk into anybody’s office, any artist, any animator, any executive anywhere, any time.

And anybody would and everyone was really sort of collaborative.

In fact, there were no titles.

That was a big thing.

Interesting.

Early DreamWorks.

Yeah.

And so that was just great for somebody who was trying to just absorb as much information as possible.

Right.

Yeah.

It was a wonderful atmosphere for that.

Chris Lacinak: 15:09

It’s kind of it’s kind of mind blowing to think about, like, at that point in time, the difference in tools, infrastructure, like capabilities, like it’s pretty wild to think about that you were tackling, beginning to tackle those challenges at that point in time.

Different world, different world from today.

Andrea Kalas: 15:28

It wasn’t, it wasn’t.

I mean, I still deal with some of the same issues today.

You know, just sort of, I think, you know, what, what archives and animation have in common is that they have to have a lot of structure.

Right.

And that was where I, you know, sort of find a common core.

Right.

So when you build a pipeline for animation, you have to have a pretty strict file naming convention or, you know, for every sequence scene shot, you know, it because everyone shares and collaborates, goes through a number of departments.

So that tight structure is absolutely necessary for animation to work.

Right.

And so that’s very good for archives.

Yeah.

We like that.

Chris Lacinak: 16:15

And digital asset management.

Andrea Kalas: 16:16

We like structure because then we know what we’re, knowing what we have.

Yeah.

So that was, that was interesting, you know, meeting of the minds.

Chris Lacinak: 16:24

I see that.

And so where, from DreamWorks, what was the next step in your career there?

Andrea Kalas: 16:31

So one of the things I did at DreamWorks was we figured out that, you know, even though the movie takes three years, people need access to materials during that, like marketing and consumer products and things like that.

So these off ramps we created from production into archives also had different approval steps and things like that.

So that, and we actually built out an access portal for people that needed materials into the production.

Okay.

And then I gave another presentation at another Association of Moving Image Archivists conference about this concept of sort of in production archiving and Discovery saw that and they were interested in trying to expand on that because they had the same issue was more around making both a domestic and an international version of some of their big, big programs that that wasn’t enough time for them to do that.

So then I worked for Discovery for a little while and we did that.

We had actual video loggers on set, the logging, some of the videotapes that were being directly after they were shot, put them into a system so that the international people could have access to those materials and create their show.

And we were going to ramp that up a little further and then the bubble burst, right?

And so that program was sort of seen as a luxury rather than a necessity.

And so Discovery, so I sort of moved away from that a little bit and I worked sort of with their stock footage group and things like that.

But it wasn’t the sort of cool program I was hoping to do.

But we did some really great things.

Like we actually had a really early digital dailies system where people could, from their shoot, put this like postage stamp sized little video on the world wide web so that executives could take a look at it.

We had all sorts of bandwidth constraints and problems with that, you know, but we did some really great stuff just sort of experimenting with technology.

Chris Lacinak: 18:42

the dot com bust of the early: 2000

Andrea Kalas: 18:46

Yeah, the dot com.

Chris Lacinak: 18:48

So yeah, that was nascent stages of digital asset management as we know it today, right?

That was the early, I remember coming out to Hollywood and doing the early digital asset management conferences that now I think it’s a Lowes.

It was something else back then.

But anyway, yeah, that was a very exciting time.

Everybody was all psyched up about the possibilities.

Andrea Kalas: 19:06

Yeah.

And right.

And some of the tools for digital asset management were starting to come out.

The video logger we used was out there.

There were other tools that were just starting at that point.

So yeah, trying to understand where they were, you know, and they were really early and they just had some functionality, but trying to work with them.

It was an interesting time.

Chris Lacinak: 19:30

Wow.

Okay.

So UCLA, DreamWorks, Discovery, or Discover.

And then, not Discover, Discovery.

Discover is a credit card.

What next?

Andrea Kalas: 19:42

Then the British Film Institute.

So then I was just, you know, I found out that, you know, that was the position, head of preservation was coming open and that I might have a shot at it.

And that was fascinating to me, right?

To be able to work in such a huge archive, work in a European archive, work with an enormous collection.

So that was an opportunity I didn’t want to miss.

So after, you know, a long time of applying because I was American and it was a British job, I finally, I got that position.

And that was, that was an incredible, you know, that was like a, so here I was with all this high tech stuff, you know, and I go over to the BFI and it’s like, oh, okay, I’m going to go back a couple decades here.

You know, there’s a film lab, very analog.

There’s not much digital anything going on.

And so that was really my job was to transform from analog to digital an entire conservation center.

And that was great too.

It was wonderful.

It was, there were so many great colleagues to work with and try to figure out how to manage things and even retraining people and, you know, because people weren’t even, they weren’t even scanning film yet, right?

They had to get a film scanner.

It was all photochemical.

But it also brought, got me back to my experience from UCLA because I had to deal with photochemical film and photochemical preservation so that it was a great way of, and also I really loved getting back with, with film too.

I have a, you know, connection to movies, I think a little bit more than I do to TV.

But even though I love TV, I work with TV all the time.

I love TV, don’t get me wrong.

TV is great.

But I think it was just more, you know, it’s more interesting to me.

Yeah.

Chris lacinak: 21:45

So you were, you must have been the perfect candidate at that time to bring that mix of skills you had that in-depth hands-on film experience and all of the most modern digital technologies and stuff.

So yeah, I can imagine they looked at you and said, this is the perfect person to come and transform this operation.

That must have been fun.

Andrea Kalas: 22:03

It was a lot of fun.

And it was just incredibly, and not only working with amazing colleagues at the BFI, who I’m also still very close to and still call for, you know, like my colleague, Charles Farrell, who was much more in the, he was a television engineer.

And we used to have these debates all the time, you know, it was sort of film versus television, you know, because they used to be very separate technologically.

Now they’re not, right.

And so just sort of arguing over approaches of preservation, things like that.

They were great.

They were, they were good arguments.

And I still will call them up and argue with them.

Chris Lacinak: 22:44

Hopefully there’s some hellos before the argument starts.

Andrea Kalas: 22:48

Oh yeah, no, no, no.

We’re great, great, great, great friends.

Wonderful friends, you know, I respect him enormously.

So they’re always very, you know, fruitful, fruitful arguments.

That’s great.

So you know, and also just being in Europe was great too, because there were lots of, because that was before Brexit.

So the UK was still involved with, yeah, so with European initiatives.

And so for example, I got involved with, there was a European metadata standard for cinematographic works.

And so, you know, and so I got to be involved with that and worked with people from Germany, France, the Netherlands, you know, on putting together a metadata standard for film, which then got implemented and required by any EU funding and still stands today.

So that was great too, to be involved with those kinds of things and learn a lot from really, really smart people across Europe as well.

So it was not, it was both learning from colleagues in the UK and being involved with, you know, a sort of different approach to, or a rigorous approach, I would say.

Because European archives are really, their client is their government, right?

Because European films and television programs are often funded by the government, that, you know, there’s just, there’s sort of, there’s a closeness to the archives and their funding agencies from the government.

That means, in a way, additional rigor, right?

You have to prove that what you’re doing is really good.

They take it seriously.

So that was a great education as well, in being in that environment and how to really be rigorous about justifying what you’re doing with an archive, transparency about what you’re doing, you know, how to make sure that what you’re doing really makes sense and is both, you know, obviously costs are an issue, but also, you know, what you’re doing is absolutely the best or the right thing to do.

You know, people would research that intensely.

You know, we built a whole new vault while I was there.

And you know, and that was a 25 million pound, you know, investment.

To build a cold vault meant we went into, you know, intense, it was like a five year project of getting- 

Chris Lacinak: 25:28

Yeah, it’s a big deal.

Andrea Kalas: 25:29

Experts from around the world to say, “Why is this temperature and humidity the right one?”

Lots of different, so, but getting that, that’s what I really appreciated that exercise, because it gave me more expertise and it taught me how to be rigorous and do it well.

Chris Lacinak: 25:54

If we fast forward to today, can you talk a little bit about what you’re doing today?

Andrea Kalas: 25:58

So I came back and when I was, heard about the job at Paramount Pictures and I was always interested in working in a Hollywood studio.

I thought that would be, you know, and be the archivist for a Hollywood studio was always interesting to me.

And so when that job came up, I was definitely interested and came back to that.

And so, and I’ve been there for 15 years, which seems amazing to me.

And it’s just been an incredible experience because we had the support of an incredible executive team that also took it seriously.

So, you know, we, you know, we did a, launched a preservation program.

We built out a digital preservation infrastructure.

We’re now working really hard on how, you know, AI and ML can provide discovery to our assets.

So, you know, it just gave me the opportunity to do a really good job and have great colleagues too that are, have made the archive great.

The other great thing about Paramount Pictures archive is that everything’s under one roof.

Different studios will have an archive here, an archive there, but we have stills, props, costumes, music, all the film and tape all under one place.

And more recently, now that we are Paramount Global, I’ve also started taking on CBS archives and the Viacom brand archive.

So expanding that a little bit more.

So that’s why I’m hoarse.

It’s a lot of work.

But it’s all good.

It’s all great.

It’s all, you know, finding ways to preserve and make accessible all these incredible films and television programs.

Chris Lacinak: 27:52

You have digital asset management is in your title.

From this conversation, I would think that you probably like we do for this podcast and the work that we do use a pretty broad interpretation or definition of digital asset management to encompass digital asset, what people traditionally think of as digital asset management, but also digital preservation and digital collections management and those sorts of activities as well.

Is that right?

Andrea Kalas: 28:16

Yeah, I think digital asset management is in my title.

You know, and actually, you know, I sort of go back and forth between asset management and archives because it is sort of, you know, that’s the way to describe.

But I think within that phrase, digital asset management, I think what I interpret that is and I think that means is that you take seriously the fact that you have digital assets, whether it’s a moving image, an image, you know, a document, whatever it is, and you have thought very seriously about how you’re going to make sure that those are around and accessible to your clients.

You know, and your clients can be anybody, right, depending on what kind of organization you are.

An archive is never its own thing.

It always has a client.

My client now is the corporation, right?

The people that work for Paramount Global and all the business units, whether it’s Home Media or Marketing or Theatrical.

Those are my clients.

Right.

When I was in the BFI, my clients would have been the British public.

Right.

So, but every but you need to make sure that your digital asset management system is serving your clients.

So it’s so it’s digital preservation is part of that in in Paramount Pictures because we continue to distribute our films over and over and over and over again.

Right.

So we will hopefully be distributing Godfather for another hundred years.

Chris Lacinak: 29:53

Right.

So Paramount Pictures wants to leverage those assets for as long as possible.

Andrea Kalas: 29:57

We will.

Yeah.

So making sure that preservation is part of it is serving my clients as well as providing access.

So that’s you know, so yes, the the software, the hardware, the functionality, everything that goes into digital asset management is is driven by what what that archives role is within their organization.

Chris Lacinak: 30:18

I want to talk a little bit about you’ve got a theory.

I’ll call it a theory.

I don’t know if you would call it a theory around the relationship between library science and rocket science that I think would be interesting to interject here before we jump in.

Would you mind talking about that a little bit?

Andrea Kalas: 30:32

Yeah, because as we talked about earlier, my experience at UCLA Film and TV Archive and seeing the brilliant minds of Martha Yee and and her team to actually figure out how to create an inventory system for moving image archives and how to really categorize different types of materials.

I mean, this was, you know, this was before any of the protocols that are out there now that people can follow, right, that people do follow for making sure that they’re using the right metadata schema or thinking about what things are considered preservation assets versus reference assets.

None of that was there was no there was no blueprint for that.

And so being around that and knowing that that came from intense research into library science, you know, Martha Yee had a Ph.D. in library science and other things like that, that that that background of the people that first figured out that card catalogs were going to go away if we needed a computer based system and how to classify things and how to work things at this such an important part of the history of technology when it comes to digital asset management.

That you know, and I just think it gets doesn’t get as much love as it should.

So that’s why I talk about library science and rocket science must work together, because I think we we think about sort of the cool stuff, the latest, you know, video format or other sort of cool technology advances which are there, not not short shrifting them, but, you know, to just, you know, pay homage to incredibly hard work of lots of library scientists that have gone before us to to figure out how to build good digital asset management systems.

That’s what I that’s what I mean by that.

Chris Lacinak: 32:32

Thanks for that.

I want to maybe we can touch on terminology real quick.

You have used the term moving image.

We will talk about there’s there’s terminology used in the forums website around cinematic holdings.

We’ve talked about film, we’ve talked about video.

I’d like to parse those a little bit or maybe put some definition around them so that folks listening understand what we’re talking about.

So we talked about moving image, we’re talking about anything with a moving image, video or film.

Tell me tell me if you disagree with any of this.

Andrea Kalas: 33:05

Yeah, no, that’s right.

It’s a catch all for for anything that moves right 

Chris Lacinak: 33:09

So Association of Moving Image Archivists is a catch all for all of those things.

Andrea Kalas: 33:13

Right.

Chris Lacinak: 33:14

The one that I wanted to ask you about was cinematic holdings.

Should we think about that as all film?

Should we think about that as film only produced with the intention of being going through like cinema, commercial cinema sort of thing?

Or how do you think when you talk about cinematic holdings?

How do you think about that?

Andrea Kalas: 33:30

Good question.

I mean, I think, yeah, it is is your question is basically, does it mean that film is only it’s something that actually gets released in the theater?

And I think that’s increasingly not true anymore.

Right.

Because of streaming.

But also, for example.

One of the things that when I got to the BFI, that was amazing.

They had discovered was these early portrait photographers had gone to factory gates and other places where people would come in and set up a camera and then held up a sign said, come and see yourself on the screen later.

And then they would go to a church or a hall of some sort and show these back.

Now, that’s not a proper theater, but I would argue that cinema, you know, so it’s you know, yes, I do think that there is a you know, it’s getting closer and closer.

Like what is a what is the difference between a movie and a TV show now?

Very hard to differentiate.

So but I think that, you know, cinematic holdings still have relevance.

You know, there’s the obvious ones, feature films or films that were distributed in theaters.

And then there’s other things like documentaries or other things that were one piece that are filmic.

I mean, I think the you know, the work that I’ve done with the Academy is based on the fact that Academy is is about film.

It’s about cinema.

It doesn’t, you know, deal with television.

And so even though those those things are melding and becoming closer and closer together, I think there’s still there’s a difference.

Chris Lacinak: 35:13

Is it fair to say that to the extent that there is a distinction between film and cinematic holdings that the work of the Digital Preservation Forum is, you know, if not 100% than 99% relevant to anybody with film and other moving image holdings?

Or is that an inaccurate statement?

Andrea Kalas: 35:35

Yeah, I mean, we’re highly aware that, you know, especially when we’re dealing with digital preservation and the technology associated with it, that, you know, the kinds of things that we’re talking about could absolutely apply to things that were in episodes as well as a long form, right?

So nobody’s tried to fool themselves that it’s only about things that call themselves cinema.

But that’s what, you know, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is mostly focused on, right?

Right.

So that and that’s who’s sponsoring that.

But you know, there is, you know, there is, we’ve had several conversations with the Television Academy, right?

They have a similar group, a Science and Technology Council.

And so, you know, I could see, you know, one day where there’s a much more high collaboration between the two around digital preservation.

Because yeah, the concepts definitely overlap.

Chris Lacinak: 36:29

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Chris Lacinak: 36:58

I’ve kind of jumped the gun a bit because I’ve started to talk about the forum already.

Would you, I guess, let’s just say that you are the Project Co-Chair of the Academy Digital Preservation Forum.

Given the background we just heard, that makes all the sense in the world.

But maybe you could tell us a little bit about how you came to be the Co-Chair and tell us a bit about the work of the forum.

Andrea Kalas: 37:22

Yeah.

So I was on this when I got to be a member of the Academy, I was accepted as a member of the Science and Technology Council.

And one of the reasons I wanted to be part of that council was I wanted to advance the concept of digital preservation, have it taken more seriously.

lemma back in, I think it was: 2007

And it was the first step, but it also said that it was really expensive to do digital preservation and we weren’t ready yet.

And I thought we needed a better message.

So that was really my mission was to say, you know, actually, lots of people are working on digital preservation and it is possible and we need to make sure that we’re talking about it well.

And so that was really my mission by joining the Sci-Tech Council.

And so the committee, which I think was like Digital Preservation Committee or something like that, came up with the idea.

We were going to do a big event and then follow that up with a website, but then COVID happened and then we focused on the website first.

And so the website really is, it is a forum.

It is a place for people to go.

There is an area on the website where anyone can post anything, have discussions and things like that.

That is the purpose of it, to understand that there are real complexities when it comes to digital preservation, to have a place where people can watch some videos about different topics around digital preservation, to comment, to add new articles, to however they are, to have a place where whoever you are, even though it’s very much, you know, from sort of an Academy standpoint, so entertainment industry based, cinema based, still, I think it’s open enough for anybody that’s interested in digital preservation, especially moving images and digital preservation in general, to have a place to go and learn more and hopefully, you know, sort of talk amongst themselves, train each other on what the best practices are so that we can continue, you know, to have good digital preservation of so many movies that are created digitally, that are really great works of art that need that kind of attention.

Chris Lacinak: 39:55

that came out, I think it was: 2007

And I wonder if you could just give us a background around that.

So maybe tell us, you know, for folks that aren’t acquainted with film, maybe just explain a little bit more when you say photochemical, what you mean.

And then could you give us a brief history of like how that’s evolved and where we are today with the film versus digital on the preservation front?

Andrea Kalas: 40:53

You know, it’s interesting.

It takes me back to, you know, when I first worked at UCLA and we had this rallying cry, “Nitrate won’t wait,” right?

o deteriorate before the year: 2000

And so dutifully, many archives did put it on to acetate film, which then we discovered also deteriorates really quickly.

But you know, it’s interesting, like that time was film wasn’t really a trustworthy source in a way, you know, that could deteriorate, that was scary.

Fast forward to now where film is like, that’s the answer, right?

It’s still, people are now suspicious, very suspicious of digital.

And so I hear this all the time, like, why?

Just preserve it on film?

What’s your problem?

You know, that’s work, that’s the archival standard, that’s what we should do.

And you know, I just don’t think it’s that simple.

You know, there’s, for example, you know, audio, there’s not really that well, great of a way to preserve audio that’s digital onto some sort of photochemical format anymore, right?

That technology is starting to, it’s sunsetting.

Mag isn’t made anymore, it’s not there anymore.

There are things that are really inherently digital, like effects that need to be treated digitally.

And so I think that that feeling, it’s something that I always encounter and a lot of people will push back on that.

You know, I remember sitting in the room with the then president of the Academy, John Bailey, who said out loud, you know, isn’t digital preservation an oxymoron?

So there’s always been this very big concern that digital is not trustworthy for the long term, that, you know, it’s going to go into the ether and things like that.

And that’s the biggest, one of the biggest challenges for digital preservation.

How can you be a trustworthy guardian of assets in your asset management system?

And I know it’s something that all of us have to manage on an ongoing basis because it’s not, you know, I think there’s a perception that you put a piece of film on a shelf and everything’s fine.

Well, actually, that’s not necessarily true.

You still have to have a really good vault.

You have to maintain that vault.

You have to make sure that you re-can that film, possibly occasionally.

You have to have archivists to make sure your inventory is okay.

It’s not without its own maintenance.

Same with, and with digital, it is more complicated.

There’s a lot more, but it’s, I think it’s, it’s the unknown and not knowing and not enough people knowing how to really dig in and insist with their technology partners to put this functionality in, et cetera.

When we did our digital preservation infrastructure at Paramount, I had a lot of, again, good battles and arguments with the infrastructure team, the people that oversaw network and storage, because I wanted to know where within that storage system that asset lived within my digital asset management system.

And I wanted to set up annual health checks automatically.

And that involved people that dealt with infrastructure systems that were really opaque and asking them to make them more transparent inside a digital asset management system was something new to them.

So I think that’s part of it as well, is that it’s that understanding of what you need for digital asset management system to make it trustworthy, to make it robust.

I think the more people become educated by that, and frankly, the younger the colleagues are in this space, I think that will become more of a, and it already has, there’s already plenty of really smart people doing this in our field.

So I think that’s the, that may be the tension about photochemical versus digital, but it still exists.

It hasn’t, it’s still a concern and it still is there.

And you know, and this binary approach of either or is the other silly part of it, right?

I love film.

I built two great film vaults that are the best they can be so that I can preserve that original film.

I love seeing beautiful print made in ideal conditions.

You know, my passion and my affection for film is alive.

Just because I like digital preservation and also appreciate films that were made digitally doesn’t mean I started hating film.

And you know, so I think that’s the other thing is sometimes people, that either or thing is…

Chris Lacinak: 46:17

You have to hold two thoughts in your head at the same time.

Andrea Kalas: 46:20

Yeah, like, yeah, we can do that, you know?

And so I think it’s interesting.

And so it’s something that it’s just an ongoing, it’s awareness, it’s understanding, and I think it’s trust too.

Trust in archivists and institutions to handle digital objects well.

And maybe we need to do a better job at showing that it’s possible and it’s done every day across tons of industries.

You know, maybe that’s our job in this space to show we are trustworthy repository advocates.

Chris Lacinak: 47:02

So is Paramount Pictures an aberration in the entertainment industry as far as the embracing of digital preservation?

Or is that the norm these days?

Andrea Kalas: 47:11

Not at all, no.

And that’s one of the wonderful things about building up the site, the Academy Digital Preservation Forum, was I decided to, you know, as…

Wanted to build a site that was going to have content and who was going to be my sort of editorial board for that content, right?

And so I assembled people from Warner Brothers, Sony, Fox, now Disney, to be that group of people.

We called it the Curatorial Working Group.

And they’re all listed on the site.

So I would bring these topics to that group.

It was one of my…

The best parts of the pandemic, it was like every Friday we had these discussions about, you know, and it was this chance for us to really discuss these issues between ourselves and show that across that group, the sort of studio group, that there were a lot of really best practices.

There were a lot of things that people really take seriously about digital preservation.

So, you know, and that was…

So that’s what the site also represents, is that collective thinking and considered approach to digital preservation.

Chris Lacinak: 48:27

I can see that being useful for sure.

Let’s sidebar on another kind of terminological thing here.

I think I use the term entertainment industry.

How do you think about who the entertainment industry is today?

When I think about it from my perspective, yours obviously in it, as I’ll call myself an outsider, the blurring of lines between both the, you know, entertainment industry versus big tech, as well as just like the blooming of the entertainment industry across the globe, right?

We used to think of entertainment industry really being Hollywood centric.

Now there’s major cinematic industries throughout the world.

How do you think about who the entertainment industry is today?

Andrea Kalas: 49:14

I mean, first and foremost, I think that, you know, the sort of the traditional studios, the big studios have definitely been challenged by the streaming services, right?

By Netflix and Amazon and now Apple.

And so that’s the biggest challenge to that model, right?

And that’s, they are definitely part of the entertainment industry now.

So that is where that it’s definitely, that’s where our entertainment is funded and made and those, you know, that’s, that is, you know, sort of the biggest industry just in terms of sheer output, right?

That those streaming services have met the studios at that level.

You know, so that’s, that’s one part, but yes, there’s, there’s every country has, you know, some sort of entertainment industry of their own, right?

So that’s the other wider part is that, you know, we know more and more about, you know, international output than we ever had before, which is exciting, right?

We’re not, we’re not in a world where American entertainment industry is the only industry anymore.

So that’s, that’s the other part of the global.

And then beyond that, of course, there’s people that are creating entertainment every day with their cell phones, right?

You could say, you could argue that that sort of, you know, web 2.0, , 2.5, 3.0, whatever entertainment industry, right?

Of TikTok and Instagram and everything like that.

That’s arguably an industry in and of itself.

So so it’s, you know, yeah, it’s, it’s certainly not the big five studios making movies and everybody else has to bow down anymore at all.

You know, it’s changed massively.

Chris Lacinak: 50:59

Let me ask another question that kind of dives into maybe more of the traditional big five or, you know, traditional entertainment industry.

In my experience, what I’ve seen, and this is, I’m thinking here about kind of the distinction between rights holders and ownership versus who holds the physical materials or digital materials on their servers.

What I’ve seen is that through mergers and acquisitions, transfer and ownership of collections, that oftentimes the physical materials may have never actually gotten inventoried and moved.

So something that’s owned by one entity, A over here, who is leveraging their ownership, they’re licensing it out.

The physical materials or the digital files may live still at the previous entity who held it.

And it seems like in a lot of ways, those business, there’s just been a collegiality.

Hey, oh, we have this thing, you know, do you have it?

Can you send it to us?

That has made that okay.

It hasn’t been, you know, in the short term for the purpose of doing business, that seems to be okay.

But when you think about digital, well, preservation period, whether it be digital or physical, that seems problematic.

And I don’t know, you know, is that, is that problem so small as to be negligible or is that a larger problem that exists out there that has to be grappled with?

Andrea Kalas: 52:17

It’s really interesting because sometimes I think, okay, when the all world’s archives are digitized, right?

And perhaps they’re, you know, sort of available in the cloud or on some sort of on-prem server storage that, you know, you could really just hand the keys over, right?

You don’t have to move the assets anymore.

Right?

And yet we do, we do move, we do, you know, Paramount had Marvel for a while, you know, when Disney purchased Marvel, we went through an enormous project of, you know, identifying all inventory and moving all inventory digital and physical over to Disney, you know, I have a binder like this thick of everything we, you know, went through to do that.

So it does, it still does matter that where your holdings are, but to your point too of, you know, other material, different libraries owned by different companies.

It doesn’t make sense.

Paramount movies made between: 1929 

Paramount owns the Republic Library, you know, Warner Brothers has RKO, early MGM.

So there’s, you know, different library acquisitions make it a little more complicated too.

But yeah, I still, I think, you know, I’ve not worked with people.

I’ve always known that we get the materials when we need to distribute them.

I’ve not had that experience that you’re talking about.

Chris Lacinak: 53:45

I don’t want to start spreading rumors here.

Maybe I’m…

Andrea Kalas: 53:48

No, no, no, it’s fine.

I’m sure it happens.

It’s just not been my experience.

Chris Lacinak: 53:52

I guess that just made me think about like the, that this term about entities that have cinematic holdings may have cinematic holdings that, you know, in partial or in whole may or may not have rights to actually leverage, which brings in like the business angle.

Right.

And I guess I wonder, you’ve given us some great insights into the complexities around some of the technical things around digital preservation, but what the forum makes clear.

And I think what those digital dilemma made clear, and at the same time there was the Blue Ribbon Task Force on Digital Preservation, Digital Preservation, Sustainability and Access, something like that.

They all focused on the business side as being like, I think maybe the main driver.

And I wonder what’s your assessment of what the business complexity looks like with regard to digital preservation.

You’ve touched on it a bit, but can you give us in the same way you’ve given us some insights into the technical complexities, like what is the business side look like of digital preservation?

Andrea Kalas: 54:52

Well, so, you know, again, I look at what’s my role, right?

So my role as an archive for Paramount is to make sure that I’m preserving the materials for which we have what I call substantial rights.

That’s my phrase.

I made it up.

And so that means if there, we have rights worldwide in perpetuity, all media, then that’s a movie I’m going to preserve.

If we have rights in the US only, but it’s also forever, yeah, that’s worth it.

Because my company, you know, can benefit from that long-term holding of that physical, of that materials, right?

So we might acquire something for two years and distribute it, and then it goes back to a rights holder.

I’m not going to preserve that.

That’s somebody else’s property, right?

So it really is based on ownership.

And I do think, you know, and that’s where my focus is.

And I feel that’s an obligation of rights holders too, to look after the materials they preserve and restore, which doesn’t always happen.

You know, and there are, of course, not-for-profit archives that hold materials for which they don’t own the rights.

And that collaboration between rights owner and, you know, a non-profit archive is, you know, usually good, can be fraught, you know, that’s another part of this project as well.

I mean, we’re, Paramount gave the Library of Congress silent films back in the ’60s and ’70s because there was no concept of an archive, right?

And so, you know, that history plays into that, right?

When did we start actually caring about archives?

Maybe a little too late, right?

So those are complexities of the business too, where there wasn’t the funding, there wasn’t the interest in taking care of archives because the business wouldn’t take care of it.

That’s part of the equation as well.

Chris Lacinak: 56:55

From your perspective, what’s the bigger challenge, technology or finance or business?

Andrea Kalas: 57:02

I mean, I think no matter where you are, whether you’re in a studio or you’re in a not-for-profit archive, and I’ve worked in both, right?

You know, the phrase, “Everyone loves an archive until they have to pay for it,” applies, right?

So, you know, if you need the technology and you need to pay for the technology.

You need the vaults and you need to pay for the vaults.

You need the staff and you need to pay for the staff.

So figuring out how to make sure you’re making the best case for the archive is probably always the biggest challenge.

And when I talk to people in university classes, I say, “If you don’t like advocacy, you may want to pick another field.”

Right?

Because if you don’t feel like you’re, if you want to just sit somewhere and catalog something and everybody’s going to leave you alone, you know, that may be your perception of archiving.

But the reality is you constantly have to think, “Okay, let me, while I’m talking to this person, I’m going to collect this use case so that when I’m up against my finance person I can say, ‘This is why I’m doing this because this makes money or this helps our marketing or this does this.'”

You know, so you have to constantly be looking at, “All right, can we do it this way?

Can we do it this way?

Is this cheaper?

If we save some money here, can we spend it there?”

That always, always, always, that’s a big part of the archival project is making sure you’re speaking well about the importance of what you’re doing.

You know, I’m sure that my finance people are tired of hearing me saying, “Well, if we don’t have that asset, the revenue would be zero.”

Chris Lacinak: 58:51

Good argument.

Andrea Kalas: 58:52

I’m sure they’re sick of hearing me say that, right?

But that’s the, you know, no matter how you’re going to implement your archive strategy with technology or physical vaults or whatever it is, it’s about advocating for why you should do it.

Chris Lacinak: 59:09

That’s a perfect segue to the next question I have for you, which is kind of about the why.

You pointed out, you know, Paramount Pictures has an interest in preserving the Godfather because they want to monetize it 100 years from now too, right?

This is an asset that they want to continue to monetize, and that makes perfect sense.

But could you give us a fuller picture of the why?

Why is it important?

You know, and let’s just focus on the cinematic holdings of the organizations that are in the Digital Preservation Forum, as an example, and not that you speak on behalf of all of them.

But just in general, why is it important?

Other than the long-term monetization argument to preserve these holdings?

Andrea Kalas: 59:45

Look, I think anybody in any entertainment organization would recognize that there’s a cultural aspect to it too, that you do have within your holdings.

You know, I do think that movies are the greatest art form ever created.

You know, they have it all.

They have music, they have art, they have cinematography.

There’s, you know, I do think that there is an understanding that there’s a cultural responsibility even within a business, right?

That may be easier for a not-for-profit to talk about as part of their advocacy thing.

Within a business, that could be a little trickier, right?

Because they’re always just about the bottom line.

But I do think that there’s that part of it.

And I think that, you know, and one of the things I always sort of get called, you know, in on is historical aspects of the studio, right?

So that becomes relevant for marketing or for our corporate branding concepts or just generally talking about where Paramount Pictures comes from, where does it fit in the history of the entertainment industry?

You know, how these things happen.

And I think that part of it, and that’s something similar that you see across corporate archives generally, right?

Whether you work for Coca-Cola or Ford or, you know, there’s other, you know, big corporate archives that realize that that legacy of how they’ve built their business and the products or the things that they’ve created have enormous, you know, sort of relevance to their corporate brand and their corporate identity, but also are really interesting things to preserve among themselves, you know?

I remember seeing, you know, my colleague at Ford, you know, some of the incredible designs for cars that have been done by these amazing designers over the years.

And you know, fantastic.

Why would you throw that out?

It’s so important.

Yeah.

And I think people feel that way too within businesses to see that contribution that company made, that intervention in culture, that intervention in innovation is remembered.

So that’s another part of it.

Chris Lacinak: 62:02

Should we trust the entertainment industry to bear that burden or, you know, take that on to be the stewards of preserving these culturally important materials?

Andrea Kalas: 62:13

Yeah, no, I think it’s a good question.

You know, I think, you know, when I first started working at UCLA Film and TV Archive, you know, the studios were the baddies.

You know, they were the ones that let things not be taken care of.

I mean, UCLA Film and TV Archive was started because Paramount was getting rid of a lot of nitrate film because it was going to be illegal to keep it on the lot.

You know?

Chris Lacinak: 62:36

For those who don’t know, maybe we should tell people why that was.

You mentioned nitrate earlier.

Andrea Kalas: 62:41

k made, used very much before: 1950

Chris Lacinak: 63:02

That’s why it was not allowed on the lot.

Andrea Kalas: 63:05

It was a fire risk.

Right.

It was a fire risk.

So, and UCLA went and like literally picked up all the nitrate and took care of it.

So that’s how, you know, so that history of studios not caring is going to be with us forever.

Right.

I think, you know, we’ve definitely turned the tide on that and made it, you know, obviously there’s great restorations coming out of all the studios right now.

Every studio built has built vaults.

Every studio is now really engaged with digital preservation.

So I think there has definitely been a switch, major switch through those, from those days.

But you know, it’s a legacy that’s hard to beat.

Right.

It’s a legacy that is not proud.

As a result, you know, there’s a lot of silent films that are stored in the Santa Monica Bay, you know.

So that’s hard to get over.

Yeah.

And I think that’s the other reason for that.

Another sort of impetus of the Academy Digital Preservation Forum is let’s turn that on its head a little bit.

Chris Lacinak: 64:06

Yeah.

So the Academy clearly has taken on some responsibility by giving a home to the Digital Preservation Forum.

So is there a larger role for the Academy to play in the digital preservation or supporting or leading thought leadership of any sort?

Is the Forum the manifestation of that or is there something bigger, do you think?

Andrea Kalas: 64:27

I mean, the Academy is not a standards body, right?

So they’re not going to insist that the entertainment industry follow a particular model for digital preservation.

That’s just not their role.

They don’t see it as their role, you know.

And I can’t speak completely for the Academy, you know, I’m an Academy member that’s on the SciTech Council doing something I think is, you know, is important for film archives, right?

So and that’s great that the Academy lets its members do that, right?

They’re letting the members have a voice in some of the important issues of the day, whether it’s, you know, talking about diversity and inclusion.

Members are very important, you know, including that.

They’re giving them a voice that way.

Or whether it’s, you know, they had a big conference on AI and ML recently that crosses all the branches, giving them a voice.

So that’s what the Academy really does well, I think, is not insist on do it the Academy way, but say, we’ve got all these smart members.

They have a clue.

Let’s allow them to help by, you know, giving them that ability.

So that’s the role I think the Academy plays really well.

Chris Lacinak: 65:43

Who makes up the folks that are on the, I mean, the Forum itself, I think is open to, is it open to the public as far as who can engage on the Forum?

But there’s a working group or a group of contributors that are listed on the site under our team.

Who is the makeup of that group?

How did they, how did the group come to be formed?

And I guess just, I’m just trying to wonder, like, what are the skills, the expertise, the breadth of experience that is, that’s on the team there?

Andrea Kalas: 66:10

So mostly it’s what I talked about earlier, right?

When I decided that, you know, out of, so there’s a small working group that are SciTech Council members and others that are interested.

But you know, for that, that Curatorial Working Group I mentioned earlier, which are people from the different studios that are in roles similar to myself that meet regularly and talk about the issues of digital preservation and decide where we’re going and what things we want to tackle.

So that’s really what it is, is trying to collect up, you know, the people that are dealing, are on the front lines of this.

And have them be the people that are vetting ideas that would go to the Forum to what’s important to talk about, what should we do?

What video should we shoot next to put up there?

What’s critical about what we’re thinking about?

Chris Lacinak: 67:04

If you fast forwarded, you’re at a dinner with your colleagues on the Forum and you’re toasting to the successes of the Forum.

I guess, what’s your hopes, your dreams?

What have you accomplished at the point at which you say, yes, we’ve done it, you know, cheers.

What do you think the Forum can accomplish?

Andrea Kalas: 67:19

You know, I think, I still feel like we have a lot to do.

I feel like we’ve just started.

I feel like there’s, you know, there’s still a lot of, you know, I still, you know, I think people are still scratching their heads like, what is digital preservation?

I don’t get it.

You know, I don’t know if we’ve really answered this.

I feel like we still have loads of work to do.

I think there’s great stuff on the Forum for people to learn from, you know, but it’s complicated.

There’s not this one answer for digital preservation.

You just have to put this switch and you’re done.

Right.

And I think that’s, so a complex message is always a difficult one to get across.

Yeah.

Right.

And so, how we, you know, success for me would mean that digital asset management systems would have digital preservation baked into them no matter where they were.

They don’t right now.

Right.

That’d be great.

If you bought a digital asset management system off the shelf, you would always know you would have a protocol that would make sure your assets were preserved.

That would be success.

That would be one version of success for me.

Right.

Or that, you know, or everybody that’s ever making a moving image has a plan for how they’re going to make sure that those assets are replicated, that they are validated annually, that you can find them easily.

You know, that if everybody had a plan to do that, that would look like success.

I think we still have a long way to go.

Chris Lacinak: 68:44

Yeah.

And digital preservation, I think, is deceitful in the sense that it is so simple in many ways and so complicated in others.

Right.

I mean, the basics, the fundamentals on the technological side are pretty straightforward.

I think there’s some strong basic business arguments for why it makes sense.

You laid out many of those today.

There’s cultural reasons, but it does get really complex really quickly when you dive into the details.

So, yeah.

How important is it that the major players in, let’s say, the studios, the holders of cinematic collections, do essentially the same thing with regard to their outputs?

Obviously, they’re going to have different workflows.

There’s going to be different little nitty gritty details that are going to be different.

That doesn’t matter much.

But file format choices, maybe digitization technology.

How important is it that that’s similar or not?

Andrea Kalas: 69:42

I think the way that if people can do things in a more similar way, what’s helpful about that is it’s not as confusing.

For example, one of the things we’re working on right now is this concept of what’s called the picture preservation package.

Right?

So, at the end of a film, when you’re working with a post house, they output what would be called a digital intermediate.

Well, now there’s all sorts of different names for these different versions of digital intermediates.

NAMS, GAMS, consolidated archives, all these different kinds of things.

And so, both post production people who are finishing the film as well as the facilities where they’re being done, it’s like, “Oh, God.

Why can’t they decide on one thing?

There are all these different versions, and I have to make this for this studio and that for this studio and that.”

So, that’s confusing, and it could mean more mistakes are made or it’s not done well.

So, if there’s a similar process, I think that helps everybody.

Everybody can just point to it and go, “That’s what I want.

Please do that.”

And if we can also make that easy to be created by working with some of the software vendors that create the DIs, then it’s allowing people to make preservation assets a little easier and there’s more potential for them to be made.

So, I think that it’s not a standard.

It’s not insisting anything.

It’s just like, “Here’s something.

If we could all agree on this, make it up.”

Chris Lacinak: 71:19

You’ve just touched on something there that I think is interesting.

From my perspective, I work with lots of media and entertainment folks, but it’s not what I do all day, every day.

I work with a lot of different verticals.

So, what I see is that, I mean, you talked about vendors and that just made me think.

My observation has been that there is a closer collaboration between archives, digital assets, holders of content and digital assets and vendors in the media and entertainment world than there is other places.

I don’t know if you can comment on whether that’s true or not.

You’ve been in a variety of verticals too, but I guess I wonder, how do you see that relationship fostering the ultimate goal of digital preservation?

Chris Lacinak: 72:04

It’s like anything else within a business.

Sometimes you want to do it internally.

Sometimes you want to outsource it.

People outsource all sorts of different things.

Some people outsource their entire media supply chain to a company.

When they’re finished with it, they hand it over to somebody to make sure it gets out to all the different final clients that it needs to get out to.

Conform all the languages, they do all that work.

Other people don’t.

Other people do it in-house.

Certainly within feature film and television production, the post house is almost always an outside vendor.

They might have colorists that the director prefers.

It’s very important to maintain that relationship.

That integration between different vendors.

There’s certain things that it would be difficult for us to insource too.

People that do localization, they have linguists all over the world and things like that.

There’s some work that’s impossible for everybody to take in-house.

That’s constantly being looked at and revised.

Technology is a big part of that.

If you can do it simpler and there’s technology that makes things not as complicated as it used to be, it’s constantly going back and forth.

There’s also outsourcing of archives too.

People will have a vendor that will do digital preservation for them.

That’s another possibility.

Yeah, it’s part of the landscape generally, I would say.

Chris Lacinak: 73:57

They are an important stakeholder at the table in the conversation, it seems.

Andrea Kalas: 74:02

They are.

Yeah.

Chris Lacinak: 74:04

When I look at the list of folks that are on the Curatorial Working Group and you have folks listed as additional contributors, it seems like you’ve got …

We’ve touched on finance.

It seems like you’ve got people that are executives.

You’ve got people that are technology-centric.

I think it’s fair to say some vendors, I don’t know if that’s an accurate assessment or not, is that folks that are- 

Andrea Kalas: 74:23

Yeah, there’s not as many vendors as there could be.

That’s a discussion too.

It’s kind of tricky with the Academy because they don’t want to be shown as supporting one business over another.

That’s a tricky part.

If we had an event, which we’re talking about doing right now, and that would be definitely one topic that I would love to have is more people from post houses really having …

Because there’s really smart, great people with all sorts of great innovations going on all the time.

Yeah.

They’re part of the conversation, absolutely.

Chris Lacinak: 75:01

Switching a little bit, I guess I wonder, should people think about this being a US-centric thing or is this a global endeavor, the Forum that is?

Andrea Kalas: 75:10

I think because it’s the academy, it’s Los Angeles, because it’s traditionally tied to the studios, it’s definitely been US in its concept now.

Although we did have …

There are other members of the Academy that are now coming in.

On the group right now is somebody from India, somebody from the Netherlands.

That’s a bias, but it’s not exclusive.

Trying to get a wider perspective on it is absolutely essential.

Yeah, I would love to see …

That’s our biggest challenge right now is how do we get more involvement.

Right?

How do we …

We can’t invite everybody into a curatorial working group.

Right.

We want to focus them on the Forum, but how do we get people interested and engaged and active in that?

That’s what we set it up for, right?

So it could be wider.

It could be a broader group.

That’s partly why I’m doing this podcast, is to get the word out about it, because that’s why we want people.

We want everybody’s input.

We want to hear what we’re doing right, what we’re doing wrong.

What can we do better?

How can we …

What other issues are we not thinking about?

So we want that feedback.

Chris Lacinak: 76:32

Who should pay attention to the Forum?

It sounds like it’s not just folks with cinematic holdings, not just people in the US.

Who do you think that the content and the subject matter is relevant for?

Andrea Kalas: 76:44

I would love to see ultimately more people that own the purse strings for archives be much more aware of archives.

I would love to have the forum reach even up to that level.

That would be my ideal.

But I think, obviously, filmmakers, archivists are an obvious one.

We mentioned vendors like post-production houses.

I’d love to see them much more engaged with it.

Technologists, people who are building things, right?

It would be great if a cloud company came to us and said, “Hey, we’re thinking about how to do digital preservation in the cloud.

What do you think?”

That hasn’t happened yet.

I’d love to see that happen.

That’s where I think as broad a possible audience of stakeholders would be amazing.

Chris Lacinak: 77:40

Well it’s come to the time where I ask the final question that I ask all the guests on the DAM Right Podcast, which is, what’s the last song that you added to your favorites playlist?

Andrea Kalas: 77:54

Probably something from ’70s funk.

That’s really where I go all the time, or disco.

Chris Lacinak: 78:02

Give us one of your favorites.

We’ve got a podcast playlist that is assembles as all of these.

Just give us one of your favorites.

Andrea Kalas: 78:08

All right.

Let’s see.

Gloria Gaynor, “I Will Survive.”

Chris Lacinak: 78:14

All right.

Love it.

That’s a very suitable song.

Love that.

That should be the theme song.

Andrea Kalas: 78:19

In the realm of preservation, right?

Chris Lacinak: 78:21

I love that.

Well, Andrea, thank you so much for taking the time to talk with us today.

It’s been fascinating.

I could talk for two more hours.

I want to just dive into just your career path.

That’s fascinating.

That’s so cool.

I love it that you joined me today.

I really appreciate all the insights and just everything you brought to the table.

Thank you.

Andrea Kalas: 78:42

It was a pleasure talking to you, Chris.

Thanks for your time.

Chris Lacinak: 78:44

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