LumaForge and Lucid Technology Combine Forces

Leveraging the price/performance value of commodity PC servers and workstations with the enterprise strength of ZFS file sharing software, LumaForge, LLC and Lucid Technology, Inc. combine forces to provide M&E clients with a cost-effective shared storage solution.

The LumaZAN collaborative workflow platform delivers shared storage across a data network that unites artist workstations with back-end servers in an affordable total workflow solution.

CEO of LumaForge, Neil Smith observes: “The demand for reliable and cost-effective shared storage for digital content workflows is only going to grow. Hollywood and the M&E industry are rapidly moving to a 4K acquisition and finishing pipeline. As resolution, frame rates and the sheer volume of digital content increases, the demand for cost-effective shared storage solutions is going to increase exponentially. We’ve spent many years working closely mastering the ‘knack of workflow optimization’ in order to deliver maximum performance with maximum ROI. The result of the extensive fieldwork with our customers is the LumaZAN collaborative workflow platform. LumaZAN provides open IT solutions that combine hardware, software and middleware in ways that are incredibly well suited and cost-effective for digital content pipelines.“

At the core of the LumaZAN solution platform is the LucidNAS shared storage file system from Lucid Technology. LucidNAS storage software is built on a UNIX foundation that includes ZFS, an enterprise file system. ZFS brings a wealth of benefits to the LucidNAS storage solution, including native I/O pooling, end-to-end data integrity, and unlimited snapshot capabilities. And to further increase the software utility, Lucid Technology adds a data management front-end for organizing and administering all aspects of the unified storage solution.

Vadim Carter, president, Lucid, explains the importance of ZFS as part of the LucidNAS file sharing architecture: “Traditional FC SANs are expensive to install and difficult to maintain for small to medium M&E companies. Our unique LucidNAS GUI interface allows customers to install, set-up and manage their LucidNAS storage pools with the minimum amount of hassle. ZFS is a modern 21st century storage architecture that provides high performance scalability with solid data integrity that just cannot be found in any alternative approach. The LucidNAS unique Hybrid Storage Pool architecture automatically caches data on RAM or SSDs to provide optimal performance and exceptional efficiency, while ensuring that data remains safely stored on reliable and high capacity hard-disk drive storage pools.“

By leveraging the hybrid storage pool architecture of LucidNAS, the LumaZAN collaborative workflow platform allows post-production facilities, VFX houses and studios to benefit from the price/performance value of commodity hardware and the functionality of COTS (Commercial Off The Shelf) applications from companies like Autodesk, Adobe, Apple, Avid, Blackmagic Design and The Foundry. Many of these desktop tools are being re-architected to take advantage of OpenCL and high powered GPUs. LumaForge is working closely with the software companies and AMD to ensure that the LumaZAN collaboration platform incorporates the advances in open IT and GPU technology.

“Open IT standards like ZFS, Unix and OpenCL are critical to sustaining the technological innovation taking place in M&E market,” says Smith. “The days of single vendor proprietary lock-in are over. Customers increasingly want freedom of choice over their strategic hardware and software platforms. The LumaZAN collaboration platform means that customers can choose the hardware, software and networking combination that best meets their budgetary and performance requirements., The added advantage of the LumaZAN platform is that we never hold your data hostage. At any time, your valuable data and video files can easily be moved to any other ZFS platform at the drop of a hat.“