Live Production

A tailored solution for rapidly growing storage and media management needs

Adlib revolutionises video production workflow with ELEMENTS

Topic
Transforming video production efficiency
Project
Adlib
Location
Knowsley, UK
Challenge
Transform efficiency, enable seamless collaboration, scalable storage, and faster content creation for large-scale projects
System used
ONE and Media Library

Adlib, a major player and leading name in the live events and audio-visual industry, has built a reputation for delivering exceptionally high-quality work with a tailored and personable approach. Known for their innovative solutions, forward-thinking vision, and exceptional service, Adlib’s expertise and professionalism are highly sought after, and on any given day the team could be working on an arena tour highlight reel, a mini-documentary for a groundbreaking AV installation, motion graphics for digital signage, and internal training videos. The sheer variety and scale of content created a strain on existing storage systems, which quickly became inadequate in terms of capacity, speed, and searchability.

The team also struggled with inefficiencies in reusing footage. Their small, shared NAS storage system made playback slow and searching for specific clips cumbersome. Editors needed an intuitive way to organise, tag, and retrieve media efficiently, especially as projects often required revisiting older footage. As demand for high-quality video content increased it became clear that Adlib required a smarter, faster, and more scalable solution to support its growing workload and creative ambitions.

The appropriate tools for the task

After evaluating potential options, Adlib chose ELEMENTS for its superior speed, scalability, and advanced media management capabilities. The ELEMENTS ONE provided an initial storage capacity of 196TB, with the flexibility to expand as the company’s needs grew. Key features, including the WebUI interface and Media Library, offered a comprehensive solution for Adlib’s storage, workflow, and collaboration challenges.

To ensure the solution aligned with their technical requirements, Adlib’s team worked carefully to identify a detailed list of needs. ELEMENTS emerged as the only platform capable of meeting every specification, offering high-speed access to multiple workstations, advanced tagging and automation tools, and seamless project organisation.

Brad Kavanagh, Adlib’s Creative Manager, explains, „For us, the ELEMENTS platform made the most sense because of its speed, management, and scalability. We required high speeds to multiple workstations, the ability to organise footage and projects, the ability to search our footage catalogue, and the ability to hand off tasks such as transcoding and workflow management to a smart system. And with the ELEMENTS ONE and the WebUI, we were blown away by how it could provide us this plus much, much more.”

Kavanagh adds, “The ELEMENTS platform has completely transformed the way we work, providing a seamless and efficient experience from the moment we power on our workstations. Gone are the frustrations of dropped frames, unplugging drives, or dismounting volumes, these issues are now a thing of the past.”

With Adlib’s team handling terabytes of footage every week across a wide variety of projects, the platform’s tagging, custom fields, and automation systems have been invaluable. These tools not only extend the lifecycle of footage but also simplify the editing process significantly. From the moment footage is ingested, it’s meticulously logged with custom tags detailing everything from the staff members featured and their actions to the locations and products involved. 

Kavanagh expands on this, “If we’re producing a product endorsement video for a specific lighting console, our editors can instantly locate clips of the right person, performing the right task, in the right venue, using the exact product we need. This precision and ease of access have revolutionised content creation, opening up limitless possibilities for our marketing efforts. When paired with the custom fields feature, ELEMENTS also allows us to seamlessly track edits and versioning. This gives our video production team complete visibility into every project’s status, helping us monitor progress, streamline approvals, and execute edits faster than ever before. ELEMENTS has become an indispensable tool for elevating our workflow and ensuring we deliver high-quality content with speed and efficiency.”

The ELEMENTS platform has completely transformed the way we work, providing a seamless and efficient experience from the moment we power on our workstations. Gone are the frustrations of dropped frames, unplugging drives, or dismounting volumes, these issues are now a thing of the past.

Brad Kavanagh, Creative Manager, Adlib

Making a difference

Adlib has full confidence in ELEMENTS as a platform capable of evolving alongside advancements in technology and industry trends, and the team is consistently impressed by how ELEMENTS introduces tools and innovations they hadn’t initially realised they needed. Each WebUI update often delivers a new feature that significantly enhances their workflow and processes.

Kavanagh supports this, stating, „I think for us, the relationship we have developed with ELEMENTS has been key to our development. And the passionate, supportive, and friendly team they have really are a credit to them. It’s amazing to work with a company that pushes such innovative solutions, but for them to also be affable and friendly is such a bonus. The team has been an excellent collaborator with our in-house IT and technical team. Upon installation, the communication with the team was excellent, making sure we had everything in place for the system to be installed. And ever since, the support has been tremendous.”

These enhancements played a pivotal role in delivering one of Adlib’s largest projects to date, The Making of Live Events, an educational video resource, aimed at universities and young people, which utilised over 3,000 clips managed entirely through the ELEMENTS tagging system and Davinci Resolve client. To date the video has over 150K views on YouTube.

Moving forward Adlib are working on exciting installations, such as the Kelpies monument, Bletchley Park and Manchester’s new ‚Aviva Studios‘ as well as tours for The Courteeners, Becky Hill and Sam Fender.

I think for us, the relationship we have developed with ELEMENTS has been key to our development. And the passionate, supportive, and friendly team they have really are a credit to them.

Brad Kavanagh, Creative Manager, Adlib

The future is Adlib

Adlib is confident in ELEMENTS’ ability to evolve alongside industry advancements. As artificial intelligence becomes increasingly integrated into video production workflows, Adlib looks forward to seeing how ELEMENTS will incorporate tools like transcription and translation to further enhance efficiency. With regular updates introducing new features and innovations, Adlib trusts that ELEMENTS will continue to provide cutting-edge solutions to meet future demands.

Kavanagh states, “We have every faith in ELEMENTS as a platform that will adapt as technology and the industry evolves. In terms of industry innovation, it’s hard to know what’s next. AI is an enormous buzzword and is becoming part of our everyday workflow. Not so much in generative video or content, but more when it comes to transcription, dubbing translation etc. It will be exciting to see where ELEMENTS goes next when integrating more advanced AI tools. But as long as the workflow, automation and organisation tools continue to be embellished and expanded, we will be overjoyed.”

ELEMENTS is thrilled to partner with Adlib, enabling the company to manage its growing workload while maintaining its commitment to quality and innovation. The partnership has not only improved efficiency but also fostered a strong relationship between the ELEMENTS team and Adlib, with the company now well-equipped to continue delivering compelling stories and exceptional experiences in the ever-evolving world of live events and audio-visual production.

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