CASE STUDY

The Louvre Museum Transforms Video
Asset Management with CatDV

Opened in 1793, the Louvre is one of the world's largest and most famous museums. Live events hosted in the museum's primary auditorium regularly captured on video. Implementing the CatDV Asset Management Platform has helped the museum simplify search and retrieval of those video assets while enabling technical staff to preserve an existing media workflow and maintain tight security.



Enter your quoCatDV's Worker Node provides powerful tools that organize media on our SAN, whilethe CatDV Web Client provides access to the media throughout the Louvre, making search
and retrieval very simplte.

Samuel Brosset
Technical Manager, The Louvre


The switch from our Final Cut Server was seamless. The migration tool meant that all our existing assets and logging were maintained, saving us weeks of work.

Samuel Brosset
Technical Manager, The Louvre


SOLUTION OVERVIEW
∙ CatDV Asset Management Platform

KEY BENEFITS
∙ Simplified search and retrieval
of video assets on the museum's SAN.∙ Streamlined migration, saving weeks
of work.
∙ Preserved the existing media workflow,
rather than being forced into a new way
of working.
∙ Maintained tight security with integration
of a MySQL database

Located on the historic site of a former fortress
and palace, the Louvre is a central landmark of
Paris. In operation for centuries, the museum
today holds more than 380,000 pieces of art and
regularly displays 35,000 of them in galleries that cover 15 acres. With more than 10 million visitors each year, the Louvre is the most visited museum in the world.
The Louvre hosts a variety of conferences,
symposia, and live musical performances each year in its main auditorium. Those events are recorded on video, and the footage becomes a valuable historical record for the museum and students. The museum had used Apple Final Cut Server,
a back-end server-based solution, for managing
Final Cut files. But that solution could no
longer meet the museum's needs. The Louvre's
technical staff required a cost-effective, proven
asset management system that would interface
perfectly with leading video editing software, including Final Cut Pro. At the same time, a
new asset management system had to operate
across physically separate networks.
TRANSFORMING MEDIA ASSET MANAGEMENT WITH CATDV
After considering its options, the Louvre
selected the CatDV Asset Management Platform
to transform their media asset management
within the museum. The technical staff found
that CatDV could integrate with Final Cut Pro
and other editing software, and it could meet the
requirement of operating across networks.
With CatDV, video from live museum events
is captured and transcoded using the CatDV
Worker automation engine and then ingested
into the asset management system. Louvre
librarians and editors in charge of asset
management can access and log media directly
using the CatDV Web Client.
SIMPLIFYING SEARCH AND RETRIEVAL
CatDV makes it easier for users to find and
retrieve what they need in the large volume of
assets. Samuel Brosset, technical manager
at the Louvre, noted, "CatDV's Worker Node
provides powerful tools that organize media on
our SAN, while the CatDV Web Client provides
access to the media throughout the Louvre,
making search and retrieval very simple."
The Louvre's video projects have specific
file-naming and folder structures that need
to be maintained on the SAN. Fortunately, the
museum was able to maintain those structures
during the migration to CatDV. Ensuring the
right media was stored in the right location was
a key ingredient in the project's success.
STREAMLINING MIGRATION, PRESERVING THE EXISTING WORKFLOW
"The switch from our Final Cut Server was
seamless," says Brosset. "The migration tool
meant that all our existing assets and logging
were maintained, saving us weeks of work."
Outside technical support further streamlined
the move to the new solution. "The support and
expertise we've received from our local partner,
DID Technology, and from the makers of CatDV,
have been par excellence," says Brosset.
As the designer of the media workflow at the
Louvre, Brosset was also impressed that CatDV
could easily adapt to support the museum's
preferred workflow. Unlike other solutions, it
did not impose a particular way of working on
the team.
MAINTAINING TIGHT SECURITY
Security of assets was a critical consideration
in selecting a new asset management solution.
The Louvre needs to ensure that assets are
only available to authorized personnel. CatDV
offers flexible security configuration options
through seamless integration of CatDV with
MySQL database.
LOOKING FORWARD WITH CATDV
CatDV has become an indispensable tool
for the Louvre's auditorium video projects.
Beyond transcoding, ingesting, and organizing
assets, CatDV is also used daily to optimize the
recycling and reuse of those assets in a speedy
media review and approval circuit.
Meanwhile, Brosset continues to explore new
ways to capitalize on the solution. CatDV's
continual evolution and update program have
allowed Brosset to plan integration of more
new features, such as LTO tape archiving, into
the workflow.


CatDV enabled the
museum to preserve its
existing workflow instead
of imposing a particular
way of working.
ABOUT THE LOUVRE
The Louvre is one of the world's
largest and most famous
museums. Centrally located in
Paris, it is typically visited by
more than 10 million people
every year. The museum's
collections, which are displayed
in more than 650,000 square
feet of gallery space, include
iconic works that span objects
from antiquities to paintings,
sculptures, prints, and drawings
from the modern era.