We’ve released our free iOS upload tool today, allowing users to upload photos from anywhere, via a mobile phone data or Wifi connection. This app is perfect for field work, such as capturing engineering records on site or delivering timely footage back to your Third Light digital asset management system.

You can use the application to upload existing images from your photo library in batches, or capture new photos from the camera, and optionally resize them before uploading. Our uploader includes HTTPS support for secure uploads, and GPS coordinate capture if location services are enabled (allow this option when you first run the app. if you plan to use this feature).

Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch and iPad. Requires iOS 4.0 or later. Compatible with Third Light IMS v6.x servers only (not supported on IMS 5.x).

• Leap Local - a responsible tourism business, enabling travel with local guides and services, mainly in developing countries. Through an extensive network of vetted guides, Leap Local coordinates a travel network for ethical travellers that covers some of the most sought-after and beautiful locations in the world.
• Farming For All - a not-for-profit Community Interest Company with the primary aim of making a positive difference to the lives of vulnerable individuals in Hertfordshire who are experiencing social and educational exclusion. Farming For All makes a huge impact on the lives of disadvantaged young people.
• The Student-Run Computing Facility, Cambridge University - a university society to provide useful, flexible computing and network services for University of Cambridge Staff and Students of all degrees of ability. The SRCF is a fantastic service and a great training platform, which Third Light is proud to support.

We still have a number of servers that are available – free to a good cause – so if you are looking for some server equipment to help support a charity, please let us know by contacting us here.

The conference program highlights important issues including how to get the best out of your DAM solution and the latest developments in DAM – from the challenges of digital workflow to monetising assets in new and innovative ways. There are still places for those who would like to speak as well as attend – details below. A host of interesting speakers from well known organisations are taking part including the BBC, ITN, the British Library and several leading agencies.

Third Light will be attending and will be happy to meet and chat with you there. If you would like to register, you can also receive a £100 discount using the code: THIRDLIGHT100 (register here).

The organisers are working hard to make this event ‘from a DAM user perspective’ rather than a platform for vendors. The programme, including case studies and workshops, is as follows:

• Getting More out of DAM: The Latest Technologies and What is Possible Now DAM and its Future for Broadcast, Publishing, Media and Entertainment: An “eye to the enterprise” executive roundtable
• The role of digital assets in securing and enhancing Customer Loyalty – workflows, insights and measuring
• Rights Management and Digital Assets – Integrating Two Worlds
• Vendors & System Integrators Working closely and successfully– making everyone a winner
• Social Media and Digital Assets – managing the unmanageable
• Selecting the Best DAM for you: Who’s in the Market, and How to Find Your Perfect Match
• Brand Strategy and Digital Asset Management – how DAM supports brand management and loyalty.
• Integrated Marketing Management The intersection of DAM with other Technologies – with SAP, Oracle and other ERP Systems, as well as other Collaboration Tools
• Procurement and Implementation Process – lessons learned
• iPad /Tablet – how they have Changed our DAM Consumption
• Taxonomy, Metadata and Search – Ongoing Developments
• Business Case for DAM – building the case
• Leading Your DAM Operation – Round Table Workshop
• Adapting DAM to Everyday Working Life – Practical Problems and Everyday Challenges – Round Table Workshop Building blocks that make successful integration of DAM into your organization possible.
• Distribution, Protection and Monetisation of Digital Content: The ecosystem around securing and enabling the supply chain.
• Predicting the Future – Meeting the Developing Needs of DAM Users – difficult but always fun!

Share your experiences – if you are interested in sharing experiences with your peers at this event let the organisers know: Email patriciac@henrystewart.co.uk with your ideas.

Leap Local - Supporting Local Communities To Benefit From Tourism

Leap Local is a responsible tourism business, enabling travel with local guides and services, mainly in developing countries. Through an extensive network of vetted guides, Leap Local coordinates a travel network for ethical travellers that covers some of the most sought-after and beautiful locations in the world. As Leap say, “Travelling is fun and enriching, but did you ever think about how your tourism affects the communities you visit?“.

As a travel business, Leap Local needs to have spectacular images as part of its brand. Leap Local sought a way to organise their images amongst a team working in very remote locations.

Third Light IMS provides a central solution with tools for efficiently browsing and searching content, and a fast web-based interface that can easily be used to download files when they are needed, or publish them directly as permanent URL links. Instead of transferring large digital files over slow internet connections, IMS offers a streamlined library that can be used anywhere, and only transfers high quality source files when they are really needed.

Founder, Nicky Dee, explains how Third Light helped Leap Local to deploy a global media library:

“The problem we had was that we could never find the right photos when we needed them – even though these photos were pouring in from our network of guides. New team members were always trying to find great pictures of the right locations, but had little success as there was no definitive source of these kind of files.”

“Our problems were solved as soon we launched the Intelligent Media Server. Third Light helped Leap address the problem of managing our images by centralising them in a secure, shared media library that all of our team could reach, no matter where in the world they were accessing the system.”

“The superb search and mapping tools in Third Light IMS are perfect for finding the right files and locations, and even on connections with limited bandwidth in Peru we have been able to transform our digital marketing with Third Light.”

“Third Light’s team have been a great source of advice and support to Leap Local, including offering us surplus equipment to really go the extra mile. Not only is Third Light IMS a great product, the company’s support and attention to us as a client has been second to none.”

Nicky Dee, Founder, Leap Local

Leap Local map

Read more about Leap Local on their homepage at www.leaplocal.org.

Without some kind of login process, all users are guests with a low, common basic set of functionality and very limited record-keeping. However, if users login when accessing the DAM server, this provides accountability, personalisation and role-based access – so critical to correctly allocating privileges and access in shared systems.

In this video we explore how to use Third Light IMS in a system containing a very large user base, specifically by using groups to manage the most common configuration choices from a central template.

If you are considering deploying a DAM server in your enterprise, you can have all the benefits of users and groups and also integrate with your existing OpenID provider or Active Directory solution, too. You can read more about external authentication and how it integrates with groups in our technical documentation.

Can we help you deploy a new central media server with users, groups and departmental roles matched exactly to your needs? Please let us know if you would like to discuss anything about the video or integration options.

From corporate events to newspapers, it makes sense to automate selling and monetizing digital media where a market exists.

For example, at an agency we provide the ability to sell your stock online with licensed downloads and invoicing tools. Third Light IMS offers configurable licenses, each being a legal document defining the scope of usage for an image, the duration and resolution. Licences can be grouped into plans, which allow different products to be offered to different buyers (eg. one set of licences for newspapers, another set for advertising agencies).

For printing, we have partnered with PhotoBox™, one of the UK’s most experienced digital printing labs to provide a fully integrated printing and delivery service. Third Light IMS  allows you to sell a wide range of prints, including large poster prints and many gift items. You remain in control of the prices that you offer to your customers and yet completely free from any production labour – everything is automated from ordering right through to delivery.

The options included in Third Light include:

• Automated web print-to-delivery via PhotoBox, with hundreds of products ready to sell
• In-house product fulfilment (ie. order management without automated printing)
• Digital downloads (eg. selling royalty free or licensed media)
• Built-in card handling with a PCI DSS e-commerce payment service provided by Third Light (handling fee of 5%) or the option to use your own merchant account
• Completely white labelled and free from branding impediments, eg. neutral packing slips and checkout completed within your Third Light site’s brand and domain name
• Mature and extensive support for taxes (eg. GST, VAT, European tax territories and international shipping options)
• Cutting edge user interface – freshly updated in our latest product, IMS v6.0

If you have been looking for a way to monetize your digital media, why not try Third Light IMS v6.0 free for 30 days?

What our customers are saying…

“Since the launch of our new Toronto Star Photo & Page Sales site, we have received many words of appreciation from our clients. They praise the site’s clean and attractive appearance, and its user-friendliness.”

“We are thrilled to have an application that allows us to quickly and easily deliver the top quality services and products that our customers deserve.”

Claire Wollen – Manager, Torstar Syndication Services, Toronto Star Newspapers Limited

One Central Storage Location

IMS stores all of your media in one central repository. This allows you to avoid silo stores of assets, instead keeping them all together, and to grant users or whole groups of users access to files as necessary. Not only does this mean that you can avoid wasting time searching for files in different locations but it also means you’ll know that they are all efficiently backed-up and catalogued, searchable and traceable. IMS even searches for and eliminates duplicates.

IMS can be accessed from any web browser, meaning that if your organisation operates across multiple sites, everyone can have immediate access to your library. Wherever you are in the world, if you can get online, you can access your assets.

Secure Shared Access

Users are only able to access and view those files to which you have granted them access. IMS offers different options in terms of how you are able to manage these access rights, so that the service can be tailored to your organisation. Departmental groups or brand teams can easily be created, with control over just their part of the system for example.

Logins to IMS can be encrypted using SSL technology or, if required, the entire site can run on a secure (HTTPS) webserver. IMS allows you to require your users to change their passwords regularly and to set minimum levels for password quality, or integrate with Active Directory and OpenID. This process is fully PCI DSS compliant to make IMS a secure addition to your existing computer systems.

Fast and Controlled Retrieval of Assets

While retrieving assets from an Intelligent Media Server you can re-size, re-format and crop files. It is often useful to resize images according to the intended use and it may also shorten the time it takes to download. Other formats such as video, InDesign, Illustrator and Office documents are also supported, and the download process can be automated by pre-defining format settings for single-click selection of popular publishing formats (web banner, press ad, presentation etc.)

Use of predefined formats can make downloading both faster and more efficient by helping ensure files are delivered in the right format for the target media.

User Access Controls

The download process is highly configurable, enabling you to assign various options ad create a productive, creative workflow.

There are a wide range of options to tailor the download process, including watermarking, embedding metadata and requiring the acceptance of Terms and Conditions. Many of these options can be applied to Users so that different types of role within your organisation can be given appropriate capabilities to download content. Users can be given access to all of the download tools, or to selected tools only. You can also limit the options available when using a download tool.

You can specify that a user must gain approval before files can be downloaded and you can specify who should approve. Workflow support is provided with a system of automatic online alerts and emails keeping downloaders and approvers informed about the progress of each download request.

Most organisations operate file servers to allow staff to share content, and like digital asset management systems the core benefit of this model is to store the files in a central location reached via the network. However, there are several fundamental problems with digital asset reuse which this a file server can cause.

Here’s a quick summary of what we think are the main problems with file servers.

1. Each file is stored in one place

File servers use folders as a descriptive structure, and filenames as a description. This limits the usefulness of the information (and layout) of the storage. Folders on a file server are too inflexible when digital content needs to be classified in multiple ways (or for multiple user groups). That model forces every file to be classified precisely once, or cloned and copied when it’s needed elsewhere.

For example, storing a file in //media/projects/building site 3/new plaza/img002.jpg may help one user in the engineering team, but when a member of the marketing department needs a selection of images from various projects, they will have to browse, collect and copy these files to their own project area. This means the content is fragmented – creating problems of tracing and managing re-use at a very early stage.

2. Limited metadata and search

Most file servers cannot present or search complex metadata, such as trees, keywords or drop-down menus. Also, filtering is normally limited to a folder’s sort order (by last changed date, media type, file size or filename).

Digital asset management allows a wide range of custom metadata to be added to files, and searched in a more convenient way by providing a purpose-built rather than generic user interface.

3. No workflow or audit

Digital asset management software like Third Light IMS provides workflow – a way of processing content in a logical order, usually involving more than one user. For instance, when a user uploads a file there may be a process for collecting metadata, and the file may also be passed to an administrator for approval. Similar procedures are in place for downloads, with records of the purpose of the downloads captured in simple and unobtrusive forms.

On a file server, though, permissions are generally limited to read-write or read-only, and no records are kept when files are copied, replaced, renamed or deleted. No workflow exists on a file server, so there is no way to involve multiple users in these processes.

4. Reliance on local tools for resizing and repurposing files

When a file is copied from a file server, the end user must have the necessary tools to resize or reformat the media. This means both extra skill and usually extra software is needed on the part of the user. Variants of existing files begin to accumulate, too – low, medium and high resolution copies, web sizes and print sizes being common sources of duplication and fragmentation of records.

In a digital asset management system, downloads incorporate tools to resize or repurpose media for specific uses without needing any software on the user’s computer. By providing purpose-built user interfaces there is far less complexity and far greater flexibility built into the process of re-using existing content.

5. Lack of portability and sharing features

While a digital asset management system can conveniently transfer lightboxes between users (without attaching full files) and keep a track of comments, changes and prior uses of files, a file server is inherently little more than a generic way to store files.

Digital asset management software unlocks far more of the potential in digital media, while a file server is generally too basic and unhelpful for advanced users.

Can we help?

To give you a taste of how you can use Third Light IMS to improve your day-to-day digital tasks, we’d like to share a video with you. This video explains how you can use metadata to provide a powerful alternative that solves file server problems using a feature we call Smart Folders.

If you’d like to try our software for yourself, you can use our software free for 30-days.

Pittsburgh Penguins deploys Third Light digital asset management solution

The marketing team at the Pittsburgh Penguins deployed a Third Light IMS Appliance to centralise their media storage and streamline digital brand activities through a single, definitive media bank.

Erik Watts, Senior Director, Technology at the Pittsburgh Penguins explains how the new solution has rapidly transformed the brand management activities at the team:

“For a professional hockey team, photo management is an essential part of our marketing and brand. We were finding we had too many files to manage and needed to upgrade to a professional DAM solution. We selected Third Light for their easy to use, feature-rich product and helpful team.”

“Since we launched, Third Light has really changed the way we manage and share these assets for the better, making our digital media easily searchable and much more engaging for every day tasks like sharing and discussing artwork. We are years ahead of where we were just several months ago.”

Erik Watts, Senior Director, Technology – The Pittsburgh Penguins

Many sports teams are making the switch to digital asset management to efficently extend digital media archives outside the organisation, while also maintain full control and management with internal users. Earlier in 2011, Third Light also deployed an Intelligent Media Server to the Denver Broncos football club, highlighting a trend for leading teams to accelerate their digital activities.

Third Light is delighted to be part of the Penguin’s success story, and we look forward to a long and productive partnership.

Third Light IMS v6.0 adds support for iPad, iPhone, Office documents and InDesign

This month, all IMS v6.0 sites are receiving a free expansion pack to support extra file formats.

Third Light IMS incorporates support for many different graphics and document formats, each presented in a simple thumbnail and preview format with no special plugins. In IMS v6.0, this neutral approach to previewing and searching for content is more useful than ever, with compatibility with a very wide range of browsers. For example, IMS v6.0 works comfortably on an iPad or a desktop, using HTML5 video to make sure that mobile clients work correctly.

As part of our ongoing work to expand the useful range of formats that Intelligent Media Servers can manage, we have added Office document preview creation. This allows IMS to support Word, Excel, Powerpoint and PDF files with a convenient thubmnail preview of the content of your files. As larger collections of files can be tagged and searched in IMS, we’ve added the ability for you to search within files, too.

The main content in any digital asset management system is visual media, so to support the increasing popularity of Adobe InDesign, Third Light IMS v6.0 now supports previews of InDesign IDD files.

• View screenshots and videos of IMS v6.0
• Try Third Light IMS free for 30-days