Sony has expanded the remit of its Creators’ Cloud platform, adding collaboration, sharing, upload and editing for individuals to the mix.
Sony first introduced Creators’ Cloud, a suite of cloud-powered applications and services for professional and enterprise users, in September last year. So far, so good, but the next generation of Creators’ Cloud is aimed at individuals or small teams of content creators and is a whole lot more interesting, at least as far as we’re concerned.
Essentially it’s a suite of applications designed to extend the camera and shooting into the cloud. There are several elements to the initial roll out.
Creators’ App is the successor to Imaging Edge Mobile and will act as an extension of a camera to upload, view, and manage content (video and photo) stored in the cloud. Key features include file transfer to mobile and cloud, remote camera control, and 25GB of free cloud storage for certain Sony camera owners, alongside a free 5GB for any user with a Sony Account.
At the time of launch, the upload of files to cloud storage via the Creators’ App will only be available for the α7 IV and ZV-1F, which is a rather short list that one hopes will get expanded in the future. Direct upload from camera to cloud, meanwhile, “is planned to be available at a future date” as well
Discover does exactly what you might expect: Users’ profile and portfolio of selected content will be available to share with their community of other professionals. Images and videos will include information about the camera operator’s location, camera and lens models, settings, genre and much more. Discover will be accessed through the Creators’ App and web browsers, and Sony’s very much emphasising the educational and community aspects of all this rather than any potential commercial angles.
Last, but by no means least, Master Cut (Beta) is a cloud-based application powered by AI that accelerates pre-editing by using camera metadata. Initially only available in certain countries (and only in the UK for the European area) Master Cut offers accurate image stabilization using metadata; reduced sound noise and optimized audio level through sound source separation; multi-device access through synchronization in the cloud; and automatic grouping of similar clips through image analysis.
Lump all this together and you have something that will give users a quick, easy, and high-quality pre-editing of video content before transferring to an NLE. It’s free at launch and accessible via a web browser.
It’s all interesting stuff, and we’ll update this with pricing info as soon as we get it. The company says that Creators’ Cloud will continue to expand in the future too with new services and features added regularly based on user feedback. More details as they emerge…