CHALLENGE: Creating visuals & VFX for Tyler, the Creator’s latest album, CHROMAKOPIA, required managing a global team with tight timelines. Other competitive cloud-based tools caused frequent file corruption for these large VFX datasets and AWS’s unpredictable costs and complexity were impractical for the project and team size. Time-consuming processes like zipping and re-uploading files slowed productivity, compounding the stress of tight deadlines like completing the "Noid" video in just three days. A more reliable solution was urgently needed.

WHY SUITE? Suite's cloud storage transformed the team’s workflow with reliable file sharing between global collaborators, saving hours on each project. Suite’s intuitive platform also allowed VFX Supervisor, Alex Bartz, to easily manage media & freelancer access. For this mid-size creative team, having media centralized on the cloud meant working effortlessly across vast distances to deliver stunning work on a tight schedule.

CORE INSIGHTS:

• 8-10 VFX artists & compositors
• Freelancers in Chicago, Los Angeles, Canada & India
• Suite Connect saves 15-30 minutes per file transfer
• Saved $3,000+ on expenses compared to AWS
• Projects for Tyler, the Creator & Lil’ Yachty

“When you create a kick a** product, people take action.”

— Alex Bartz, VFX Producer

Tyler, the Creator is one of the most multi-faceted artists in the music industry. Whether he’s releasing new tunes, working on skit comedy with Loiter Squad, or diving into a fashion collaboration with brands like Louis Vuitton, his artistic endeavors turn heads, a sentiment that rings true for his latest release, CHROMAKOPIA. For the creative team behind the album launch—handling post production & promotional assets—the release was a massive endeavor with tight timelines. Alex Bartz, a Los Angeles-based Project Manager & VFX Producer was one of the key creatives in the launch. Working with Happy Place, Bartz managed a team of 8-10 VFX artists spanning the globe, utilizing Suite to store media, edit files in real-time, and create polished final cuts for the “Noid” and “St. Chroma” music videos, and all accompanying social cut downs & promotional materials. Here's a closer look behind the scenes...

Bartz is no stranger to technical post production workflows. His experience in marketing & advertising brought him to work for some of biggest names in the industry, like Disney, DreamWorks, and Amazon. Over time, he’s built his own network of artists & freelancers, which he now taps for an array of post production work supporting artists in the music industry. Through these experiences—and somewhat out of necessity—he quickly learned to be an expert in AWS, virtual machines, and optimized post production workflows.

“I've been working with Tyler’s team since the ‘Call Me If You Get Lost’ album. Back then, we did everything on AWS,” he reflects. “It was great, but the overhead was high, and it’s nearly impossible to predict those costs. With some projects, we turned to third-party syncing solutions like Google Drive or Dropbox, but it wasn't great.”

When a different competitive cloud-native solution was introduced Bartz was quick to implement it, seeking workflow efficiencies that weren’t possible before. But the platform didn’t perform up-to-snuff, offering more headaches that streamlined solutions. “We had so many corrupted files,” he remarks. “There were too many instances of not knowing the origin of the file corruption. Dealing with EXR files, you're handling hundreds, even thousands, of individual files.”

For Tyler, the Creator’s CHROMAKOPIA album launch, which involved VFX & compositing work on the “Noid” and “St. Chroma” music videos, as well as numerous social cut downs & marketing assets, Bartz sought a better way to work.

“I want the least amount of stress possible when managing files. Workflow technology shouldn't take any extra steps—it should just fit,” he remarks. “If I can save five minutes here, 10 minutes there—it all adds up. When you accumulate the time you spent just sending files back and forth, you realize you’ve spent an entire day just waiting around.”

Bartz met the Suite team at Siggraph 2024 and promptly put Suite’s cloud-native filesystem to the test on his latest assignment for Tyler, the Creator. “I'm EPing, APing, producing, and supervising these projects,” he notes. “Everything runs through Suite. You can use it like any regular drive. Everything you need is right there.”

Bartz mainly works from his home studio, and the same hold true for his team of domestic and international freelancers: Each artist utilizes their own machine, integrated with Suite and a local SSD cache drive, providing real-time access to media. “When I need to pre-cache media, I add the folder in Suite and it stays there until I remove it. It’s the same for my artists—I tell ‘em to add specific folders to the cache and they work directly off of it.”

Direct file transfers via Suite Connect are also a game-changer for Bartz’s dispersed team. “I outsource rotoscoping work to my team in India, so sharing files directly from Suite with an upload link, or drop-link, means 15-20-30 minutes saved on every file transfer. When there are so many moving parts, that’s really helpful.”

Bartz now finds his role as project supervisor is more focused on the creative process, and less on administrative headaches, which included corrupted files, lost media, and unverifiable checksums on other competitive cloud storage platforms. Better yet, Bartz knows that the media stored on Suite is workable the moment it lands in the cloud-connected drive. “I don’t have any corrupted file issues on Suite,” he notes. “Collaboration is easier. I don’t have to tell my freelancers to zip files or upload in a certain way. Suite is just there, it works, it’s plug and play.”

As Bartz looks ahead and takes on more work with some of the biggest players in the music industry and advertising, he recognizes cloud-based workflows are here to stay. From developing intricate AWS buildouts in the past, to using Suite now, he’s already riding the wave and creating efficiencies between team members that span the globe.

For those who haven’t yet made the switch to cloud storage, he has a simple suggestion. “Take a trip to NAB in Las Vegas to see exactly how far behind they are compared to the industry,” he says. “When you go any of the big media technology conferences, everything is cutting-edge. It becomes pretty clear that if you aren’t paying attention to every detail, you’ll end up a decade behind everyone else.”

The success of Tyler, the Creator’s CHROMAKOPIA project underscores the growing need for creative teams to embrace efficient, reliable workflows. Choosing Suite, Bartz was able to eliminate the bottlenecks of traditional sync solutions and move away from a competitive cloud storage product that caused consistent frustration. Worried less about file management and transfers, Bartz and the VFX artists on this project were able to focus on polishing the creative and delivering stunning visuals right for one of the biggest acts in music without missing a beat.

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