Zoic Studios: case study

The renowned artist-owned and operated visual effects company made Evercast their collaboration tool of choice, as it not only makes their work more efficient, but it’s also enhanced the creative process and final products, resulting in increased client loyalty and repeat business.

“[Evercast] leaves everybody feeling that the visual effects process was productive, collaborative, and added to the art that they’re trying to do, which means return business from that client, which is the biggest deal. It’s about building on that brand as a creative partner, and when you help someone achieve their vision through visual effects, it just reinforces that.”
– Andy Orloff, Zoic Studios

The company

Zoic is a dynamic visual effects studio founded in Los Angeles in 2002. Independently owned and operated, the company is well known for their cutting-edge R&D, mixed reality visualizations, strong characters, and compelling narratives. Their work caters to a diverse range of entertainment and commercial clients. 

The projects

The Zoic team has used Evercast continuously since 2020, working on high-profile film and television projects including The Boys, Generation V, 9-1-1, Star Trek, The Sympathizer, and House of the Dragon. Commercial work includes a recent campaign for CrowdStrike as well as design and virtual set work for Fox Sports.

Unique challenges

Facilitating communication with a remote, global team
Zoic boasts a team of 350 people, with offices spread among Vancouver, Los Angeles, and New York, and most employees working from home. Their clients, too, are often all over the world. So, the onus is on Zoic to facilitate productive, efficient communication both internally and externally.

Maintaining client loyalty in a highly competitive space
The Zoic team has established their brand on delivering a stellar client experience that keeps productions coming back, time and time again. When the team chose to go hybrid, they needed a reliable workflow that met their high standards of client service.

Putting an end to the infinite review cycle
The team sought a remote workflow that would expedite the painfully endless phases of back-and-forth notes and revisions, which were frustrating and inefficient for both internal and client sides.

Mitigating wasted time on technical challenges
When attempting remote reviews with stakeholders, subpar video quality on platforms like Zoom and Teams was hampering shot approvals—but using more specialized tools posed technical challenges in synchronizing media and client training, resulting in frustration and delays.

“The video playback quality on platforms like Teams and Zoom was not sufficient to actually approve shots. Too much compression, no real-time playback. So I personally went on a search and did a lot of research. Evercast won in terms of the ease of use, stability, interactivity tools like drawing and notetaking—and particularly the ability to broadcast either from our machines or directly from the edit rooms. I only do reviews on Evercast.”
– Andy Orloff, Zoic Studios

The setup

Working primarily from home, the team leverages high-performance workstations with VPN access to server clusters for real-time playback. They run Evercast locally on their devices and broadcast content from a virtual machine offsite. Creative software they use includes Autodesk Flow (formerly ShotGrid), Krita, Nuke, RV, and Unreal Engine, depending on type of work and stage of production.

The workflow

Primarily based in Vancouver, the Zoic team has been accustomed to facilitating remote reviews with clients for many years, but in the early days, it was not without its challenges. With sometimes as many as 16 clients at once, they were juggling kickoffs, bidding reviews, shot reviews and more, having to download each batch of material in two different places and using software to synchronize playback. Inevitably, the client wouldn’t have the correct media or wasn’t able to locate it, and frustration on both sides was the norm. When conferencing tools like Teams and Zoom became popular, the plus was that clients were used to the interfaces, but screen sharing professional content proved unstable and ineffective.

When the team discovered Evercast, it became the Zoic standard. Evercast eliminated the hassle of media presynchronization and file sharing; they could just send clients a link and review anything on the spot. They use Evercast to share from any and all their creative software—as well as full shots, AI work, and more. As VFX is a highly visual and detailed medium, the team often leverages Evercast’s built-in comment and draw tools for clear communication.

With most of the Zoic team working from home, they generally run Evercast locally on their devices and access a virtual machine to stream into the Evercast room.

When working on ready-to-approve content with editorial teams, who tend to use Avid with NDI, the editor can stream their Avid directly into the scene so both teams can view together in context and make changes in real time. When collaborating on more work-in-progress material, like playblasts or animatics of dynamic simulations, the Zoic team broadcasts an RV playlist directly from their machines into the Evercast room for review.

“I didn’t notice how much time we were spending in our other solutions just getting everything together to start the session. The ability just to say, ‘Hey, can you jump on Evercast to approve this shot?’ is great. The friction is so low with Evercast and the ability to get material to another person is so easy. I mean, it’s got the quality of having your media locally with the usability of a much larger platform like Zoom, so everybody is kind of familiar with how it works. It’s hard to go back—to see a chunky Teams playback that you can’t draw on and you can’t really scrub—and then you go to Evercast and it’s crystal clear and looks like your monitor. It’s a whole different ball game.”
– Andy Orloff, Zoic Studios

The results

Evercast has brought significant value to Zoic Studios, including streamlined communication, less time wasted on revisions, and faster turnarounds on projects—which, in turn, make for a more positive experience for clients. Evercast has enabled better quality control, as high-quality playback means accurate shot approvals and ensures that creative visions are realized effectively. On the business side, Evercast has allowed them to connect with clients globally and take on diverse projects, with a low barrier to entry. Real-time interactivity fosters a collaborative environment that has strengthened client relationships and increased repeat business.

In the end, Evercast has not only enhanced Zoic Studios' remote work capabilities but it’s also reinforced their reputation as a premier visual effects provider in a highly competitive landscape.

“Evercast allows us to take on more work in the sense that the type of work we can take is kind of infinite. There’s no infrastructure issues at all with getting a job awarded. And we’re also able to run a lot faster and leaner with technology like this. We don’t have to hold the type of editorial staff that we used to, and we can repurpose those people. A lot of them have moved into the artists’ space and done work that’s a little bit more rewarding for them rather than just converting files all day.”
– Andy Orloff, Zoic Studios

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