Case Study: Crafty Apes achieves high-performance VFX storage and reliable 2D compositing with Qumulo

Crafty Apes Relies on Qumulo for 2D Compositing for La La Land Film

Crafty Apes, a boutique visual effects studio, faced a monumental data challenge while creating the complex 8,000+ frame opening sequence for the film La La Land. Their legacy storage system was too slow for real-time compositing at this massive scale and its support costs were prohibitively high, jeopardizing the project's tight deadlines. The studio turned to Qumulo and its QF2 file storage system to find a solution.

Qumulo implemented a six-node cluster of its QC24 hybrid storage appliances. The solution provided the high throughput required for real-time work, significantly lowered costs compared to other vendors, and offered proactive support via Qumulo Care. The results were critical to the project's success; the system had no downtime during the production of La La Land, allowing artists to work efficiently and with confidence that their data was safe and performant.

Crafty Apes

Tim LeDoux

Founder/VFX Supervisor