DataDirect Networks Case Studies Ringling College of Art and Design Accelerates Student Creativity with High-Performance Computing and Powerful, Scalable DDN® Storage

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	Ringling College of Art and Design Accelerates Student Creativity with High-Performance Computing and Powerful, Scalable DDN® Storage DataDirect Networks

Ringling College of Art and Design Accelerates Student Creativity with High-Performance Computing and Powerful, Scalable DDN® Storage

DataDirect Networks

Technology Category	Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Cloud Storage Services
Applicable Industries	Education
Applicable Functions	Product Research & Development
Use Cases	Digital Twin
Services	System Integration
Challenge	Ringling College of Art and Design faced a challenge of explosive data growth caused by high-resolution, digital file-based workflows. This created a demand for future-proof storage that could scale on demand. The college wanted to use technology to support art as a tool, so that students could be creative without having to manage technology or deal with interruptions to their work. A robust, reliable and transparent storage infrastructure was required to accommodate the college’s desire to give students seamless access to all their digital assets, regardless of platform or location. The college wanted to avoid the management, access difficulty, cost and complexity of siloed storage. Read More
About Customer	Ringling College of Art and Design is a prestigious institution that has been cultivating the creative spirit in students from around the world for 84 years. The college offers a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree (BFA) program in 11 disciplines, including Advertising Design, Computer Animation, Digital Filmmaking, Gamer Art & Design, Graphic Design, Illustration, Interior Design, Photography & Digital imaging and more. Located on Florida’s Gulf coast, the college attracts close to 1,300 students each year from 48 states and 60+ foreign countries. The college's alumni are heavily recruited by top art and design companies, including Apple, Disney, DreamWorks, Hallmark, Sony and Target, to a name a few. In 2014, LinkedIn ranked Ringling College seventh among design schools for placement of graduates into top design jobs. Read More
Solution	Ringling College deployed DDN’s SFA10K and 12K storage platforms with 1.6PB of storage to meet its needs for industry-leading performance, density and scalability. At the file server level, Ringling deployed Oracle Solaris with the ZFS file system, as the team felt it best met the college’s needs for robust yet transparent performance. The college implemented its high-performance DDN system so that students can immediately access their digital files upon logging into their home spaces, regardless of platform or location. Each home space is immediately visible to the student, making it extremely easy to create, share, process, reclaim and archive digital assets. Many students treat their home spaces like a local disk, so all their project files are readily available the next time they log in on any workstation or lab system. Read More Log in to view content
Contents

Technology Category

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Cloud Storage Services

Applicable Industries

Education

Applicable Functions

Product Research & Development

Use Cases

Digital Twin

Services

System Integration

Challenge

Ringling College of Art and Design faced a challenge of explosive data growth caused by high-resolution, digital file-based workflows. This created a demand for future-proof storage that could scale on demand. The college wanted to use technology to support art as a tool, so that students could be creative without having to manage technology or deal with interruptions to their work. A robust, reliable and transparent storage infrastructure was required to accommodate the college’s desire to give students seamless access to all their digital assets, regardless of platform or location. The college wanted to avoid the management, access difficulty, cost and complexity of siloed storage.

About Customer

Ringling College of Art and Design is a prestigious institution that has been cultivating the creative spirit in students from around the world for 84 years. The college offers a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree (BFA) program in 11 disciplines, including Advertising Design, Computer Animation, Digital Filmmaking, Gamer Art & Design, Graphic Design, Illustration, Interior Design, Photography & Digital imaging and more. Located on Florida’s Gulf coast, the college attracts close to 1,300 students each year from 48 states and 60+ foreign countries. The college's alumni are heavily recruited by top art and design companies, including Apple, Disney, DreamWorks, Hallmark, Sony and Target, to a name a few. In 2014, LinkedIn ranked Ringling College seventh among design schools for placement of graduates into top design jobs.

Solution

Ringling College deployed DDN’s SFA10K and 12K storage platforms with 1.6PB of storage to meet its needs for industry-leading performance, density and scalability. At the file server level, Ringling deployed Oracle Solaris with the ZFS file system, as the team felt it best met the college’s needs for robust yet transparent performance. The college implemented its high-performance DDN system so that students can immediately access their digital files upon logging into their home spaces, regardless of platform or location. Each home space is immediately visible to the student, making it extremely easy to create, share, process, reclaim and archive digital assets. Many students treat their home spaces like a local disk, so all their project files are readily available the next time they log in on any workstation or lab system.

Impact #1	Staff and Students can play HD, 3D and 4K streams directly from the SAN 10 times faster without any frame loss thus speeding collaboration and project completion.
Impact #2	With its powerful storage and compute environment, the school rendered 2.8 million frames in one week, which would have taken 89 years to complete on a high-end workstation.
Impact #3	Students can push the boundaries of the creative process without any technical concerns or limitations.

Impact #1

Staff and Students can play HD, 3D and 4K streams directly from the SAN 10 times faster without any frame loss thus speeding collaboration and project completion.

Impact #2

With its powerful storage and compute environment, the school rendered 2.8 million frames in one week, which would have taken 89 years to complete on a high-end workstation.

Impact #3

Students can push the boundaries of the creative process without any technical concerns or limitations.

Benefit #1	The school rendered 2.8 million frames in one week, which would have taken 89 years to complete on a high-end workstation.

Benefit #1

The school rendered 2.8 million frames in one week, which would have taken 89 years to complete on a high-end workstation.

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Overview

Ringling College of Art and Design Accelerates Student Creativity with High-Performance Computing and Powerful, Scalable DDN® Storage

Operational Impact

Quantitative Benefit