How a browser-based low-latency remote desktop tool has made working in Creative Industries frictionless— Reemo.io
“The tool takes on a whole new dimension when you realize that you can find your identical working environment and move forward on your VFX, 2D/3D projects …anywhere from a simple web browser via Reemo”
Maxime Caron, Head of CG at Supamonks Studio.
Whether you are a designer, architect, game developer, engineer in a research and development center, computing power is needed as software get bigger and bigger and require more capacities.
If a graphic designer needs to apply sophisticated filters, works with 3D software or does a lot of batch processing, then he will need to use a pretty heavy and powerful equipment such as a tour with 4 GPU to enable him to use those software.
With the Covid-19 crisis and the lock down, both workers and employers have changed a lot. Teleworking and more broadly the Open Work trend are turning our habits upside down. Unlike most nomad workers, artists in the digital world do not have very “Starbucks friendly” hardware.
With the emergence of the cloud added to this, players in the creative industries must equip themselves with a brick of agility. This is a problem on the way to being solved with a technology developed by Reemo.io
Remote access is a technology that has been around for a long time, and the primary objective was to give a screen basic remote control as part of computer troubleshooting.
We can point out several problems / limits to these traditional tools:
→ Poor image quality (Pixelation and color rendering not optimized)
→ High latency
→ Connection and data security
→ Local tools not managed (graphic tablet, stylet pen pressure, multiple monitors, microphone, camera, printing, etc.)
Reemo addressed these issues by developing a low latency desktop streaming protocol that mimics the screen of a PC or Virtual Machine (Windows10 / Linux) from a web browser. Then, all you have to do is connect your tools to your local terminal to be able to use all of your applications on your targeted PC.
I’m the co-founder of Reemo.io and to talk about it, let’s go with Maxime Caron from Supamonks Studio, where a large part of the team now work remotely on their ongoing VFX & 2D/3D animation projects via Reemo.
Here’s what I’ll break down with Maxime to help you get a better understanding:
1. Before Reemo how did you manage remote work at Supamonks Studio ?
2. What are the main advantages of a low latency remote desktop solution for creative people & studios?
3. How easy a company is able to switch from a standard mode to an agile one ?
4. Reemo’s little extra?
1 - Before Reemo how did you manage remote work in a studio like Supamonks?
Supamonks is a French animation studio based in Paris which has been developing films, video games and advertisements since 2007. We are the first studio to receive the “Living Heritage Company” label from the French Ministry of the Economy. We are now approximately 50 people and we are partly working remotely since the reopening of the Studio last September 2020.
Firstly, in our industry, we have always encountered great difficulties in working remotely because the work requires a lot of computer resources.
Secondly, due to our internal organization, each person does not have a dedicated machine but uses the one he needs to continue working according to the software required.
Knowing that, we didn’t have a lot of options before Reemo. The first one is to buy each person a PC and equip it with a VPN connection so the work can be done locally. However, with a VPN, you don’t have the same working comfort as you would have with Reemo. Opening files on the network I access from home is just impossible, whereas with streaming it is super smooth and very pleasant to use.
Another possibility is to equip yourself with a remote control tool. But these solutions are not suitable when it comes to finding the same working environment with perfect image quality and being able to continue your projects remotely using specific tools — I am thinking about the graphic tablet management specifically.
This is why, when we heard about a French solution that has developed its own low latency remote desktop streaming protocol to meet the need for “high performance”, we decided to test your solution and generalize thereafter.
2 - What are the main advantages of a low latency remote desktop solution for creative people & studios?
The first advantage of such a tool is to switch your organization on an agile mode by opening up to telecommuting. 100% of Supamonks employees were able to work remotely during COVID-19 lock down and at their own pace, processing studio data on studio software without anything coming out of the IT system. Which is a very good point when it comes to Security.
As every machine is remotely accessible, it has become very easy for us to allocate the right machine to the right person according to software needs
Since we are talking about remote work via Reemo, we can also talk about recruitment. By using Reemo, we have given ourselves the opportunity to recruit talented people who are not geographically next to the studio. As we are in a very stressed sector in terms of HR and recruitment, removing the geographic constraint and thus being much more agile has helped us a lot.
For example, we have been able to collaborate with graphic designers in Brazil who have worked on our system, on our network in a way that is completely integrated into our working methods. And that we couldn’t do before!
Finally, Reemo’s ability to reproduce the screen of a remote PC with a frequency of 60 FPS without pixelation brings real working comfort and is an undeniable asset for us [graphic designers] when we talk about working remotely. Not to mention the ability to manage the graphics tablet and pen pressure through the encrypted stream of pixels.
3 - How easy a company is able to switch from a standard mode to an agile one?
Well, the solution is very simple and easy to use. The access and user management admin interface is very intuitive and allows you to make the solution operational in just a few clicks while being very comfortable in managing the solution on a day-to-day basis.
Since Reemo is accessible from a simple Chrome browser, the team did not need any special training. Opening Reemo and streaming your PC is as easy & smooth as opening Youtube and watching a video.
Moreover, Reemo and its low latency remote desktop tool received excellent feedback from all of our team members, to such an extent that we asked Reemo to build an immersive mode feature in order to identify which screen belongs to which PC.
4 - Reemo’s little extra?
Today it’s easy for VFX, 2D/3D animation, game development studios and more broadly for all small and medium-sized companies in the Creative Industries to switch to Reemo because it goes fast, it’s flexible, it’s secure and it works. So much so that we only reopened the studio in September.
I would like to thank Maxime Caron, CG manager at the Supamonks studio for sharing his feedback with Reemo.io
To conclude, Reemo is opening your workspace with a “digital rocket” equipped with an ultra powerful low latency streaming engine. Go get your next talent located on the other side of the world and get ready for the next step: Make your end-user computing invisible…anywhere.
Are you looking for a 60 FPS low latency remote desktop software to access a virtual machine or a PC whether it’s Windows 10 or Linux ?
Then feel free to use Reemo as much as you want as there is a free plan for individuals. If you are a business and you are fed up with the limits of your VPN, Teamviewer, logMeIn and you want to manage rights & user access smoothly, then go and get your license for a new remote working experience.
