Founded in 1998, DNEG is one of the world’s leading visual effects and animation studios for feature films and television. DNEG has grown over the years to become a global force with multiple facilities on several continents. The company has built its reputation for delivering the best in visual effects through major projects such as Dune: Part Two, AvatarAnd The last of us. Its exceptional work has earned it numerous accolades, including Oscars, BAFTA Awards, and Visual Effects Society Awards. But the company isn’t resting on its laurels. Instead, DNEG is working to accelerate the efficiency and creativity of its teams by integrating artificial intelligence (AI) into its VFX workflows. With ASUS hardware and ProArt, it’s already achieving astonishing results.
By leveraging AI, DNEG can automate complex tasks, analyze vast amounts of data, and generate realistic effects to create new possibilities in the film landscape. DNEG’s AI-powered VFX solutions have helped make film production more efficient and cost-effective, allowing the company to remain at the forefront of the industry, pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in visual effects.
High-performance solutions for a global workforce
As DNEG strives to develop the latest AI-powered solutions, one of the biggest challenges it faces is providing its employees with sufficient computing resources for demanding AI workflows. As a global company with teams spread across multiple time zones and many employees working remotely, DNEG couldn’t just outfit its headquarters with high-performance workstations and call it a day.
Martine Bertrand, Senior AI Researcher at DNEG, explains the main obstacle the company had to overcome: “Machine learning requires access to very specialized equipment that you can’t necessarily have at home. Being able to access it via virtual machines from anywhere in the world is a very important thing for us.”
Thousands of ASUS NUC mini PCs provide DNEG employees around the world with access to the company’s virtual machines. ASUS NUCs, like the ASUS NUC 14 ProASUS NUCs are surprisingly small and highly configurable PCs that are easy to deploy at scale for businesses. With high performance per liter, excellent connectivity, and dongle-free Bluetooth connectivity, ASUS NUCs are an effective tool for scaling a large workforce.
Supreme AI Performance with ProArt-Powered AI PCs
Some DNEG employees, like Bertrand, need access to PCs with even more performance. When working from home, they need high-end hardware that’s ready to run and display projects smoothly. They need equipment that can handle large amounts of processing power. To achieve this, the company has invested in the latest technologies, such as high-performance GPUs and CPUs.
Currently, Bertrand is exploring the performance potential of a Powered by ASUS Puget Systems Workstation. Equipped with a ProArt Z790-Creator WiFi motherboard, a powerful Intel Core i9 processor and a robust ProArt GeForce RTX™ 4080 SUPER graphics cardThis workstation allows distributed teams like Bertrand’s to efficiently manage training and pre-processing tasks.
Bertrand emphasizes the importance of these ProArt components in running pre-trained models and producing high-resolution images. “The graphics card is at the heart of it all. Since we’re playing with pre-trained models, they can run fantastically on 16GB of VRAM, and you can produce high-resolution images on a graphics card like this,” she concludes.
The ProArt Z790-Creator WiFi motherboard was designed from the ground up for scenarios like DNEG’s. PCIe 5.0 x16 slots support the fastest graphics cards available today. DDR5 RAM accelerates bandwidth-intensive content creation workloads, while four onboard M.2 slots allow for a spacious and fast storage bay. A robust power supply design and enlarged VRM heatsinks allow this motherboard to take on the work of maintaining demanding workflows. And exceptional connectivity options, including dual Thunderbolt 4 ports and WiFi 6E, ensure it’s easy to connect a full creative workstation to this motherboard.
Cutting-edge ProArt displays with professional-grade color accuracy
As a visual effects company, DNEG relies as much on high-quality displays as it does on high-performance hardware. As Betrand explains, “The shots we work with are always in a high-dynamic-range, high-bitrate format, and we need to be able to have a monitor that allows us to look at 4K content and see if it preserves the quality and detail that we want to put into the final shot.”
To help its AI researchers preserve and ensure the quality and consistency of the images they work with, DNEG uses ProArt PA32UCXR Display monitors. These professional displays offer high dynamic range with peak brightness up to 1,600 nits, support for multiple HDR formats, true 10-bit color, and 4K resolution, all essential for maintaining color representation and detail in the final shot.
For the large-scale projects DNEG works on, it is essential that team members around the world evaluate and discuss the same colors for every pixel in a project. The PA32UCXR is factory pre-calibrated to achieve an average ΔE value of less than one for industry-leading color accuracy. To maintain this level over the long term, ensure consistency across the global workforce, and facilitate effective communication and collaboration, it also features automated calibration via an integrated motorized colorimeter.
A complete ecosystem of ProArt components for businesses worldwide
With its fleet of ASUS NUC mini PCs, DNEG has been able to put powerful performance at the fingertips of its employees around the world. Using the latest AI solutions to accelerate its work in creating advanced lifelike visual effects, it will be able to harness this power to create, collaborate and innovate at the cutting edge of film production. Powered by ASUS Puget System, the workstations equipped with ProArt PC components give DNEG high-performance options to accelerate the efficiency of employees with particularly demanding workflows. And throughout their process, the ProArt displays will allow DNEG to evaluate high-speed HDR footage with professional-level accuracy.
These ProArt PC components and displays are just a few of the many creator-focused solutions offered by the complete ProArt portfolio. The ProArt display portfolio includes options tailored to the needs of 3D animators, architects, game developers, HDR color graders, and more. ProArt PC components, including motherboards, PC cases, AIO coolers, and graphics cards, allow you to build a custom PC tailored to your exact needs, while ProArt laptops and pre-built desktops make it easy to get high-level performance and features for creative work. Click here for an overview of the complete ProArt ecosystem.