Endcrawl offers a simple to understand interface that the whole post team can feel comfortable handling. Note how some of the standard logos used in end credits are available as clickable icons. 

If you edit a fast-paced TV series, or face a quick turnaround to ready a feature for a festival, you might dread the thought of slogging through the creation of end title credits as you near the finish.

It’s a relief if your budget or schedule allows you to hand this task off to a graphic artist, someone who knows all about layout and font selection.

But what if you don’t have a line in your budget or the time to explain the job to someone else? What can you do?

Well, Endcrawl has your back. Or rather, your end credits.

That’s the angle for PNYA member John "Pliny" Eremic, co-creator of the app Endcrawl (at Endcrawl.com). This cloud-based program creates fully formatted title credits with just a simple upload of text files on the user’s part.

To help members get a handle on the process, Eremic organized a panel for interested PNYA’ers this past October 20^th in Light Iron’s Broadway screening room.

Joining Eremic in the discussion at the demo were Chris Fetner, Director of Global Media Engineering at Netflix and HBO's Rod Bogart, Director of Production R+D.

(For those who appreciate tech history, Bogart helped invent the OpenEXR format – now a standard in the VFX industry - while at ILM.)

Of course such software fits the bill for documentaries and indie features, where producers try to balance budgets with good-looking on screen results. The software’s track record includes use on hundreds of films, including The Adderall Diaries, A Most Violent Year, and Mr. Holmes.

Topics covered during the panel put John’s Endcrawl project into perspective. The app integrates into a new generation of file-based deliverables that are quickly replacing traditional tape­ based formats. These formats include IMF (Interoperable Master Format) and AS­02 (an MXF mastering tool), but also lesser-known MXF versions like Op­1a and AS­11 DPP.

These newer formats offer more sophisticated control over digital media compared to what you could accomplish with traditional linear tape. For example, previously content creators had to manually interact with a sprawling mess of folders and output requirements to prep a package for a network or cable system. Now, the new formats enable easy distribution of multiple versions of the content, via playlists, all inside a single package.

New renders can be made quickly using the compute resources of the cloud-based app.

During the evening’s event, Chris Fetner also discussed Netflix's approach to deliverables and versioning, while Rod Bogart added rich historical detail on events that lead to the creation of the IMF format at Disney/Pixar.

Currently, Eremic works at HBO in the Post Delivery department, where he helps draft details on contribution standards, “among other things”.

Endcrawl's automated cloud render engine turns around free 1K previews in about 5 minutes, according to Eremic. Need 2K DPX files? Expect to wait about a half hour. Those 2K titles cost $499 per project, with “unlimited” numbers of changes and re-renders available. Finally Google Docs, which is integrated into the app, allow project members to collaborate in real time, previewing the title layout as they work.