Check files with Hiscale ANALYZE + PLAYER
Your QC report says there is blockiness at 10:14:22:08. Now what?
The short end of it: FLICS has a new analysis module, ANALYZE, that reads every file it processes and writes down what it finds, with timecodes on each finding. The report goes wherever you want it: download it, hand it to your asset management system, or open the file in the new Hiscale PLAYER and jump straight to the flagged frame on the high-res master. You verify the findings in minutes and skip the two hours of watching.
PROBLEM: QC EITHER EATS HOURS OR HAPPENS SOMEWHERE YOU CAN'T SEE
Manual QC on a two-hour master means someone sits and watches a two-hour master. You run it at double speed near the end of a shift, your attention drifts during the long static shot, and the four black frames at the reel change get through.
Full QC suites handle all of this well, and they price accordingly, which keeps them out of reach for teams whose checking needs are smaller. Lighter QC solutions, however, still stop short. They live in another vendor's system, return a list of timecodes, and leave you to open the master in another tool and scrub to each one by hand. If that tool plays a proxy, you are checking a blockiness flag against compression artefacts that belong to the proxy, and the master has its own.
SOLUTION: ANALYZE FINDS IT, PLAYER SHOWS IT
ANALYZE runs inside FLICS, on the same file FLICS is reading for the transcode. You choose a QC template with the checks you want to run and a sensitivity level, so you decide what counts as a problem for this kind of content, and every finding comes out as an event with in and out timecodes in a JSON report.
What ANALYZE does
Checks for black frames, freeze frames, colour bars, flashing (PSE), blockiness and scene changes
Tracks video bitrate and audio silence and loudness
Gives every finding a timecode with in and out points
Writes the results to a JSON report for FLICS or any downstream system
Lets you set QC templates and sensitivity levels per workflow
Opens the results in Hiscale PLAYER with one click on the job
Hiscale PLAYER is a cross-platform desktop app that opens media wherever it lives and plays the high-res, which is the only version worth checking a blockiness flag against. The ANALYZE results sit on the timeline as markers, with bitrate and audio channels underneath, and ANALYZE splits the file into scenes so you hop between them instead of scrubbing.
What PLAYER does
Runs on Mac, Windows and Linux, opened straight from FLICS
Plays files FLICS has processed, local files, and media in cloud storage as well as the once you open manually from the player
JKL jog and shuttle, frame stepping, timecode or frame count display
Waveform and vectorscope
Audio mixer with mute, solo and pan on every channel
Metadata view, safe-area overlays and a pixel-coordinate readout
HOW TO USE IT: THE HUMAN CHECK IN MINUTES
Open a file ANALYZE has run on, click the blockiness marker, and PLAYER jumps to the frame: a sky full of clouds, the encoder did what clouds do to encoders, and you move on. Click the black-frame marker and you land on a fade to black in the edit, which is fine as well. Two flags checked with no scrubbing, and you have looked at every point in the file a machine had a reason to doubt. The file goes out with the report attached and the human check on record.
The same report drives automation. Black frames at the head and colour bars at the tail are the classic case: ANALYZE finds them, FLICS can trim them on the next pass, and nobody opens a player at all.
Both pieces slot into the rest of the line-up. AGENT gets the media in, FLICS transcodes and orchestrates it, ANALYZE checks it, and PLAYER opens the result wherever it sits. One vendor covers the run from card to delivery.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Is ANALYZE a separate product? It is an add-on module to FLICS and runs inside your FLICS deployment, whether that is cloud, on-premises or a mix of both.
Does PLAYER need ANALYZE? PLAYER works on its own as a high-res review player. With ANALYZE in place, the findings appear on the timeline.
Do I keep my existing QC tool? FLICS keeps its integrations with Interra BATON and QScan. ANALYZE gives you a QC pass inside FLICS itself, with a report any downstream system can read.
THE BOTTOM LINE
ANALYZE turns QC into a list of timecodes and PLAYER turns that list into a few clicks on the master. You look only at the frames that need a human, on the high-res rather than a proxy.
If you are running QC by hand, or in a system you cannot see into, talk to us about turning on ANALYZE in your FLICS workflow.
