Media and VFX

The artist is elsewhere. The production stack stays put.

Give editors, colourists, and VFX artists responsive access to the Linux or Windows workstation already connected to shared storage, installed applications, plugins, GPUs, and specialist hardware.

The operating problem

Moving the workstation stack is harder than reaching it.

Source media, caches, plugins, colour pipelines, licence services, GPUs, and storage are already coupled in the facility. Rebuilding that environment elsewhere creates another production stack to operate.

Hand-drawn Deck workspace with a pen tablet connected across one copper span to a fixed GPU workstation and storage rack.
One working surface. One fixed production stack. Applications execute on Pier.
Installed environment

Use the workstation as built.

Applications, plugins, GPUs, caches, licence clients, and mounted storage stay in place.

Professional input

Carry the artist's working gestures.

Deck carries keyboard, mouse, and professional pen input to Pier.

Review audio

Publish workstation sound when required.

Pier can publish workstation audio for editing and review, or the operator can disable it.

A practical freelancer handoff

Start the job without mailing a hard drive.

When a freelancer needs to begin quickly, keep the project on studio storage and give the authorized artist remote control of a workstation already connected to the production environment.

Studio

Prepare the workstation, project, and account.

The studio keeps the media on its existing storage and makes one Pier reachable over its LAN or customer VPN.

Freelancer

Install Deck and connect to the supplied address.

The freelancer uses the route and workstation credentials provided by the studio. Arcen does not create the account or VPN access.

Work

Use the production workstation from somewhere else.

The applications execute on Pier and the project files stay on studio storage instead of being copied to a drive and shipped.

Boundary: Remote control presents frames to the artist. It is not anti-piracy or leak prevention; screen capture, a camera, or application export may still reproduce information.

Creative proof

Judge the pixels, pen, and sound in the real application.

Arcen is engineered for responsive, high-quality workstation access. A studio should judge colour, codecs, display layout, peripherals, and latency on its own pipeline and production content.

Generated interfaces are never used as product proof.

Operator control

Pier decides which session channels exist.

Pier controls clipboard direction, content type, transfer size, workstation audio, and microphone input. Deck cannot widen the policy.

Clipboard

Set direction, content, and size.

Allow both directions, one direction, or none; permit text, PNG images, or both within a host-defined limit.

Audio output

Match the review path.

Enable workstation audio for editorial and review, or disable the channel.

Microphone input

Control the upstream channel separately.

Deck microphone input is configured independently and packaged off by default.

Infrastructure

Keep runtime dependencies out.

Direct sessions, OS authentication, and current Pier licence verification work without contacting Arcen.

Shift economics

Licence the workstation, not each artist.

A Pier licence is tied to the workstation HostID. Three artists using one workstation across three shifts still use one Pier licence. Creative-application licensing remains separate and runs on the Pier.

EUR 199per Pier / year

Product status

macOS Deck with Linux and Windows Pier is the current platform path. Display topologies, peripheral coverage, and release availability must be checked against the published product status. Customer-hosted Arcen Span is planned.

Technical evidence

Inspect what happens before a frame reaches Deck.

Review transport, certificate trust, OS authentication, session policy, and offline licensing.

Open the technical page