EngineLab works with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to help creative teams manage the time and resources needed to build cloud workflows for projects.
Early in 2025, the founders of EngineLab recognised a demand for industry-specific expertise in cloud transformation for media and entertainment studios, partly in response to distributed creative teams who need more agility and scalability. EngineLab now works with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to help those creative teams shorten the time needed to build cloud workflows for projects.
Co-founder Sam Reid gained specific experience in the use of cloud infrastructure when he was the chief technology officer at Untold Studios. There, he led the company's efforts to move from their startup in 2018 to launch entirely on the AWS Cloud in only six weeks, becoming one of the first creative studios to take this step. From there, Sam decided to start his own business and, joined by fellow co-founders Daniel Goller and Matt Herman, launched EngineLab.
Transforming Workflows
Though Sam, Daniel and Matt could see that many artists needed help handling the complexity of digital infrastructure, they hadn’t anticipated the interest the company would attract within only a few days of opening for business. In particular, on 21 February 2025, Technicolor began notifying employees that operations would be shut down the following week.
The developers from one of Technicolor's commercial VFX studios, The Mill, decided they would take this opportunity to start a new company and continue the projects they were currently working on. The new company, ARC Creative, had 72 hours to set up and launch their infrastructure or risk costly delays. At that point, the phone rang and the EngineLab team had their first project.
"We met with the ARC team and discussed what they wanted to do, and how they wanted to do it. It became clear that their Flame workflow for finishing and VFX was the most important one to get up and running – it was their most sensitive workflow with the most client interactivity," said Sam. "So, our remit was to create this workflow and start operating it on the cloud hardware as quickly as possible, which we successfully completed in three days. We received approval on the Friday and they were up and running by the following Monday."
Cloud-native Tools and Services
EngineLab enabled ARC Creative to deliver client projects without significantly altering schedules. Starting from their experience in creating similar workflows, they used a range of different cloud-native services, such as Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) for graphical workstations and Amazon FSx for scalable storage. FSx simplifies and lowers the cost of launching and scaling high-performance file systems in the cloud. It supports diverse workload types with wide functionality – including reliability and security.
EngineLab’s purpose is to set up systems in which creatives focus on their craft without being distracted by technical issues. Speed, scalability and cost-effectiveness are key factors. Sam said, "After spending seven years meeting and solving varied cloud challenges, we now aim to package that expertise to accelerate the process for other organisations in a standardised way."
"We have significant experience with AWS infrastructure and services, which helps us know exactly what the services do and how to use them. We can advise clients when to use certain services and when not to use them in favour of another service or solution. That judgment, based on real-world experience, is what allows us to launch fully functioning studios in a matter of days instead of months."
Automation – Templates and Scalability
Nina Walsh, Global Leader of Industry Business Development for Media & Entertainment, Games and Sports at AWS is pleased to see specialised partners like EngineLab emerge, and believes they strengthen the AWS Partner Network. While pushing innovation for creative industries, ultimately, Sam’s work in using the power of the cloud will pioneer industry advancement more generally. “EngineLab's deep expertise and ability to accelerate cloud adoption will be invaluable to studios looking to modernise their workflows and embrace solutions on AWS," she said.
The EngineLab team also emphasises the importance of Infrastructure as Code (IaC), using AWS CloudFormation to create repeatable, auditable deployments across multiple regions. CloudFormation manages infrastructure by automating, testing and deploying templates. Its codified approach means that studios can scale – from a single EC2 instance to more complex multi-region applications – across locations as project demands evolve.
Staying Resilient
As well as using AWS for core infrastructure, EngineLab has been integrating generative AI into creative workflows. The company works with Amazon Bedrock to develop AI-assisted tools that take on post-production tasks that are typically considered tedious – such as adjusting eye-lines in VFX shots or creating shot segmentation and depth mapping. By accessing Bedrock’s foundation models and agent tools, EngineLab automates non-creative, repetitive tasks, saving time for artists.
EngineLab is also using generative AI services from AWS to develop custom AI assistants integrated into collaboration tools like Slack and Teams. This gives studios new ways to enhance productivity without disrupting existing workflows.
While still in its early days, EngineLab currently sees significant interest from studios that want to introduce intelligent techniques into their technology stacks. By matching cloud scalability with AI acceleration, creative teams can respond more quickly to the ups and downs of a volatile market, and meanwhile preserve their operating capital without compromising performance.
"In an industry that's naturally bursty and prone to disruption, cloud technology has become one of the best ways to stay agile," said Sam. "We have worked with AWS for over seven years. The resulting relationship centres on customers and innovation. With AWS, studios can access the most recent hardware, optimise costs and stay resilient under almost any circumstances." aws.amazon.com
