What is a release studio? Finishing a film in one project

A release studio is a single workspace for everything that happens between a locked cut and an audience: the grade, the sound mix, subtitles and dubbing, the poster and social sizes, and the final deliverables. Instead of exporting the film to a different application for each job, the whole release stays in one live project, where a change in one place is visible everywhere else.

That is the idea behind Momentum cinemaOS. It is still an editor, and a capable one, but it is built around the stretch most editing tools treat as somebody else's problem. Your film deserves a finish. Not another handoff.

The gap between "locked" and "released"

Ask an indie filmmaker how long the edit took, then ask how long it took from picture lock to the first festival screening. The second number is often surprisingly large.

The reason is that "finishing" is not one task. It is a dozen small ones, each traditionally done in its own tool by its own specialist:

• Conform and grade
• Dialogue cleanup and the sound mix
• Subtitles in one or more languages
• A dub or voice-over for other markets
• Titles and credits
• Poster, key art and social sizes
• Trailer and cut-downs
• Masters, stems, loudness checks and delivery packages

Every one of those steps is a handoff. Every handoff means an export, a new file, a version that can drift, and a moment where a late picture change breaks something downstream. Change two frames after the subtitles are timed, and the subtitles are wrong. Change the title font, and the poster no longer matches the trailer.

We wrote about the cost of this in too many tools, too many handoffs. The short version: the work itself is rarely the problem. The joins between the work are.

What makes it a release studio rather than an editor

Three things define the idea.

One live project. The cut, the grade, the mix, the subtitles and the key art all live in the same .mntm project. The poster can use a graded frame from the timeline. The subtitles follow the cut. The trailer titles use the same brand kit as the poster.

Organised by outcome, not by engine. You do not have to know which module does what. You say what you are making, and the app takes you to the right place. In cinemaOS, the HOME chip (⌘⇧H) opens 16 "what are you making" tiles, from "Cut a film" and "Key art" to Captions, Dub, Sound, Grade, Restore and Import a cut.

Delivery is part of the project. Masters, stems, subtitle files, sizes and checks are produced from the same place you finished the film, so the files you hand over are the files you watched. One shoot. A whole release.

A tour of the workspaces

cinemaOS has three workspaces, switched with ⌘1, ⌘2 and ⌘3, plus two tools that work across all of them.

Sequencer (⌘1): the cut and the sound

The Sequencer is the editor: bins, source and program monitors, a timeline with trim tools, multicam, keyframes, transitions and adjustment layers. The Text Editing bin tab lets you cut interviews by transcript, and the CREATE chip adds live titles and graphics that stay editable.

The SOUND console (⌘⌥S) lives inside the Sequencer: buses, sends, automation, loudness meters, 79 native processors and hosting for Audio Units and VST3 plug-ins. The Spatial Theatrics room delivers 2.0, 5.1, 7.1 and 7.1.4 PCM WAV. If you are curious about surround on a small budget, see spatial audio for indie film.

Cuts from other editors come in through FCPXML, XML, EDL, OTIO, AAF, Premiere and Resolve import, with a conform report listing anything that did not translate.

Finisher (⌘2): everything after the cut

The Finisher is organised into six outcomes, each with its own chips:

• Grade: Color, Lab, Vintage. Input LUTs, wheels, curves, qualifiers, tracked windows, grade versions, scopes and Shot Match from a reference still, which lands as editable sliders. Output runs through OCIO with ACES 2 SDR Rec.709.
• Localize: Captions and Dub. Local transcription, subtitles in nine export formats with QC, local translation into 58 languages with honest quality tiers, and voice-over or dubbing with macOS voices.
• Fix: Archival, Enhance, Cover, Dialogue. Restoration and upscaling, face and object covering, dialogue cleanup.
• Frame: Reframe and Aerial. Subject-tracked reframing from 16:9 to 9:16, and drone footage tools.
• Find: Search, Shots, Signals, Tech. Analysis that helps you find shots and technical problems.
• Deliver: Export and Presets. Masters in ProRes 422, HQ or 4444, H.264 or HEVC, and a Delivery Bundle with checksum and QC.

Atelier (⌘3): the release's visual identity

Atelier is the design workspace, with Photo, Layout, Video Composition and Brand rooms. You build key art from your own graded frames, keep a brand kit, adapt designs to every size and export them all at once with ⌘⌥E. Building a brand kit for every aspect ratio walks through it.

J.A.R.E.D. (⌘J): an assistant that runs on your Mac

J.A.R.E.D. is an on-device assistant. You type a request, such as "Tighten this interview to 2 minutes and keep the pauses" or "Reframe to 9:16", and the edit lands on the real timeline, where ⌘Z undoes it. In Always ask mode it proposes before acting; destructive actions always ask, whatever the mode. It works best in English today.

The model thinks. cinemaOS acts. cinemaOS verifies. It is a bounded, local tool, not an autonomous agent, and no project, media, transcript or prompt is uploaded.

Momentum Dial: commands under your pointer

The Momentum Dial is a radial command wheel. Force-click or press and hold, and it shows the commands that fit what is under the pointer: Split and Ripple Delete on a timeline clip, Insert and Overwrite on a bin clip, a color trackball in the grade. Hold ⌥ to scrub through undo history. Radial menu editing explains why it is fast.

Who a release studio is for

The idea is most useful to people who have to finish the whole thing themselves, or with a very small team.

• Indie filmmakers who direct, cut and deliver their own films, and cannot afford a separate colourist, mixer, subtitler and designer for every release.
• Creators who publish the same story in several shapes and languages, and need the vertical version and the subtitles to keep up with the edit.
• Colorists who want grading tools close to the cut, with versions and Shot Match, and a clean handback through FCPXML, XML, EDL or AAF.
• Designers who make the poster and the title sequence, and want them built from the actual graded frames rather than from screenshots.
• Photographers moving into motion, for whom Atelier's Photo room is a familiar place to start.

It is less suited to large facilities with established pipelines and specialists on every stage. They often benefit from dedicated tools. A release studio is for the many projects that do not have a facility behind them.

What a release studio does not replace

Honesty about limits is part of the idea. cinemaOS exports a mezzanine master, not a DCP, so a cinema screening still needs a lab or DCP tool. It does not encode Dolby formats, separate stems from a finished mix, do lip sync or remove objects from video. There is no real-time collaboration or shared cloud project; collaboration happens through files and interchange. And it is Mac-only, on Apple silicon with macOS 15 or later.

Other tools have real strengths. DaVinci Resolve has deep colour heritage, Premiere Pro has a vast ecosystem, Final Cut Pro is very fast on a Mac. Our comparisons with Resolve and Premiere Pro are written to help you choose, not to pretend those strengths do not exist.

FAQ

Is a release studio just an editor with more features?

The difference is the project model. An editor with plug-ins still tends to send work out and bring it back. A release studio keeps the grade, sound, subtitles, design and delivery in one live project, so changes carry through.

Do I need to stop using my current editor?

No. You can cut where you like, import the cut through FCPXML, XML, EDL, OTIO or AAF, and finish in cinemaOS, then hand it back through the same formats.

Does any of it need the cloud?

No. The AI features run on your Mac. The network is used for your account, licence, checkout and updates, and the app works offline for up to seven days between licence checks.

Start with one release

The clearest way to understand a release studio is to finish one film in it, from locked cut to delivery folder. cinemaOS runs on Apple silicon Macs and comes with a 60-day free trial, no card required. After that, cinemaOS Complete is €9.99 / $9.99 per month excluding VAT. Bring a locked cut, open HOME, and pick what you are making.