Built by Someone Who
Lived the Problem.
ReviewRoom was founded by Shankar Natarajan, who serves as both Founder and CTO. A VFX technology leader with 15+ years in the industry, Hollywood credits on blockbuster films, and deep expertise in AI and computer vision — he built ReviewRoom because he spent a decade waiting for cloud tools to transcode his team's files.
Why Does ReviewRoom Exist?
After compositing shots for Pacific Rim, Star Trek, and The Wolverine at FutureWorks Media, Shankar experienced the same frustration every VFX artist knows: uploading massive EXR sequences to cloud review tools, then waiting 30 to 60+ minutes for server-side transcoding before anyone could see a single frame.
When he co-founded Spellbound Visual Effects in 2015 and began managing his own studio's pipeline, the problem only got worse. Cloud-based review tools charged premium prices for GPU-farm transcoding that still couldn't keep up with the volume of daily reviews. The infrastructure costs were passed directly to studios as expensive subscriptions.
The insight was simple: every artist's workstation already has a powerful GPU sitting idle during review sessions. Why upload 500MB EXR sequences to a remote server when the machine in front of you can transcode them into lightweight MP4s in seconds?
ReviewRoom was born from that realization. Unlike competitors that require you to convert files first and then transcode again on their cloud — a double conversion — ReviewRoom handles EXR, ProRes, and heavy formats directly on the user's GPU (NVIDIA, AMD, Apple Silicon, or Intel). No source files are uploaded to the server. Only lightweight browser-ready MP4s sync through a global CDN. The result: review-ready in minutes, not hours, at a fraction of the cost. And because ReviewRoom handles both video and image review, it's a single tool for the entire creative pipeline.
VFX Credits & Productions
From personal compositing work at FutureWorks Media to leading technology at Spellbound VFX — a TPN-certified studio delivering VFX for Marvel, Sony, Netflix, and Disney productions.
Personal Credits (FutureWorks Media)
Spellbound VFX Studio Credits
From VFX Artist to Product Builder
VFX Compositor & CG Generalist
Started in VFX at Sai Studios in Chennai, progressing through compositing and CG generalist roles across multiple studios. Worked end-to-end from storyboard to final composite, built expertise in previz, postviz, and on-set supervision for Indian cinema.
Compositor — FutureWorks Media
Joined FutureWorks Media to work on Hollywood blockbusters including Pacific Rim, Star Trek Into Darkness, The Wolverine, and Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters. Gained first-hand experience with large-scale international VFX pipelines and the pain points of remote review workflows.
Co-Founder & Head of Technology — Spellbound VFX
Co-founded Spellbound Visual Effects & Animation in Chennai — now a TPN-certified studio delivering VFX for Marvel, Sony, Netflix, and Disney productions including Spider-Man: Far from Home, Shang-Chi, Eternals, Stranger Things, and Hawkeye. Architected the studio's entire technology pipeline from render farm infrastructure to real-time review systems — the direct precursor to ReviewRoom.
Founder & CTO — Vision-Scematics
Founded Vision-Scematics to bring AI and computer vision solutions to the visual computing industry. Built platforms for advanced data annotation, synthetic data generation, and AI training infrastructure — applying the same precision used in Hollywood VFX to machine learning workflows.
Creator — ReviewRoom
Built ReviewRoom to solve the problem he experienced first-hand for over a decade: waiting hours for cloud tools to transcode heavy VFX files. By moving transcoding to the user's local machine, ReviewRoom eliminates the upload bottleneck entirely — making review at least 2X faster.
Areas of Expertise
Visual Effects
15+ years across compositing, CG, previz, and on-set supervision
AI & Computer Vision
Data annotation, synthetic data generation, and ML infrastructure
VFX Pipeline Architecture
Render farms, review systems, and end-to-end studio technology
Studio Operations
Co-founded and scaled a VFX studio serving international productions