In Broadcast - May 2015 - 50

50

www.inbroadcast.com | Vol: 5 - Issue 5 | May 2015

InStudio

Sports Production Solutions:
Gearing Up The Big Events
Broadcast technology for sports coverage
is ahead of the game reports Jim Evans...

T

he calendar for major global
sporting events is becoming even
more crowded and the statistics show
that viewers' appetite for both national
and international sporting events
remains as healthy as ever.

ITV will provide live coverage of every
single match throughout the six weeks
of 2015 Rugby World Cup, hosted by
England

The football merry-go-round rolls on
with the finals of the Europa League
(Warsaw) and Champions League
(Berlin) the main early summer
attractions; on the cricket field
there's a much publicised England/
Australia Ashes series. The world of
Grand Prix racing continues to appeal
to audiences worldwide. Later in the
year, England will stage the Rugby
Union World Cup, and looking further
ahead, there's the small matter of the
Olympic Games in Rio in 2016. Busy
days then, for the outside broadcast
teams and production studios on site
and back at base. And developments
in technology for the technical teams

- while reliability remains a core
essential - is becoming more and
more versatile as the different viewing
formats develop apace.
4K technology, as elsewhere in
broadcasting, is making its presence
felt in the sports sector. Sony teamed
up with Sky during last year's Ryder
Cup, held in Gleneagles, Scotland, on
a series of successful 4K technology
trials, which were broadcast on
4K screens at the event and also
distributed live to Sky's London HQ.
During the trial, Sony F55 cameras
were equipped with Sony's CA4000
adapters, which, together with the
BPU-4000 base band processor unit,
enables the cameras to slot into a live
production workflow and feed into
Sony's MVS-X series of vision mixers.
4K footage was captured using the
F55s with cine lens as well as a broad
range of legacy box zoom lenses,
through the use of Sony's newly
enhanced B4 lens adapter.
"We were asked to come and
participate in the trial at the Ryder
Cup with Sky Sports, basically looking
into using the three-day event as a test
bed for what we're learning around 4K
and how we can take that forward,"
explains Mark Grinyer, Head of Sports
Innovation, Sony Professional.
Commenting on the image quality

Lawo technology proved to be at the top of its
game at the Biathlon World Cup 2015, held in
Kontiolahti, Finland
The Biathlon World Cup 2015 was covered by
Finnish public broadcaster YLE and also served
Russian nationwide TV and radio broadcaster
RTR, Sweden's SVT, France TV and Russian
broadcaster C1R

Sony teamed up with Sky during last year's Ryder Cup, held in Gleneagles,
Scotland, on a series of successful 4K technology trials

of the 4K images captured during the
Ryder Cup 2014, Sky Sports' Technical
Manager Robin Broomfield says:
"There's a lot more detail in the 4K
and everyone was really impressed
with the images we were producing.
The whole environment at Gleneagles
is fantastic."
The Ryder Cup 4K trial followed
other high-profile 4K trials at sporting
events, including the FIFA World
Cup 2014 and the Wimbledon tennis
tournament.
"Over the last 12 months, there's
been a change in the way we can
handle 4K. Setting up the cameras
and working them in a live truck
environment has become a lot easier,"
sums up Sky Sports' Broomfield. "It's
much more a plug and play operation
now than it was a year ago."
Meanwhile, on the ski slopes of
Europe, held in Kontiolahti, Finland,
the Biathlon World Cup 2015, Lawo
technology proved to be at the top of
its game. Finnish public broadcaster
YLE used an IP-based Commentary
System with ten Lawo Commentary

Units (LCU) - including onsite support -
from rental company Audio Broadcast
Services (ABS) for television coverage
of the event.
The fully digital Commentary System
is based on RAVENNA Audio-over-IP
networking technology that enables
the use of standard IP networks for
interconnecting venues and devices.
The Lawo solution spans the actual
commentary unit, the IP-based link
infrastructure and the softwarebased Commentary Control Room
Management tools, to the convenient
hand-over of the signals to all National
Broadcast Partners - a complete and
extremely flexible solution from a
single source.
In addition to YLE, a number of
other broadcasters used the Lawo
Commentary System, among these
were Russian nationwide TV and radio
broadcaster RTR, Sweden's SVT,
France TV and Russian broadcaster
C1R.
Rental provider Gearhouse Broadcast
has rolled in nine Lawo mc²56 audio
mixing consoles, 21 x Lawo V-pro8
video processor units and a Nova73 HD
router for the broadcast of the first big
international sports event of 2015 - the
Australian Open tennis tournament
staged in Melbourne Park.
Lawo staff went down under in order
to support Gearhouse Broadcast in
setting up and commissioning the
Lawo systems. "The build of a system
that had distribution flexibility was key
for us during the design process and is
why we chose to network the system,"
says Nick Bowey, Gearhouse's Senior
Audio Engineer.
http://www1.skysports.com/ryder-cup http://www.itv.com/rugby https://youtu.be/Gj7TwOUGhJE https://youtu.be/Gj7TwOUGhJE https://www.lawo.de/up-to-date/news/nbsp/biathlon_en.html https://www.lawo.de/up-to-date/news/nbsp/biathlon_en.html
In Broadcast - May 2015

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