SVG SportsTech Journal

SPRING 2022

We,re Back in Las Vegas!

2022 NAB Show Preview

VOLUME16 ISSUE 1 PUBLISHED BY

ADVANCING THE CREATION, PRODUCTION, & DISTRIBUTION OF SPORTS CONTENT

BIG FEBRUARY Super Bowl LVI & Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics INSIDE SVG EVENT RECAP: SVG Returns to In-Person Events With SVG Summit and Esports Production Summit WHITE PAPERS: Blackmagic Design and The Switch

SPORTS BROADCASTING Inducts Class of 2020-21

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in this issue SPRING 2022 Volume 16 Issue 1

upfront 6

ROM THE CHAIRMAN F Return of the Shows

8 COVERING THE FIELD Welcome Back to Las Vegas

SVGeventrecap

page 10

10 SVG SUMMIT 11 TRANSPORT

11 SPORTS BETTING PRODUCTION FORUM 11 ESPORTS PRODUCTION SUMMIT 12 TEAMS SUMMIT 12 SYSTEMS INTEGRATOR SUMMIT

page 12

SPORTS BROADCASTING HALL OF FAME 16 CHARLES BARKLEY 20 JAMES BROWN 24 DON CORNELLI

28 JOHN FILIPPELLI 32 TIM FINCHEM 36 HUGO GAGGIONI

starts on page 15

40 FRED GAUDELLI 46 PHYLLIS GEORGE 50 TOM SAHARA

COVER STORY

NBC SPORTS’

BIG FEBRUARY Starts on page 54

56 SUPER BOWL LVI 72 BEIJING 2022 WINTER OLYMPICS

white papers 100 BLACKMAGIC DESIGN: CAPITALIZING ON CREATIVITY BY INCORPORATING DIGITAL FILM INTO SPORTS BROADCASTING 102 THE SWITCH: THE NEW ‘CONTENT CONTINUUM’: A GROWING SPECTRUM OF CLOUD SERVICES POWERS A FAST-EVOLVING ARRAY OF SPORTS COVERAGE 104 NAB 2022 PREVIEWS

4

120

SPONSOR UPDATE

134

SVG SPONSOR DIRECTORY

140

CLOSING COMMENT Will NAB Signal the Dawn of a New Age? SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

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ASSOCIATION LEADERSHIP

FROM THE CHAIRMAN

RETURN OF THE SHOWS

By Mike Davies Sports Video Group, Advisory Board Chairman For a while now, it is safe to say that the big shows have been off and running. From the Olympics, Super Bowl, Daytona 500, the Masters, and many more, we have seen not only a return to things as usual, but — in my view — an expansion. The shows have been getting bigger with more technology, sidecasts, and shoulder programming, and have captured some amazing moments along the way. While the wake of COVID still presents itself with limited capacity international programming as well as some technological legacy like the increase of remote production, we have been seeing a resurgence of where we left off in 2020.

Not only have the shows returned, but the conferences have as well. As we anticipate the return to an NAB that would resemble those of old, we welcome the opportunity to be around those we work with.

I think that is one thing that is unique among the production classes of sports broadcast is the camaraderie that we have with one another, and the openness we share with one another in our craft. Truly, our identities are often intertwined with what we do and who we do it with in this business.

NAB may not quite announce the cadence of new products that it used to; indeed, many announcements now follow their own flow unencumbered with the scheduling of the biannual shows, NAB and IBC. Instead, we look forward to seeing what EACH OTHER are doing in our spaces, and how we are doing it. This is the time I am looking forward to as we march to the SVG Chairman’s Forum and the 2022 NAB Show, and hope that future iterations of the pandemic will no longer have an effect on the scheduling of these meetings.

And there is a lot to talk about: the ongoing conversation on remote production workflows, HDR and 4K/8K, object-based audio, MAM enhancements — you name it, we are there to talk about it. So come with your opinions and your drinking hat. NAB and SVG in-person events are back. <

2022EVENTS SEE PAGE 13 FOR DETAILS

6

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

>CHAIR

Mike Davies, Fox Sports, SVP, Technical and Field Operations

>EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

Ken Aagaard, SVG Chairman Emeritus and HOF Chairman Andrea Berry, NBCUniversal –Telemundo and Latin America, EVP, Operations and Technology Eric Black, NBCUniversal, SVP, Sports & Entertainment Technology Chris Brown, Turner Sports, VP, Sports Production Technology Jason Cohen, CBS Sports and CBS Sports Network, VP, Remote Technical Operations Mike Connelly, Bally Sports, EVP Scott Gillies, VENN, CTO Steve Hellmuth, SVG Chairman Emeritus and NBA Entertainment, EVP, Media Operations and Technology Jeff Jacobs, VENN, EVP and General Manager Patty Power, CBS Sports, EVP, Operations and Engineering Tom Sahara, SVG Chairman Emeritus Susan Stone, MLB Network, SVP, Engineering and Operations

>ADVISORY BOARD MEMBERS

Adam Acone, NFL Network, Director, Media Operations and Planning Glenn Adamo, Ivanhoe Media and Entertainment, President Peter Angell, Industry Consultant Tracey Arrowood-Shaw, Industry Consultant Onnie Bose, NFL, VP of Broadcasting Dylan Boucherle, Warner Media/Turner Studios, VP, Technology Strategy and Media Workflows Tab Butler, Industry Consultant Chris Calcinari, ESPN, SVP, Remote Production Operations, ESPN and ABC Sports Mary Ellen Carlyle, Dome Productions, SVP and GM Ken Clausen, HBO, Director of Production Joe Cohen, Industry Consultant Michael Cohen, United Soccer League, EVP and Head of Broadcasting and Media Don Colantonio, Industry Consultant Scott Davis, CBS Sports, VP of Broadcast Operations Jim DeFilippis, Industry Consultant Ed Delaney, Industry Consultant Jed Drake, Industry Consultant David Dukes, PGA Tour Entertainment, Senior Director, Technical Operations Jerry Gepner, CP Communications, COO Steve Gorsuch, Industry Consultant Ken Goss, NBC Sports, SVP of Remote Operations & Production Planning Mark Haden, NHL, Group VP, Broadcast Technology Rob Hedrick, NHRA, Tech Manager, Director of Production and Supervising Producer Ed Holmes, The Holmes Group, Principal Deb Honkus, NEP Broadcasting, Chairman of the Board George Hoover, Industry Consultant Darryl Jefferson, NBC Sports Group, VP, Postproduction and Digital Workflow Robert Jordan, CVE, 1337 Facilities, CEO; Venue Road, Founder John Kvatek, University of Central Florida Knights, Senior Associate AD/ External Operations John Leland, PSL International, LLC, Principal Glen Levine, NEP, President, U.S. Louis Libin, Broad Comm, President Jodi Markley, Industry Consultant Geoff Mason, Industry Consultant Bernadette McDonald, Major League Baseball, SVP, Broadcasting Grant Nodine, NHL, SVP, Technology Ken Norris, UCLA, Director of Video Operations Gary Olson, GHO Group, Managing Director Del Parks, Sinclair Broadcast Group, SVP and CTO Scott Rinehart, University of Notre Dame, Director, Broadcast Technology Larry Rogers, FirstInTV, President Mike Rokosa, Industry Consultant Scott Rothenberg, NEP, SVP, Technology and Asset Management Oscar Sanchez, CONCACAF, Director of Broadcast Operations Bruce Shapiro, Broadcast Consulting Don Sperling, New York Giants Entertainment, VP and Executive Producer Jerry Steinberg, Industry Consultant Steve Stum, NASCAR, VP, Operations and Technical Production Patrick Sullivan, Game Creek Video, President Jason Taubman, Game Creek Video, VP Design/New Technology Larry Tiscornia, Industry Consultant Jacob Ullman, Fox Sports, SVP, Production and Talent Development John Ward, Friend MTS, EVP, Americas Ernie Watts, Industry Consultant Mike Webb, YES Network, VP, Broadcast Operations Jeff Willis, Industry Consultant Dave Zur, KSE Media Ventures, SVP, Operations & Engineering

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8

By Karen Hogan Ketchum, Sports Video Group, Director of Production and Editor, SportsTech Journal Three years ago, when we boarded our flights home from Las Vegas, it seemed assured that we would return the following year. The NAB Show was a constant in our calendars; an event to plan for, and schedule around, every spring, like clockwork. No matter where else our travels might take us, a week spent in Las Vegas was a sure bet.

Obviously, that all changed in 2020, when the pandemic would not only postpone and ultimately cancel the show once (in 2020) but twice (in 2021), leaving many of us to wonder just when we’d board that flight again for Las Vegas. Even earlier this year, with Omicron surging, we questioned whether 2022 would follow suit and the show be canceled for a third time.

But, here we are — less than a week out from the 2022 NAB Show and this year’s show is almost certainly a go. And with masks in our pockets and proof of vaccination (or negative test) in hand, we return to the Las Vegas Convention Center for four days of new product announcements and new technology workflows, but — most importantly — four days of networking, meeting up with colleagues and friends, and a hopeful feeling that this annual event truly is an annual event once again.

It’s fitting that the Spring 2022 SVG SportsTech Journal includes the return of the NAB Preview section. Turn to page 104 for everything you can expect from the show floor from 125+ leaders in sports broadcasting, production, and technology. Read on for Sponsor Update (starting on page 120) from those companies who may not be showing gear at this year’s NAB Show, but are no less busy as our industry continues its return to normalcy.

Speaking of busy, it’s safe to say that no one had a busier February than NBC Sports. In honor of the Peacock’s epic feat of multi-national production for not one, but two, massive tentpole events (during a pandemic, no less), we devote the cover story to NBC Sports’ efforts broadcasting Super Bowl LVI and the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics. Turn to page 54 for in-depth reports on NBC Sports (page 56), NFL Media (page 62), Telemundo Deportes (page 66), ESPN (page 70), NEP Group (page 70), and Van Wagner (page 70). Beginning on page 72, we catch up with NBC Sports’ Dave Mazza for his take on the Beijing Games, and follow up with interviews with NBC Sports’ Chip Adams (page 74), Tim Canary (page 80), Darryl Jefferson (page 82), Karl Malone (page 86), and Todd Donovan (page 90). While not under the NBC Sports umbrella, we also caught up with OBS’ Sotiris Salmouris (page 92), as well as international broadcasters BBC, CBC/Radio Canada, Discovery, and ZDF. Can’t get enough of Winter Olympics coverage? CLICK HERE to check out our SportsTechLive: Beijing 2022 Blog!

Despite the challenges posed by COVID-19, here at SVG, we were thrilled to return to in-person events in 2021. In November, we hosted our Esports Production Summit in Los Angeles (page 11) and, in December, our SVG Summit in New York City (page 10). The latter was especially exciting, as we were able to officially induct the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame Class of 2020-21: Charles Barkley (page 16), James Brown (page 20), Don Cornelli (page 24), John Filippelli (page 28), Tim Finchem (page 32), Hugo Gaggioni (page 36), Fred Gaudelli (page 40), Phyllis George (page 46), and Tom Sahara (page 50).

Lastly, we round out the Spring 2022 SVG SportsTech Journal with two industry white papers. The first, by Blackmagic Design (page 100), explores how sports broadcasters can incorporate digital film cameras into their productions. The second, by The Switch (page 102), details how the growing spectrum of cloud services powers sports television.

We hope you enjoy this edition of the SVG SportsTech Journal as you make your way to Las Vegas, and we can’t wait to see you there. <

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

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EVENTS RECAP

SPORTS VIDEO GROUP CONFERENCES IN REVIEW REVIEW

> S VG SUMMIT

DECEMBER 13-14 NEW YORK CITY

The 15th SVG Summit brought together more than 1,000 sportsproduction professionals at the New York Hilton Midtown hotel for the first time in two years. After being held virtually in 2020 due to the pandemic, the in-person event offered two days of informational panels and workshops, cutting-edge technology showcases, and, most important, plenty of opportunities for attendees to network and socialize face-to-face.

The first day of the SVG Summit once again featured a full day of workshops — eight in all — offering a detailed look at the industry’s latest technology trends. The morning kicked off with the first-ever SVG SPIRIT Career Development Track, designed to bring together industry professionals at the center of hiring and creating apprenticeships, internships, and mentoring programs.

The morning also included workshops on The Future of Remote Production, Cloud Tools & Services, and Social Sports.

The DTV Audio Group hosted a day-long workshop exploring the task of cost-efficiently creating premium audio experiences and the impact of modern networking and cloudbased processing on achieving that goal. The Summit’s general sessions kicked off in the afternoon of Day 1 and served as a “Hot Tech Showcase” highlighting today’s most exciting liveproduction technology. In addition to the Hot Tech Showcase, the afternoon featured workshops on Production Truck & Facility Design, Sports Content Management, and Streaming & OTT.

Day 2 ended with a Production Service Perspectives panel, featuring (from left): SVG’s Ken Kerschbaumer, Mobile TV Group’s Nick Garvin, CTV’s Hamish Greig, and NEP Broadcast Services’ Mike Werteen.

A panel on Augmented Reality Graphics feautred (from left): Quintar’s Tom Sahara, Ross Video’s Bryan Bray, disguise’s Simon Davis, Unreal Engine’s Craig Laliberte, and SMT’s Andrew Lorenz.

Day 2’s general sessions kicked off with a State of the Industry session featuring three industry stalwarts: SVG Chairman and Fox Sports SVP, Technical and Field Operations, Mike Davies; Program Productions Chairman/CEO Bob Carzoli, and Devoncroft Partners Principal Analyst Josh Stinehour.

NBA Entertainment’s Steve Hellmuth discussed 5G as a production tool.

Fox Sports’ Mike Davies shared his thoughts on shallow depth of field cameras.

The day continued with panels spotlighting National Networks, Regional Sports Networks, Digital Leaders, Leagues, and Production Services Perspectives.

Tuesday’s program also featured a trio of case studies from Diversified, Imagine Communications, and Spectra Logic. < 10

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

> T RANSPORT

SEPTEMBER 23, 2021 VIRTUAL

SVG’s annual TranSPORT conference featured a full afternoon of online sessions focused on the current state of live-sports contribution and distribution technology. TranSPORT addressed the industry’s most pressing issues including the latest developments in terrestrial and satellite backhaul, IP and bonded-cellular contribution, the potential of 5G and other next-gen technologies, OTT and streaming protocols, 4K and HDR delivery, the rise of REMI and centralized-production workflows, and more. Technology leaders from both major sports broadcasters and broadcast vendors took the virtual stage to offer up the latest developments in this integral sector of the sports-media ecosystem.

> S PORTS BETTING PRODUCTION FORUM OCTOBER 27, 2021 VIRTUAL

As the state-by-state legalization of sports betting continues across the country, sports broadcasters and OTT outlets are looking to capitalize on the expected revenue boost and create new betting-focused content for their viewers. Several national broadcasters and regional sports networks have already begun producing alternative “betcasts” for games, wageringfocused studio shows and original programming, predictivegaming apps and contests for fans, and more. Leaders from these sports broadcasters and streamers joined top vendors and experts from the sports-betting space to discuss how they are incorporating betting content into their broadcasts and how that’s changing their production strategy moving forward.

> E SPORTS PRODUCTION SUMMIT NOVEMBER 16, 2021 LOS ANGELES

The fourth-annual SVG Esports Production Summit returned to Los Angeles with a full day of panels, keynotes, and case studies delving deep into the next-gen workflows being used by today’s top esports tournament producers, publishers, and platforms. Over the past year and a half, the esports-production industry has undergone a historic transformation as a result of the pandemic. Although esports organizations were largely ahead of the curve when it came to cloud- and remote-production technologies, the pandemic fasttracked their technological roadmaps and brought these technologies to the forefront. The SVG Esports Production Summit took attendees behind the scenes of today’s live online and in-person tournament productions and went inside the groundbreaking technologies being used by esports-production leaders. Production teams from top esports organizations shared how they are delivering content to their fans today and what tomorrow’s esports productions might look like as in-person live events return.

Riot Games’ Carrie Dunn (top) and Nick Troop presented an opening keynote at the SVG Esports Production Summit on the historic 2021 League of Legends World Championship production.

Relive SVG Events with with video on demand available exclusively on SVG PLAY: svgplay.sportsvideo.org SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

11

EVENTS RECAP continued

> T EAMS SUMMIT

FEBRUARY 3, 2022 VIRTUAL

After a peculiar 2020 and a more normal 2021, sports leagues and teams are back in action and look forward to an even more prosperous 2022. The second-annual SVG Teams Summit provided informative panel discussions and case studies with executives and production professionals to better understand the current state of team-based content creation.

> S YSTEMS INTEGRATOR SUMMIT MARCH 3, 2022 VIRTUAL

As production control rooms in sports venues, studios, and trucks evolve in both design and scope, the role of the systems integrator must grow and evolve — especially in the pandemic era. In addition, a wave of centralized production hubs have popped up as the demand for remote-production facilities continues to explode. Meanwhile, the need for sophisticated media-asset management tools has never been more integral to the success of broadcasters, leagues, and teams — creating a bigger role than ever for media-workflow-solutions integrators. In its second year, the SVG Systems Integrator Summit brought together leading systems integrators to discuss their latest projects, the rise of IP and the cloud, and the latest technological trends being seen in the industry today.

Relive SVG Events with with video on demand available exclusively on SVG PLAY: svgplay.sportsvideo.org

DON’T MISS

SVG’S UPCOMING 2022 EVENTS! May 24 Jun 1 Jun 13-14 Jun 29-30 Jul 27 Sept 28-29 Oct 18 Nov 10 Dec 12-13

SPORTS GRAPHICS FORUM NEW YORK CITY AUSTRALIA SUMMIT SYDNEY SVG COLLEGE SUMMIT ATLANTA RSN SUMMIT CHICAGO SPORTS CONTENT MANAGEMENT FORUM NEW YORK CITY REMOTE PRODUCTION WORKFLOWS FORUM TBD TRANSPORT NEW YORK CITY ESPORTS PRODUCTION SUMMIT LOS ANGELES SVG SUMMIT NEW YORK CITY Event dates and formats are subject to change

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SPORTS BROADCASTING FUND It’s. What. We. Do. Supporting our own in times of need...

Since 2012, the SVG Sports Broadcasting Fund has been making a difference in people’s lives, day in day out, week after week. Created especially for those involved in sports production, the Fund is dedicated to providing aid to industry professionals and their families in times of need.

Our goal is simple: to be available as a “first responder” and to quickly help those we serve pay bills, enabling recipients to stretch their own cash reserves so that stress related to financial challenges is not piled onto an already stressful situation.

On October 2, 2020, 11-year-old Cassidy Stocker (center) was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor. The SVG Sports Broadcasting Fund stepped in to assist with everything from living expenses to insurance premiums and treatments. She continues to inspire friends, family, and even strangers via her “Candid with Cassidy” YouTube channel that has more than 2,000 subscribers.

The SVG Sports Broadcasting Fund exists thanks to the generous financial support of those in our industry. As you or your company lay out charitable contributions, please make sure to include the SVG Sports Broadcasting Fund in your plans!

All ticket sales to the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame Ceremony directly support the SVG Sports Broadcasting Fund, a 501(c)(3) non-profit charity.

TIN: 84-2588096 NYS Reg: 48-15-35.

<Scan here to donate... ...or visit https://svgsportsbroadcastingfund.org

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CLASS OF 2020-21

F

or the first time in two years, the sports-broadcasting industry reunited on Tuesday, December 13 for the 2020-21 Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame induction ceremony at the New York Hilton Midtown. After last year’s ceremony was delayed due to the pandemic, industry legends from both in front of and behind the camera were inducted during a memorable, emotional evening hosted by Lesley Visser, a Hall of Famer herself.

All table sales for the 14th annual ceremony, totaling more than $200,000 this year, are once again being donated to the Sports Broadcasting Fund, which supports industry members in times of need.

This year’s ceremony honored 10 sports-broadcasting greats: NBA legend and TNT analyst Charles Barkley, longtime CBS Sports and Fox Sports host James Brown, handheld camera operator Don Cornelli, former PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem, YES Network production chief John Filippelli, Sony technology guru Hugo Gaggioni, NBC Sunday Night Football producer Fred Gaudelli, trailblazing sportscaster Phyllis George, and Turner Sports operations stalwart Tom Sahara.

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

15

> CHARLES BARKLEY There is no one like Charles and there never will be. He is one of the most influential figures in sports history, with a personality and voice that has transcended the entire media industry. His basketball IQ, quick wit, unfiltered opinions and self-deprecating demeanor have informed, entertained and endeared him to countless fans. He is so deserving of this prestigious honor.

– Lenny Daniels, Turner Sports Charles is one of the smartest, most entertaining and influential commentators in all of sports. With a larger-than-life personality and unique perspective on the game, Charles has endeared himself to generations of NBA fans as he did throughout his Hall of Fame playing career.

– Adam Silver, NBA Commissioner In the history of the business, there’s three people who you watch regardless what the score is because you have no idea what they’re going to do. The first one was Howard Cosell, the second was John Madden, and now its Chuck.

– Shawn Gerchicoff, Turner Sports 16

M

any sports fans know Charles Barkley’s manifold nicknames: Sir Charles, the Chuckster, the Round Mound of Rebound. Now they have a new one to learn: Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer.

An unabashed analyst on one of the most successful studio shows in the history of sports entertainment, Inside the NBA, Barkley is always willing to discuss any topic at any time and go toe-to-toe with anyone in the business. His brutal honesty has provided unfettered insights into the psyche of a professional basketball player and a character who plays by his own set of rules.

“There is no one like Charles,” says Turner Sports President Lenny Daniels. “There never will be. He is one of the most influential figures in sports history, with a personality and voice that transcend the entire media industry.”

Long before gracing the masses with his on-air persona, Barkley made his way through the high school basketball ranks in Leeds, AL. Having nabbed a starting spot on the varsity team his senior year, he blossomed into a player who averaged 19.1 points and 17.9 rebounds per game. His efforts led the Leeds High School Green Wave to a 26-3 record in 1981 and the program’s fourth appearance in the state tournament.

His stellar play didn’t garner attention from collegiate coaches, but his luck would change in the state semifinals vs. Huntsville’s S.R. Butler High School. Going against the top-ranked recruit in Alabama, McDonald’s All-America and future NBA sixth-round pick Bobby Lee Hurt, Barkley dropped 26 points and attracted the notice of Auburn University Assistant Coach Charles H. Smith.

During his time with the orange and blue, Barkley ascended to elite-level player, winning the 1984 SEC Player of the Year Award and 1984 SEC Tournament MVP, holding the school record for field-goal percentage at 64.4%, and being named to the All-SEC First Team in 1984 and All-SEC Second Team in 1982 and 1983. The university retired his No. 34 in 2001, making him

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

one of only six players to have their jersey hang in the Auburn Arena rafters in the program’s 116-year history.

Barkley was once an overlooked short and stocky kid from Leeds, but NBA scouts clamored for his instinctual feel for the game and his bulldog tenacity. The Philadelphia 76ers won the sweepstakes and drafted him with the fifth overall pick in the 1984 NBA Draft.

Over his 16-year professional career, he racked up countless accolades, including 11 All-Star appearances, back-to-back Olympic gold medals with the 1992 “Dream Team” in Atlanta and in 1996 in Barcelona, 1993 NBA MVP, and the rebounding title in 1988. He was one of six players with 20,000 points, 10,000 rebounds, and 4,000 assists; his No. 34 was retired by the 76ers, and he was included in the Phoenix Suns’ Ring of Honor. He was selected for the NBA 50th-Anniversary Team in 1996 and NBA 75th-Anniversary Team in 2021. His playing days culminated with enshrinement in both the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame and the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2006.

When he decided to hang up his shoes and retire from the professional game, folks in the NBA knew that Barkley wouldn’t stay away too long.

“With a larger-than-life personality and unique perspective on the game,” says NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, “Charles has endeared himself to generations of NBA fans as he did throughout his Hall of Fame playing career. Charles is one of the

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> CHARLES BARKLEY continued

Charles is great because there’s nobody else like Charles. And he gets away with saying things that would get other people in trouble, or would not go down as appealingly if somebody else said it.

– Bob Costas, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Charles is a game changer because he is completely authentic. Off the air, Charles is one of the most gracious and loyal people you will come across and is revered in the halls of Turner Sports because he treats everyone like they are part of his family.

– David Levy I think our willingness to talk about things other than basketball and things that are socially important stems from Charles being on the show.

– Ernie Johnson, Turner Sports

18

smartest, most entertaining, and influential commentators in all of sports.”

After retirement, Barkley joined the 12-yearold Inside the NBA and launched his second act as one of the most beloved — and, at times, most controversial — figures in 20th century sports television. At the time, Turner Sports as a whole was coming of age on the sports scene, and, with the show’s dynamic in the early stages nurtured

by Ernie Johnson and Kenny “The Jet” Smith, Barkley began moving the needle with his oftenout-of-bounds sense of humor.

“The free-wheeling format at TNT allowed him to be Charles,” notes Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and legendary sportscaster Bob Costa. “He gets away with saying things that would get other people in trouble or gets to do what he wouldn’t be able to do anywhere else.”

As the show picked up steam throughout the mid to late 2000s, Barkley found his niche: part class clown and part basketball genius. Soon enough, serving up knowledgeable information about a certain play or game alongside a hilarious joke was working well with the fanbase.

“He would’ve been a viral sensation,” says Albert “Scooter” Vertino, SVP, programming, Turner Sports, “but we didn’t have the technology back then. I used to talk about how he was kind of like our King Midas: whatever he spoke about turned to gold.”

The “viral” moments were bountiful, but today social media has a field day with his playful antics. For instance, the four-time Sports Emmy Award–winner “guaranteed” that the Brooklyn Nets would sweep the Boston Celtics in the 2021 NBA Eastern Conference First Round after a Nets 130-108 win in Game 2. The Celtics went on to win Game 3, 125-119, to avoid the sweep and ruin Barkley’s prediction. In a popular segment “Who He Play For?”, Barkley tries to guess (and regularly fails) to correctly guess the NBA team that a random player is on.

“This is all about the most respected NBA analyst’s not knowing which teams particular players play for,” says ESPN SportsCenter anchor Stan Verrett. “Everybody has so much fun in the fact that he doesn’t know any of these players.”

Most of the time, his knack for being unpredictable makes for appointment viewing. Fans flock to the pre/postgame and halftime shows during the NBA season to see what Barkley will say next. Over

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

the course of the show’s existence, that could very well be the secret sauce of its success.

“In the history of the business,” says Turner Associate Director Sports Shawn Gerchicoff, “there are three people who you’ll watch regardless of what the score is. The first one was Howard Cosell, the second was John Madden, and now it’s Chuck.”

Similar to the way he played in high school, collegiate, or professional basketball games, Barkley is able not only to share the stage with Johnson, Smith, and Shaquille O’Neal but also to take over the show by commenting on moreserious topics, such as the death of Kobe Bryant or the league’s stance on social-justice issues.

“Our willingness to talk about things other than basketball that are more socially important stems a lot from Charles being on the show,” says Johnson.

Some of the conversations can spark a nuanced and meaningful discussion or draw a backlash from an opposing group, but Barkley remains true to himself and doesn’t let his convictions be swayed by others.

“One thing I like about Charles is that he’s unafraid of input,” says Michael Wilbon, host of ESPN’s Pardon the Interruption. “Most people that famous and rich want an amen chorus, but he isn’t interested in an amen chorus.”

More than two decades after entering the sports-media landscape, Inside the NBA has won 15 Sports Emmy Awards, has a four-part documentary, and has turned into the prime example of what studio shows strive to become.

“Along with Ernie, Kenny, and Shaq,” says former Turner Sports President David Levy, “[Barkley has helped establish] Inside the NBA as the most iconic sports studio show in the history of television. Off the air, Charles is one of the most gracious and loyal people you will come across and is revered in the halls of Turner Sports because he treats everyone like they are part of his family.”

Barkley continues to offer player-centric viewpoints on the current era of the sport and serve up laughter and lighthearted moments to the beat of his own drum.

“His basketball IQ, quick wit, unfiltered opinions, and self-deprecating demeanor have informed and entertained countless fans,” says Daniels. “He is so deserving of this prestigious honor.” – Kristian Hernández

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> JAMES “J.B.” BROWN Throughout J.B.’s awardwinning career, he not only has distinguished himself as the quintessential studio host, but also a versatile broadcaster and, in some instances, the conscience of the industry. JB’s work on THE NFL TODAY is without peer and solidifies him as a Hall of Famer.

His versatility has shown as he has anchored the CBS EVENING NEWS, and is often called upon to contribute reports and stories for CBS News, as well as contribute to 60 MINUTES and CBS MORNINGS. Apart from his professional accomplishments, JB is a wonderful human being, a man of faith, and as good a friend and colleague as one could ever have.

– Sean McManus, CBS Sports and Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer It’s a joy to have J.B. as a valued teammate. It’s even better to be able to call him a trusted friend. Simply put, he is one of the finest men I’ve ever known. A giant television talent. An all-world human being.

– Jim Nantz, CBS Sports and Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer 20

I

ntegrity. Class. Warmth. Intelligence.

All words one would use to describe James Brown before even touching his excellence as a sports broadcaster.

A staple of the sports-television industry for nearly four decades, the man affectionately known simply as “J.B.” has established himself as the gold standard for the host of a live sports studio show. A winner of three Emmy Awards, Brown has been a fixture of NFL Sundays since 1994 and has hosted the Super Bowl show a record 10 times, including most recently at Super Bowl LV in February 2021.

“Throughout J.B.’s award-winning career, he has distinguished himself not only as the quintessential studio host but also as a versatile broadcaster and, in some instances, the conscience of the industry,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Sean McManus, chairman, CBS Sports. “J.B. is a wonderful human being, a man of faith and as good a friend and colleague as one could ever have.”

Brown’s journey to sports television was anything but conventional. Following a collegiate basketball career at Harvard, he fell short of making the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks in an open tryout and, in the late 1970s and early ’80s, worked for such companies as Xerox and Kodak. In 1984, he got his first opportunity to get back into sports: a role as an on-air analyst on Washington Bullets telecasts and a spot in the rotation of analysts for NBA on CBS. In the late 1980s, Brown’s star at CBS Sports continued to brighten as he handled a variety of roles, including play-by-play for NFL on CBS and reporting on the NFL Finals, the MLB Postseason, and the 1992 and 1994 Winter Olympics.

Brown’s big break into Sundays came when Fox Sports shook up the sports-media world, landing rights to the NFL at the end of 1993.

At the start of the 1994 season, the first edition of Fox NFL Sunday debuted, with J.B., Terry Bradshaw, Howie Long, and Jimmy Johnson.

Brown anchored that iconic program for its first 11 years.

“J.B. has been a Hall of Famer ever since

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

he first sat in front of a camera,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer David Hill, former president, Fox Sports. “He has this authentic charisma, which makes every viewer feel that J.B. is speaking exclusively to that individual. It’s a rare gift.”

During his tenure at Fox, Brown stretched himself into hockey, serving as lead studio host for NHL on Fox from 1994 to ’98.

In 2006, Brown returned to where it all started — CBS Sports — to take over as host of The NFL Today, and he has been behind that desk ever since, cementing his legacy as one of the greatest to host a studio show.

“It’s a joy to have J.B. as a valued teammate,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Jim Nantz, CBS Sports’ long-time lead play-by-play voice. “It’s even better to be able to call him a trusted friend. Simply put, he is one of the finest men I’ve ever known. A giant television talent.

An all-world human being.”

Brown’s signature has always been bringing out the best in those around him. Whether it’s expertly crafting a story — as he did with one of his all-time favorite projects, the 1991 film Let Me Be Brave, the story of 12 mentally disabled athletes climbing Mount Kilimanjaro — or setting up his analysts to succeed from behind the desk on an NFL day in the fall.

“J.B. is simply the kindest, most prepared colleague with whom I’ve ever worked,” says former NFL quarterback and current analyst on The NFL Today Boomer Esiason. “He brings out the best

> JAMES “J.B.” BROWN continued JB has been a Hall of Famer ever since he first sat in front of a camera. He has this authentic charisma which makes every viewer feel that JB is speaking exclusively to that individual. It’s a rare gift.

– David Hill, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer JB is a man of integrity and thoughtfulness. He can reflect on any subject and put it in its proper perspective. He is humble, funny and, not only a Hall of Fame broadcaster, an even better colleague, friend and person.

– Bill Cowher, CBS Sports First off, he’s a Hall of Fame person. He treats everybody the same, and that’s with great respect. To say he is tremendous at his job is an understatement. He does it with great knowledge of each and every subject he speaks, and always with a smile on his face.

– Phil Simms, CBS Sports JB is not only a Hall of Fame broadcaster, but first and foremost, a Hall of Fame human being. His unselfishness, guidance, and mentorship since we first met when I was in the NFL Broadcast Boot Camp has been a driving force in helping me to achieve and succeed in becoming the broadcaster I am today.

– Nate Burleson, CBS Sports, CBS This Morning JB is simply the kindest, most prepared colleague with whom I’ve ever worked. He brings out the best in everyone. His egoless nature, along with his self-deprecating sense of humor, brings harmony and professionalism to all of our broadcasts. Throughout his entire career he has carried himself with dignity, grace, and substance.

– Boomer Esiason, CBS Sports

From left to right: Bill Cowher, James Brown, and Nate Burleson at the 2021 Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame Ceremony

22

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

in everyone. His egoless nature, along with his self-deprecating sense of humor, brings harmony and professionalism to all of our broadcasts. Throughout his entire career, he has carried himself with dignity, grace, and substance.”

“Sustained excellence is what I’d like to be thought of,” Brown said in 2020. “It has never been about me. It has always been about those with whom I work and trying to pull out and elicit the best from them for an excellent product, whatever that telecast is.”

A native of Washington, DC, Brown received the 2016 Pete Rozelle Award from the Pro Football Hall of Fame, which recognizes “longtime exceptional contributions to radio and television in professional football.” Sports Illustrated named him the Best Studio Host of the Decade in 2010, and he was also honored that same year as one of the “Faces of Black History,” celebrating Black Media Legends who have impacted the Black community through their achievements and positive examples. He was also the first recipient of the coveted Pat Summerall Award, which is presented annually during Super Bowl weekend. – Brandon Costa

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

23

DON CORNELLI Nobody sees the world more clearly through a viewfinder than Cornelli, and the world is better for it.

– Eric Shanks, Fox Sports Donnie is the GOAT of hand held operators. His thought process, attention to detail and shotmaking, are what has always made him special.

Add that to his tenacity and hustle, and you have a combination that every director and producer marvel at! He puts himself in the right position with great preparation and anticipation. It has been a privilege, and the ultimate directorial pleasure, to have done so many NFL games with him.

– Artie Kempner, Fox Sports Don’s body of work speaks for itself…a consummate pro who makes every broadcast better with his creative eye for the perfect shot, as well as his unparalleled work ethic. He is a credit to every camera crew he has ever worked on.

– Bob Fishman, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer 24

A

nyone who has watched an NFL broadcast in the last 30 years has seen a Don Cornelli shot. And they’ve also probably seen him in the shot: he’s the guy sprinting down the sidelines anticipating the next play, inches from the celebrating player who has just scored, or getting run over by a player tumbling out of bounds. Whether it’s on the football field, the hardcourt, the fairway, or anywhere else a sports event is taking place, Cornelli and his handheld camera can somehow be found in the right place at the right time to capture the money shot.

“From the very beginning of Don’s long, successful career in network television,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and camera operator Davey Finch, “he has always possessed the wonderful, natural gift of a ‘great eye’ for shot composition and framing. His camerawork excels because he knows what to shoot, when to shoot, and how to position himself to achieve the best possible shot on any sport he covers.”

As one of the top handheld-camera operators working today, Cornelli endeavors to get viewers as close as possible to the action and is a mainstay on the sidelines of some of the NFL’s biggest games. Though most known for his work on NFL broadcasts on CBS Sports and Fox Sports for more than three decades, he has also covered NBA, MLB, NHL, NCAA, PGA, NASCAR, the Olympics, and the World Cup. “Nobody sees the world more clearly through a viewfinder than Cornelli,” says Fox Sports CEO/ Executive Producer Eric Shanks. “And the world is better for it.”

A native of suburban Detroit, Cornelli grew up loving sports and, after graduating from Troy Athens High School, attended Central Michigan University, where he caught the sports-broadcasting bug.

“I did not go to Central Michigan thinking I was ever going to be in broadcasting,” he says, “but, when I got there and started doing the hands-on stuff in the studio, I got hooked. That’s when I realized that this is what I wanted to do.”

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

After graduating from Central Michigan, he landed a job shooting instructional and promotional videos for General Motors and eventually got a full-time camera gig in news — first at CNN’s office in Detroit and then at UPN affiliate WKBD Detroit. He continued freelancing on live sports shows on the weekends and, in 1986, worked his first NFL game for CBS Sports in Minneapolis.

Cornelli worked his way up the ranks and, by 1988, was a fixture on the CBS A game with the fabled team of director Sandy Grossman, producer Bob Stenner, and Pat Summerall and John Madden in the booth.

By 1993, Cornelli had begun to make a name for himself as one of the best handheld-camera operators in the business. However, when CBS lost the rights to the NFL’s NFC package to fledgling Fox Sports, he found himself unsure of what was next.

“When it happened after the ’93 season, no one knew what was going to happen,” he remembers.

“Thankfully, Fox ended up taking Madden and Summerall, and they brought Sandy and Bob with them, and Sandy asked me to go with him as well. Those were really exciting times because we were starting something brand new at Fox.” Cornelli has been working the NFL on Fox A games ever since. In all, he has worked 33 NFC Championship games for Fox and CBS and 23 Super Bowls for various broadcasters. He has also captured countless iconic NFL moments, including the Giants’ Plaxico Burress’s game-

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> DON CORNELLI continued One of his best qualities is his demeanor. He’s one of the nicest and most loyal people in the business.

Along with his camera work, his honesty and integrity are second to none.

– Fred Aldous, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer From the very beginning of Don’s long, successful career in network television, he has always possessed the wonderful, natural gift of a “great eye” for shot composition and framing. His camerwork excels because he knows what to shoot, when to shoot, and how to position himself to achieve the best possible shot on any sport he covers. Don’s talent has certainly positioned him in the very top tier of great cameramen!

– Davey Finch, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Don is a true professional — the on-air talent, the production team and his peers all respect and love working with him. He is always a welcome addition onto any show and that’s a testament to both his talent and his attitude.

– Judy Boyd, Fox Sports

26

winning TD catch to beat the undefeated Patriots in Super Bowl XLII. As a freelancer, Cornelli retains the freedom to work events for different broadcasters.

And work he does. After the NFL season winds down, he works on CBS Sports’ golf coverage in the offseason, including The Masters and PGA Championship. Over the years, he has also run handheld camera at the NBA Finals, NCAA Final Four, NHL Stanley Cup Final, World Series, Olympics (1992 and 1994 Winter Games for CBS and 1996 Summer Games for NBC), FIFA World Cup (1994 in the U.S.), US Open tennis, and Daytona 500, among others.

“Don’s body of work speaks for itself,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and longtime director at CBS Sports Bob Fishman. “A consummate pro who makes every broadcast better with his creative eye for the perfect shot, as well as his unparalleled work ethic. He is a credit to every camera crew he has ever worked on.”

Although Cornelli attributes much of his intuitive “right place, right time” ability to luck, he does acknowledge that movement and positioning are key to his success. For example, if it’s a must-win game for a team with a great passing offense, he will position himself farther down the field from the line of scrimmage than in an average game. By the same token, if a backup quarterback is in or it’s an extremely cold day, he’ll stay closer to the line of scrimmage. But, in the end, he says, it’s all about going with your gut.

“How do I determine where that particular position is on the field? I honestly don’t know,” he says. “But what I do know is that so much of it is about positioning yourself and being ready to adjust. There are times I’m out of position. I’ll be way behind the line of scrimmage, and I’ll think I screwed up. But then, suddenly, there is a pick-6 or the quarterback gets sacked and fumbles, and [the action] returns the other way for a touchdown. Why am I there? Well, sometimes I just get lucky.”

Although Cornelli is modest about his ability to magically appear at the exact spot where a big play is about to happen, the directors he has worked with think it’s much more than just luck.

“Don is incredibly talented,” says Fox Sports lead director Rich Russo, who works with Cornelli on the broadcaster’s NFL A-game crew.

“He has a keen eye and is always in the right place at the right time, consistently delivering incred-

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

ible pictures. He is, without a doubt, one of the top handheld operators in the history of sports television and has proven that time and time again from the sidelines of some of the biggest sporting events in history. It doesn’t matter if it’s a preseason game or a Super Bowl, Don is always going to get the best shots and the best pictures.”

“Donnie is the GOAT of handheld operators,” says Fox Sports director Artie Kempner. “His thought process, attention to detail, and shotmaking are what has always made him special.

Add that to his tenacity and hustle, and you have a combination that every director and producer marvel at.”

Says Fox Sports/NFL Network director Steve Beim, “Don is one of those people that makes everyone around him look better. It doesn’t matter the field of play; he’ll always have the shot.

And it will always be good. But even more than a great cameraman, he’s a great person.”

While Cornelli’s sixth sense for getting the shot is the stuff of legend, he is just as highly regarded for being one the most beloved figures in the business.

“One of his best qualities is his demeanor,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Fred Aldous, who worked with Cornelli for years as the A1 on Fox’s NFL coverage. “He’s one of the nicest and most loyal people in the business.

Along with his camerawork, his honesty and integrity are second to none.”

Looking back at his storied career, Cornelli says, “I honestly just feel lucky to be here and have been able to do something I love for so long.

And to have worked with so many great people over the years has been amazing. All the credit goes to them.” – Jason Dachman

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> JOHN FILIPPELLI I Flip has had an immeasurable impact on countless on-air talent and production personnel who have had the good fortune to work alongside him over his storied career. He has always been a Hall of Famer to me.

– Jon Litner, YES Network Colin Powell said one of the greatest talents of all is the ability to recognize and to develop talent in others. John J. Filippelli is a Hall of Famer because he has the innate ability to recognize and develop talent. It is one of the great honors of my career to represent the network that Flip built.

– Howard Levinson, YES Network Flip has been a one-of a-kind mentor, colleague, and loyal friend for more than three decades. He has inspired and guided not only me but the entire team that launched YES. Under Flip’s leadership, a culture of excellence was created at YES, making it the standard by which all other RSNs are measured.

– Woody Freiman, YES Network 28

f, as former Speaker of the House of Representatives “Tip” O’Neill said, “all politics is local,” the same can certainly be said for sports. Even today, in a world unbound by geographical limitations, few things can unite a city or a country more than a championship run by a sports team donning its letters.

For John J. Filippelli, those letters are an interlocking N and Y. He’s one of the more respected, influential, and accomplished leaders in the history of sports media, and his career is a rare one, spanning both the executive suite and the front bench. His current role as executive producer and president, production and programming, for New York-based YES Network, is an appropriate exclamation point on a career that has engrained memories in the minds of sports viewers and altered the careers of countless sports broadcasters for nearly five decades.

“Flip is an innovator who thinks outside the box,” says longtime New York Yankees playby-play voice Michael Kay. “He sees things that others don’t see, through a prism of inventiveness and attention to detail. Most important, he’s a Hall of Famer in the way he treats his people. He is your defender at all times, and he is the rare leader who constantly tells you how good a job you’re doing. All workers in all walks of life should experience working with a leader like Flip.”

Brooklyn-born Filippelli’s story reads like one that was predestined. His father ran a bar across the street from Ebbets Field (one that many famous Dodger players would frequent after games), and his first job was as a 16-year-old vendor at Yankee Stadium. Baseball is in his roots.

It was, however, during a run-of-the-mill tour of NBC in New York City — one that any tourist visiting the city would go on — that the magic of television gripped him. 1974 was the year Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Dick Ebersol got his first job at NBC Sports, and Saturday Night Live debuted. As young Flip walked through the halls of the tall building overlooking Rockefeller Plaza, it was, in his words, “love at first sight.”

Determined to break into the sports-television industry, Filippelli landed a job as a PA at NBC and eventually earned the opportunity to sit down

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

with the first president of NBC Sports, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Chet Simmons, to make his case to join the team. According to Filippelli, Simmons, perhaps slightly skeptical of the overly enthusiastic youngster, challenged him to name the starting lineup of the 1961 New York Yankees. Fortunately, that World Series-winning, homerun-record–breaking squad held a special place in his heart. He named not only the starting lineup but the club’s entire roster.

Filippelli was in, and thus was birthed one of the most influential careers in the history of sports television. During his tenure at NBC Sports, he climbed the ranks to become a lead producer for numerous MLB Game of the Week telecasts, as well as for multiple League Championship Series, All-Star Games, and World Series telecasts.

He was in the producer’s chair for the famous 1988 World Series, including the night of one of the most iconic moments in baseball history, when Los Angeles Dodgers’ Kirk Gibson slapped a game-winning home run over the right-field fence at Dodger Stadium in Game 1.

After more than two decades at NBC Sports, Filippelli moved over to the new Fox Sports, where his influence on the game of baseball grew even further. He served as coordinating producer of the broadcaster’s first World Series, in 1996 (when his beloved Yankees win their first title in 18 years). He was also producer on the 1998 night when Mark McGwire hit his 62nd home run, breaking the record Roger Maris set in that ’61 season that Filippelli’s knowledge of got him in the sports-television door.

Fox gave him the room to flex his innovation

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> JOHN FILIPPELLI continued Flip is an innovator who thinks outside the box.

He sees things that others don’t see through a prism of inventiveness and attention to detail. He built an entire network in a few months and when the YES Network got up and running it was immediately the gold standard of RSNs. Only a Hall of Famer could have done that. Most important, he’s a Hall of Famer in the way he treats his people.

All workers in all walks of life should experience working with a leader like Flip.

– Michael Kay, YES Network Flip is a generational talent, and his passion connects with everyone. Flip has an innate ability to understand storylines and weave them seamlessly in the fabric of every production. In my opinion Flip is a Hall of Famer because instinctually he knows how to connect the audience with each event he is associated with and surrounds himself with talent in front and behind the camera that rise to the challenge.

– Jared Boshnack, YES Network

30

muscles. He was a major part of key industry firsts, including the permanent baseball scorebug and, perhaps most notable, running regularspeed instant replays during a live broadcast. It changed how viewers perceived the speed and power of MLB players.

“Many of the production enhancements commonplace on baseball telecasts today — such as full-speed replays, tight super-slo-mo shots of the bases, and even subtle elements such as the full-time display of the pitch count – are all things that Flip implemented,” says former YES Network and Fox Sports executive Ed Delaney. “Although Flip’s accomplishments are prodigious, they are eclipsed by his compassion, generosity, and wondrous spirit. At the end of the day, the sportsbroadcasting industry is a better place because of Flip’s remarkable contributions.”

Filippelli’s career hasn’t touched only America’s Pastime. During his days producing in the 1980s and ’90s, he left his mark on productions of a global scale — the Olympic Games, multiple Super Bowls, Monday Night Football, the Indianapolis 500, Wimbledon, the NHL, golf, college football — and was even involved in the iconic ABC’s Wide World of Sports. He also spent time with World Wrestling Entertainment.

But when it comes to second chapters in life, they don’t come more prolific than Filippelli’s.

After a brief stint at ABC Sports, he got the call that the Yankees were starting their own television network and that Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and team owner George Steinbrenner wanted him to help run it. He was the network’s first hire, brought on in September 2001. Over the next few months, as his beloved city healed from the great tragedy at the World Trade Center, a small team laid the groundwork for what has become the gold standard for the regional sports network.

YES Network is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year and has set the bar for both financial and creative success in the RSN industry. Since its launch, YES, under Filippelli’s leadership, has collected a staggering 134 Emmy Awards (as of 2021).

“Flip was already a Hall of Famer for the many ways he revolutionized baseball coverage as a producer,” says YES Network VP, Broadcast Operations, Mike Webb, who was one of the startup network’s first hires. “He cemented his place in this distinguished class by reinventing the definition of [the] regional sports network.

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

He built a culture of excellence at YES with his singular leadership style that encourages creativity and innovation in every department at every level of the network.”

Under his watch, YES became the first television network to produce 3D and interactive MLB telecasts and was also the first to display continuous on-screen pitch counts during a game.

YES Network was the first RSN to produce and televise an MLB game outside North America when the Yankees opened the 2004 season vs. the Tampa Bay Devil Rays in Tokyo. Filippelli also challenged the status quo when it came to around-the-clock content, making YES Network the first RSN to simulcast a sports radio talk show when it picked up the legendary Mike and the Mad Dog program in March 2002.

It was out in front of the HD trend as well, launching its standalone 24/7 HD channel in 2007, and its “Super Slo Mo” and “YES MO” cameras have set a new standard for replays.

Filippelli’s induction into the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame is just the latest honor of his decorated career. In 2017, he was inducted into the Silver Circle by the Board of Governors of The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, New York Chapter. In 2013, he was named Executive of the Year by New York University’s Sports Business Society.

From the technological to the personal, few people have had a greater influence on what fans see and on broadcast careers than Filippelli has had over the past half century.

“Flip has had an immeasurable impact on countless on-air talent and production personnel who have had the good fortune to work alongside him over his storied career,” says YES Network CEO Jon Litner. “He has always been a Hall of Famer to me.” – Brandon Costa

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> TIM FINCHEM W Tim Finchem’s vision and leadership have made an indelible impact on the game of golf over the past 25 years with his tireless dedication and contributions, but more importantly, the countless lives impacted by his life’s work.

– Jay Monaghan, PGA TOUR Tim’s leadership was invaluable for the growth of the game and his thoughtful decision making helped the PGA Tour soar to incredible heights.

He led his global partners in promoting and implementing a World Golf Championship series and here at home he brought life to the PGA TOUR’s end of the season. He was instrumental in designing golf’s first postseason playoffs for the FedEx Cup and saw the value of nurturing and respecting his television relationships.

– Jim Nantz, CBS Sports and Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer 32

hen Tim Finchem retired in 2017 after 22 years as PGA TOUR commissioner, he had transformed the game and its relationship with fans on the course, watching on TV, watching on portable devices, and, yes, the computer at the office for the diehards who want to watch golf play from sunrise to sunset.

He introduced the FedEx Cup Playoffs, offering the sport a greater sense of an actual season. The Presidents Cup gave the sport another great international competition. And the World Golf Championships created greater opportunities for international golfers to compete together beyond the majors. The 1997 rights deal he negotiated changed the relationship between TV and golf forever as it required every round of every tournament be carried on TV. “The most impressive thing about Tim is he was a remarkable consensus builder,” says Sean McManus, CBS Sports Chairman and Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer. “His relationships with the players, with the tournaments, with the sponsors, and TV networks were all first rate where everyone felt like they were getting full value.”

He also spearheaded efforts to coordinate the bid for golf’s return to the Olympics, which became a reality in the 2016 Games after a 112year absence and gave NBC a chance to bring one of its most important rest-of-the-year properties to its Olympic programming schedule.

“Tim Finchem super-charged the PGA TOUR during his tenure as commissioner by adding World Golf Championships, the Presidents Cup, and the FedEx Playoffs,” says Molly Solomon, EP/president, NBC Olympics Production, and EP, Golf Channel. “What the PGA TOUR looks like today is due in large part to his big ideas and creative leadership.”

Adds Tommy Roy, NBC Sports, lead golf producer, credits Finchem with allowing NBC to have more than a dozen cameras on the island green for THE PLAYERS Championship, allow-

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

ing the network to capture shots from almost any angle.

“He gave us the ability to put a camera six feet away from Tiger Woods when he was about to execute a magical, game winning shot,” he adds.

“And he also gave us the ability to put microphones three feet away from Phil Mickelson and [caddie] Bones when they were discussing the execution of a great shot.”

Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Dick Ebersol says he was lucky enough to have a front row seat to Finchem’s efforts.

“Tim built the PGA TOUR into one of the most important franchises in all of American TV sports,” he adds.

As if that weren’t enough, he helped oversee First Tee’s growth into a great youth-development organization, reaching more than 15 million youngsters (during his tenure as commissioner, the PGA TOUR and its tournaments raised more than $2 billion in charitable contributions).

“Tim Finchem’s vision and leadership have made an indelible impact on the game of golf over the past 25 years,” said Jay Monahan, PGA TOUR commissioner and World Golf Foundation board chairman, when Finchem was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame last year. “His enshrinement in the World Golf Hall of Fame will forever stand as a testament to his tireless dedication and contributions, but, more important, so will the countless lives — whether those are the players on the PGA TOUR and beyond, millions of First Tee participants, or charitable organizations around the world — impacted by his life’s work.”

Finchem became commissioner in 1994 when then-Commissioner Deane Beman, just 55 years old, retired to resume his playing career, this time as a member of the then-Senior PGA TOUR. “My history is one of just being in the right place at the right time,” says Finchem. “So much of where you’re headed is based on the individuals that you’re interfacing with.”

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> TIM FINCHEM continued

Tim Finchem super charged the PGA TOUR during his tenure as commissioner by adding World Golf Championships, the Presidents Cup and the FedEx Playoffs. What the PGA Tour looks like today is due in large part to his big ideas and creative leadership.

– Molly Solomon, NBC Sports He gave us the ability to put a camera six feet away from Tiger Woods when he was about to execute a magical, game winning shot and the ability to put microphones three feet away from Phil Mickelson and [caddie] Bones when they were discussing the execution of a great shot.

– Tommy Roy, NBC Sports

34

For example, prior to joining the PGA TOUR, Finchem was in the Jimmy Carter Administration, working with the president and his staff.

“I’ve had a great run with regard to being around people who are extremely successful and thoughtful and committed to making this place a better place to live,” he says. “I look back at all those people I met and the players that I interfaced with, and I was very, very fortunate to be in the right place at the right time.” One example: he became commissioner only a few weeks before a player named Tiger Woods turned professional.

And the beginning of the Woods era and the beginning of Finchem’s tenure as commissioner coincided with a time when some of the greats of the game had retired but were still an active part of the PGA efforts.

“I was lucky,” Finchem says, “because I came into the PGA TOUR at a time when I had the opportunity to meet Sam Snead and Byron Nelson and all these great players and spend a fair amount of time with them. In some ways, many of those players were similar to working with the president because of their knowledge of the sport, their intensity about transferring that information to fans and to people like myself.”

Finchem always had a passion for golf and freely admits to using his paper-route money to support his golf habit.

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

“My dad was in the Marine Corps for 30 years, and I started playing golf when I was 8 or 10,” he says. “He took me to the Azalea Open in North Carolina; Arnold Palmer won, and I was mesmerized by him. Years later, I’d call him up from time to time and say, ‘Take me through one of your wins.’ He’d say, ‘Which one?’ and I’d tell him that one.”

Although nearly half his adult life has been spent at the PGA TOUR, Finchem didn’t set out to work in sports administration. He attended the University of Richmond on a debate scholarship and graduated in 1969, then received his law degree from Virginia four years later. After practicing law in Virginia Beach for three years, Finchem served in the Carter White House as deputy advisor to the president in the Office of Economic Affairs in 1978 and 1979.

“Tim’s leadership was invaluable for the growth of the game,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and CBS Sports Lead Play-by-Play Announcer Jim Nantz. “His thoughtful decisionmaking helped the PGA TOUR soar to incredible heights. He led his global partners in promoting and implementing a World Golf Championship series, and, here at home, he brought life to the PGA TOUR’s end of the season. Lastly, Tim saw the value of nurturing and respecting his television relationships. He has been viewed by all as a great partner.” – Ken Kerschbaumer

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> HUGO GAGGIONI When Hugo began working for Sony, he closely collaborated with the engineers in our R&D group in Atsugi. I clearly remember the first time I met him and he tried to passionately absorb all of the technology details from my presentation.

He quickly became an international ally and a trusted resource on compression, helping shape Sony’s industry-leading capabilities. His expertise also ushered in transformations that drastically advanced broadcasting – standards which we continue to build upon to this day. Hugo’s an all-star within the Sony organization and also a very good friend for over 30 years, so we’re thrilled to see the industry take note of his significant achievements.

– Mikio Kita, Sony Hugo has been an instrumental leader and visionary throughout the HDTV development process in the industry. He’s an engineer, a thought leader, and has consistently been a futurist.

– Chuck Pagano, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer 36

S

ports productions are divided into two camps: above the line and below the line. And then there is a third camp: the technology world of manufacturers and innovators who make the work of the other two possible. And when it comes to leaders from that camp, few are equal to Hugo Gaggioni, CTO, Imaging Products and Solutions Americas Professional Group, Sony Electronics.

The best way to sum up his career contributions is this: if you’ve ever seen a video image that has made you go “Wow,” odds are that, somewhere in the development chain, Gaggioni played a big part.

“Hugo has been an instrumental leader and visionary throughout the HDTV development process in the industry,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and former ESPN CTO Chuck Pagano.

“He has been nothing short of an incredible library of info, thoughts, and ideations that transformed us from 525-line interlaced NTSC to 1080 digital HDTV. He’s an engineer, a thought leader, and has consistently been a futurist throughout my relationship with him.”

Growing up in Venezuela, Gaggioni was enamored with music, but his father persuaded him to attend university, where he discovered a passion for electronics. A scholarship opportunity to study in England arose, and he took it, earning a degree in telecommunications from the University of Essex.

“Very few people get a second chance to make a first impression, so I took the chance to go to England, abandoning everything and starting from scratch,” says Gaggioni. “But timing is everything, and, at that time, in 1974 and 1975, the world of digital signal processing had just begun.”

In England, he had learned about the new field of digital signal processing and image compression and, returning to Venezuela, taught a university-level course on the subject. A desire to keep learning had him looking for something more.

“One of the professors at the university used to represent RCA,” Gaggioni recalls. “He said they were looking for people in Camden, NJ. I

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

went to New York on vacation, took an interview with RCA, and met [Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and former RCA, Sony, and Canon executive] Larry Thorpe.”

RCA made Gaggioni an offer, and, in January 1980, he moved north, joining the company just as the transition to digital technologies was beginning. He continued his academic studies, earning a degree in systems engineering at the University of Pennsylvania and a degree in electronic engineering at Columbia University.

In 1983, the RCA broadcast group was dismantled, and Gaggioni soon joined Bell Communications Research, part of Bell Labs.

“We claimed to have broken 100 Mbps for HD, which at the time was a big deal,” he says. “But I also continued my friendship with Larry; when he left RCA, he joined Sony’s Broadcast Group.”

Although Bell Labs was the “cradle of everything,” Thorpe persuaded Gaggioni to join Sony in 1987. And he has been there ever since.

“Joining Sony changed me completely, in every

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> HUGO GAGGIONI continued In addition to being an indispensable and highly respected colleague, Hugo is a technological pioneer whose contributions have helped propel the industry forward. His knowledge of video processing and compression and his expertise in HDR have had an indelible impact on sports broadcasting.

The innovations and advancements he’s supported have changed the way broadcasters capture live sporting events and ultimately, enriched the viewers’ experience.

–Theresa Alesso, Sony Electronics, Pro Division Hugo Gaggioni is known the world over. His more than 40-year participation in many international standardization activities, his command of the Spanish language, his role as the CTO of Sony Broadcast — all combine with his gregarious nature to make him the icon of the Broadcast television and Cinema industries that we see today.

– Larry Thorpe, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer

38

aspect,” he says, “human, mentally, technically.”

Sony VP, Media Business, Imaging Products and Solutions, Mikio Kita, notes that, when Gaggioni began working for Sony, he collaborated with the engineers in the R&D group in Atsugi.

“I clearly remember the first time I met him,” says Kita. “He tried to passionately absorb all of the technology details from my presentation.

He quickly became an international ally and a trusted resource on compression, helping shape Sony’s industry-leading capabilities. His expertise also ushered in transformations that drastically advanced broadcasting — standards which we continue to build upon to this day.”

Gaggioni became part of Sony Advanced Systems, where he (along with Thorpe and others) was on a mission to push, promote, and establish high-definition.

“Back then,” he says, “there was a battle between the computer and broadcasting industries over HD and things like pixels and sampling rates. Japan was fully onboard with HD much sooner than the U.S., and, when we brought HD into the U.S., Sony was already a powerhouse.”

Sony Electronics President, Pro Division, Theresa Alesso says that, in addition to being an indispensable and highly respected colleague, Gaggioni is a technological pioneer whose contributions have helped propel the industry forward. “His knowledge of video processing and compression and his expertise in HDR have had an indelible impact on sports broadcasting. The innovations and advancements he has supported have changed the way broadcasters capture live sporting events and, ultimately, enriched the viewer’s experience.”

To help in the efforts to make HD a reality in the U.S., Gaggioni served as a member of the Advanced Television Advisory group to the FCC from 1987 to ’94. He was also chairman of the SMPTE Technical Groups on Digital Representation of the 1125/60 High Definition TV Standard (SMPTE 260M, for the period 198892) and Digital HDTV Serial Interfaces (SMPTE 292M, 1993-96). He also chaired a SMPTE group on editing MPEG bit streams for TV-studio usage.

Over the years, Gaggioni has found fulfillment in working closely with designers in Japan on things like compression and the studio profile in the HDCAM SR tape decks. More recently, HDR has become a source of pride.

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

“I spent an incredible number of hours with the guys at Sony who developed SR Live for HDR,” he says. “I did my due diligence, studying and learning about HDR via hundreds of papers and simulations so I could be ready to be a cheerleader and advocate to promote HDR from the Sony perspective.”

Today, Gaggioni holds six patents and has authored 32 technical publications in the areas of video compression, digital filter banks, and HDTV devices and systems. More important, he has served as session chairman at 13 international conferences on both HDTV and bandwidthcompression systems.

In 2019, he was honored with the Charles F. Jenkins Lifetime Achievement Award at the 71st Engineering Emmy Awards and has received several technical Emmys over the years.

Sometimes, Gaggioni’s vision has gone beyond pure television. Pagano describes an ESPN visit to Sony in Japan: “During our meetings, Hugo introduced me to a young engineer that worked on the PlayStation product. Our discussions led to integrating a videogame engine into our studio football production to simulate what was going on on the football field. Innovation, creativity, and curiosity have always been in Hugo’s DNA, and it delivered a hit for us just from that single visit to Sony in Yokohama with Hugo and company.”

Adds Kita, “Hugo’s an all-star within the Sony organization. We’re thrilled to see the industry take note of his significant achievements.”

– Ken Kerschbaumer

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> FRED GAUDELLI Fred has the respect of the League, the coaches, the players and the production team. SNF is the number one show in Primetime for more than a decade due to Fred’s strong leadership, dedication, preparation and relationships.

– Mark Lazarus, NBCUniversal Fred has the most brilliant eye for telling a threehour story. Like the most talented filmmakers, he introduces the characters, hooks you on intimate storylines, and artfully rides those storylines to unpredictable conclusions.

The difference is, Fred is doing it in real time without a script. There will not be another one like him, so enjoy his artistry while you still can.

– Cris Collinsworth, NBC Sports Watching a game that Gaudelli produces is unbelievable. Listening to the conversation back and forth between Fred Gaudelli and Drew Esocoff, [it’s as if] their language was almost without words as decisions got made in the truck.

– Dick Ebersol, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer 40

F

ew — if any — individuals have had as indelible an impact on the look and feel of NFL broadcasts over the past three decades as Fred Gaudelli. The producer of NBC’s Sunday Night Football, ABC’s Monday Night Football, and ESPN’s Sunday Night Football has reimagined how viewers watch pro football, deploying groundbreaking technical innovations, inimitable storytelling tactics, and an impeccable sense of style to bring the game into the modern age for millions of fans.

“There’s no one better than Fred Gaudelli,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer John Madden, who worked with the 24-time Emmy Award winner at ABC and NBC. “He’s the hardest-working person in TV, and he’s a great coach.”

Adds Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Dick Ebersol: “Fred is unquestionably the finest and most honored NFL television producer in history.

A native of Harrison, NY, Gaudelli grew up obsessed with sports and was a fan of Knicks and Rangers announcer Marv Albert and ABC Sports’ Keith Jackson, Chris Schenkel, and Howard Cosell.

“I figured out that I wasn’t going to be a professional athlete around 13 or 14,” Gaudelli explains, “but I still had this great passion for sports, and I grew up constantly listening to sports on radio and watching on television. I thought it would be a fun job to call games and get paid for it. That’s when I really started thinking hard about it and paying attention to the broadcast of games.”

After graduating from Harrison High School, where he served as PA announcer for basketball and baseball games, Gaudelli headed to Long Island University – C.W. Post. As a communications major, he was extremely active at the campus radio station, calling football and basketball games and serving as sports director his senior year. However, he soon came to realize that his future was behind the scenes rather than behind the mic.

“I just didn’t feel like my voice was the kind of voice that you would hear at a Super Bowl or a

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

World Series and realized that would put a pretty quick ceiling on how far I could go,” he remembers. “So I took an internship at Channel 5 in New York City in the production department. I fell in love with it right away and thought that it would be a better path for me because I would still get to use my sports knowledge and satisfy my passion for sports, but my success wasn’t going to be incumbent on something I couldn’t control: my voice.”

After graduating and while working on a weekend sports-radio talk show at WFAS White Plains, NY, Gaudelli heard via the station’s owner about potential job opportunities at a fledgling cable sports network in Bristol, CT. He soon found himself working in the mailroom at ESPN and, by 1983, had worked his way through the ranks of ESPN’s remote-production department to become an associate producer on a variety of sports, including college football, basketball, and baseball; the USFL; the U.S. Olympic Festival; and the NFL Draft.

“I was extremely fortunate to work closely with Fred from the very beginning of his career at ESPN,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and former ESPN exec Steve Anderson.

“Right from the start, he was the most talented, hardest-working, and best-prepared producer I have ever known. He always set incredibly high standards for himself and for everyone on his team. In my opinion, Fred has developed into the best live-event producer in the history of television sports.”

Gaudelli got his first front-bench gig in 1986,

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> FRED GAUDELLI continued His work ethic and dedication to the profession has been a driving force not just for himself but for his peers and those that follow. I benefited as much as anyone!

– Drew Esocoff, NBC Sports Fred should do a Master Class on sports television production so every aspiring young producer could get a big head start.”

– Al Michaels, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer It is an honor to be a part of the same team as Fred Gaudelli and to see someone in action on a day-today business who is truly the very best at what he does. Fred has a tangible passion for his work and I am constantly amazed how each off-season, as opposed to resting on his laurels and decades of experiences, he is tirelessly striving to be better and looking for ways to elevate his teammates and Sunday Night Football.

Fred improves each year and, as a result of that, we do too.

– Pete Bevacqua, NBC Sports

42

producing ESPN’s live Thursday-night collegefootball package, and he went on to produce the broadcaster’s Big Monday college-basketball and College World Series packages as well.

“The people and the camaraderie that we had at ESPN back then are what sticks with me to this day, as well as the work ethic that was embraced and shared by everyone,” says Gaudelli. “I was fortunate to have two bosses in [Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famers] Bill Fitts and Scotty Connal, who were giants in the business teaching a bunch of young kids that didn’t know anything. They were demanding but, at the same time, understanding, kind, and they were terrific teachers in terms of storytelling, organization, and how to lead. I still use those lessons today.”

In 1990, Gaudelli took over as producer of ESPN’s Sunday Night Football package and helped to build it into the highest-rated series on cable television, along with serving as producer of ESPN’s NFL Draft coverage. Named senior coordinating producer at ESPN in 1996, he also oversaw the network’s X Games broadcasts and its Cable Ace Award–winning Major League Baseball coverage in 1997.

He would go on to produce SNF on ESPN through 2000, with the show winning an Outstanding Live Sports Series Emmy in his final year.

“In my opinion, Fred Gaudelli is quite simply the best NFL-game producer of all time,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Howard Katz, who served as president of ESPN and later ABC Sports during Gaudelli’s tenures. “His knowledge of the game and the way he thinks like an offensive coordinator gives him an uncanny ability to anticipate in the truck what’s about to happen on the field. Combine that with his instincts and intuition along with his ability to process information in the heat of the game on so many different levels, and you’ve got a very, very special talent.”

In 2001, Gaudelli succeeded Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Don Ohlmeyer as producer of the most iconic sports franchise in all of television: ABC’s Monday Night Football. He went on to produce Super Bowl XL in February 2006 — the first of his seven Super Bowls.

“Fred should do a master class on sportstelevision production,” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Al Michaels, who manned the

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

booth for Gaudelli first at MNF and now on NBC’s SNF broadcasts. “Every aspiring young producer could get a big head start.”

In advance of the 2006 season, NBC won the rights to the Sunday Night Football package, which was to become the NFL’s No. 1 primetime broadcast package. That’s when Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and legendary NBC Sports exec Dick Ebersol came calling.

“Watching a game that Gaudelli produces is unbelievable,” says Ebersol. “When it was announced that we were going to have Sunday Night Football, we watched a [MNF] game in their [truck]. I became very taken by listening to the conversation back and forth between Fred and Drew Esocoff, who was directing that game.

Their language was almost without words as decisions got made in the truck. I said to them.

‘Come back to the hotel after the game. I’d love to buy you guys a drink.’”

That drink led to a new job at a new network producing Sunday Night Football for NBC and marked the beginning of a new chapter in NFL broadcast history. Since NBC launched SNF in 2006 with Gaudelli at the helm, it has held the title of primetime’s No. 1 TV show for an unprecedented 10 consecutive years.

“Fred has the respect of the league, the coaches, the players, and the production team,” says Mark Lazarus, chairman, NBCUniversal Television and Streaming, and former chairman, NBC Sports Group. “SNF is the number-one show in primetime for more than a decade due to Fred’s strong leadership, dedication, prepara-

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> FRED GAUDELLI continued I was extremely fortunate to work closely with Fred from the very beginning of his career at ESPN. Right from the start, he was the most talented, hardest working and best prepared producer I have ever known. He always set incredibly high standards for himself and for everyone on his team. In my opinion, Fred has developed into the best live event producer in the history of television sports.

– Steve Anderson, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer In my opinion, Fred Gaudelli is quite simply the best NFL game producer of all time. Fred’s leadership role for over 30 years running his network’s most important franchise — first at ESPN, then at ABC, and for the past 16 years, at NBC — makes him a true Hall of Famer in every sense of the word.

– Howard Katz, NFL and SportsBroadcasting Hall of Famer There’s no one better than Fred Gaudelli. He’s the hardest working person in TV and he’s a great coach – John Madden, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer 44

tion, and relationships.”

In 15 seasons on NBC (2006-20), Sunday Night Football has won 30 Sports Emmys and is the first-ever 10-time honoree for Outstanding Live Sports Series, having won its 11th honor in the category following the 2020 season (it also received a record six consecutive Emmys in the category from 2008 to ’13).

“His work ethic and dedication to the profession have been a driving force not just for himself but for his peers and those that follow. I benefited as much as anyone,” says Esocoff. “There’s no question who the leader of the group is and he takes that on himself. That’s why he’s the best ever at what he does.”

Although Gaudelli has focused primarily on the gridiron during his time at NBC, he also produced the network’s Triple Crown coverage in 2011 and served as coordinating producer in 2012.

NBC promoted Gaudelli to his current position of SNF executive producer in June 2016 and also named him lead producer for its Thursday Night Football series. The 2016 debut of the NBC/NFL Network Thursday Night Football series, which was primetime’s No. 2 show in the 2016-17 TV season.

“Fred has the most brilliant eye for telling a three-hour story,” says NBC Sports game analyst Cris Collinsworth, who is in his 13th season alongside Michaels in the SNF booth. “Like the most talented filmmakers, he introduces the characters, hooks you on intimate storylines, and artfully rides those storylines to unpredictable conclusions. The difference is, Fred is doing

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

it in real time without a script. There will not be another one like him, so enjoy his artistry while you still can.”

A 24-time Emmy Award–winner, Gaudelli is now in his 32nd season as lead producer for an NFL primetime game and his 16th season producing SNF for NBC. “It is an honor to be a part of the same team as Fred Gaudelli and to see someone in action on a day-to-day basis who is truly the very best at what he does,” says NBC Sports Group President Pete Bevacqua. “Fred has a tangible passion for his work, and I am constantly amazed how each off-season, instead of resting on his laurels and decades of experience, he tirelessly strives to be better and looks for ways to elevate his teammates and Sunday Night Football. Fred improves each year. As a result, we do, too.”

A fanatical researcher and student of the game, Gaudelli believes in “being prepared for every possible eventuality.” However, he also stresses the importance of agility, the ability to adapt on the fly as the story unfolds on the field.

“I want to have an idea of a decision that I might have to make before I actually have to make it,” he says. “I’m a pretty incessant preparer, and I’m involved in every aspect of the show. That is pretty time-consuming, but I believe that is what the job requires. The one thing I’ve learned is that you can’t bend the telecasts to your will; the game is going to have its own story, and you better be ready to jump off your plan and adapt to the story evolving right in front of you.”

Today, Gaudelli continues at the front bench alongside Esocoff in the SNF truck every Sunday night and has no plans to slow down anytime soon. Reflecting on his three decades producing primetime NFL broadcasts and 40-plus years in the business, he cites a simple formula: extremely hard work and a fanatical passion for the game.

“To me, every game is a Super Bowl,” he explains. “I don’t treat any game less than I treat the Super Bowl. I and the thousands of others who have worked on our shows want people to have a better experience watching our games than they do watching anything else on television. So, in the end, I’d like to think I’ve had a small impact on how [pro football] is consumed and perceived by people. If that’s the case, then I’ve done my job.” – Jason Dachman

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> PHYLLIS GEORGE S Phyllis George was special. Her smile lit up millions of homes for the NFL Today. Folks — men and women — were comfortable with her talking about their favorite sport. And in New York, Philadelphia, and Washington, they loved Phyllis despite her Dallas Cowboys bias!

– Brent Musburger, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Phyllis was a true pioneer for women in Sports. She was admired and loved by all of us who worked with her, not just for her talent, but for her warmth, kindness and a smile that lit up the TV screen. A true hall-offamer, who left us far too soon.”

– Bob Fishman, CBS and Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer

46

he was Miss America. She was a co-host on Candid Camera. But it wasn’t until Phyllis George made the move to The NFL Today in 1975 that her popularity became apparent: her presence on the show made it appointment viewing, “In the East and Midwest,” says Rich Podolsky in his book You Are Looking Live!: The Story of The NFL Today, “churchgoers rushed home in time to see it, and more attention meant more eyeballs watching and higher ratings.”

The road to The NFL Today began in Denton, TX, a small town 42 miles north of Dallas. George’s parents were hardworking Methodist people, and, as a young girl, she watched the Miss America pageant with her mom every year.

“Back in the day, it was the biggest thing on television,” George told the University of Texas in 2018.

She rose to fame as Miss America, winning the crown in 1970. But, the year before, she placed second in the Miss Texas pageant and almost swore off competing the following year. “I came in second to a drummer from Longview,” she told Texas Monthly. “The local papers had to retrieve their original headline of ‘Miss Denton Becomes Miss Texas.’”

The Miss Dallas organization kept asking her to run for their title. She kept saying no but relented with the possibility of scholarship money as the carrot. Little did she know she would be named not only Miss Texas but also Miss America and be destined for a career in sports TV that ultimately would give her a chance to change the industry forever.

Being Miss America gave her a chance to be on arguably TV’s biggest stage: The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson. When she told Carson, “You’ll remember me. I’m the klutzy Miss America” (she dropped her crown while walking down the runway), viewers and the press were smitten, even though the concept of Miss America had its critics.

“The ‘women’s libbers’ — we didn’t call them ‘feminists’ — would follow me around,” she said.

“I was in DeKalb, IL. I kept saying, ‘They’re not picketing me; they’re picketing what they think

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

this program stands for.’ So I went outside and said, ‘It’s really cold out here. Why don’t you guys come in, and let’s have some coffee and talk about this?’

“They all came in,” she continued. “And I said, ‘Look, I don’t feel like I’m exploited. I’m from a small town in Texas. This is great for me. I won scholarship money. I’ve done something with my life, and I can show my talent. I want to be in broadcasting. This is going to help me, so I want you to look at it that way.’ Did I like being in a swimsuit? Absolutely not. I hated it.”

When she arrived in New York after her year as Miss America, she hoped to land a job in broadcasting. Making the rounds, she ran into two young producers from CBS Sports, Tommy O’Neill and Bob Stenner, and that meeting would soon prove important.

When the Miss America pageant invited her back to cohost with Bert Parks, it gave her a chance to be seen on TV, and, in 1974, Allen Funt hired her as a cohost for his Candid Camera show in New York. But working as the second banana to Funt wasn’t exactly what George had in mind when she sought a job in broadcasting.

Changes at CBS Sports at the end of the year offered an opportunity. President Bill MacPhail was quietly retired, and 38-year-old Bob Wussler was brought in.

“Casually, Bob Stenner and I went to Wussler,” O’Neill said, “and we told him about Phyllis.

Wussler liked her right away.”

A 13-week contract was drawn up with the promise that, if things worked out, it would

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> PHYLLIS GEORGE continued

Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Lesley Visser (left) with George’s daughter, Pamela Brown

Phyllis was magic — warm and kind and authentic. She did stories that weren’t about the game but were about the people, and she did them as well as anyone ever has. Her legacy is that she didn’t just open the doors for other women, she rooted for them. It was in her DNA. – Lesley Visser, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame She was the original natural. She was the most natural, open, delightful person and everyone adored her. She was the vanguard for women in televised sports and she didn’t break the mold; she was the mold.

– Tommy O’Neill, NBC Sports 48

become permanent.

“I accepted Bob Wussler’s offer,” George said, “partly because I needed a job — always a good incentive — and partly because something inside told me I could do it.”

For one of her first assignments, she was sent to Boston to interview Celtics star Dave Cowens, who was never known for being glib. Cowens, who cherished his privacy and disliked interviews, had reluctantly agreed to the CBS request because the team management insisted it was good public relations. He also had no idea they were sending a woman. He took one look at her when she and her camera crew arrived at practice, according to George, and rolled his eyes.

“Hey, Dave, how are you?” she called out to him, but he didn’t respond. She tried again, and again he ignored her.

“As soon as practice was over, Cowens made a beeline for his Jeep,” George wrote in her memoir, Never Say Never. “I followed, and my producer urged me to hop in. I did.

“My career was on the line, and I had no intention of going back to New York without talking with him. I’m not going away, I thought to myself. I am getting this interview! So off we went to his log cabin on the outskirts of Boston.”

She kept peppering him with questions on the 45-minute drive to his cabin, getting very few answers. When they got there, he took a beer out of the fridge, offered her one, which she declined, and they settled into a couple of rocking chairs on the porch. By the time the CBS crew arrived, she had slowly started to draw him out, and the interview turned into more of a conversation.

“He rocked back and forth in his old chair,” she wrote. “And he talked and talked. As the camera rolled, I instinctively tossed aside my formal questions and talked to him like a regular human being, not like a superstar. Mostly, I asked him what I was interested to know as a curious fan, questions like, ‘What would you do if it were all over tomorrow? Are there some days you just don’t want to suit up? What if you had an injury? Where would you go, what would you do? Do you ever want to settle down and get married?’”

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

These weren’t typical questions guys like Cowens were accustomed to hearing. Asking a player about his feelings was almost unheard of.

When the piece got edited, it was obvious that George had captured a side of Dave Cowens that few people had ever seen. As she introduced the interview on the air, she said that Cowens had “a little bit of Huck Finn lingering inside him.”

Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer and sportscaster Lesley Visser notes that Cowen didn’t warm up to that many people and that was part of George’s gift. “She was persistent and she was kind, so people wanted to embrace her and they rooted for her. She was someone that I think all of America fell in love with.”

Sports Illustrated’s Melissa Ludtke called it “probably the best national television piece ever done on [Cowen].” Ludtke should know: she was one of the very first women permitted to report from a pro locker room.

“Phyllis didn’t do stories about the game,” says Visser. “She did stories about the people, and she was as good as anybody who has ever done it.

Players warmed up to her.”

George had a straightforward philosophy for an interview: “I went for the heart, and the athletes gave heart back.”

Wussler later told USA Today that he knew all along she’d be great. “In my gut, I thought Phyllis was pretty special. I thought there was a role for her, as somebody who could talk to guys who knew something about sports.”

Her 13-week tryout quickly turned into a three-year deal, and George was on her way.

A month later, she was starring on the hottest sports show on TV and, within a year, adorned the cover of People magazine.

“We all realized what we had [in Phyllis],” says Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Mike Pearl, who produced the show. “When we took the show on the road for the playoffs and Super Bowl, Phyllis was the main attraction. When we all walked through an airport or down a street together, the public would go to Phyllis. And when we went out for dinner, Phyllis was the one being asked for autographs.”

– Ken Kerschbaumer Thank you to Rich Podolsky for providing the majority of information in this bio from his book, “You Are Looking Live!”

TOM SAHARA In every sports media division, there are individuals behind the scenes who are the true hidden treasures, responsible for helping drive groundbreaking innovation and production. For more than 21 years at Turner Sports, that was Tom Sahara! He developed a well-earned reputation as a forward-thinking executive, and his vision and technical prowess helped transform Turner Sports’ remote and studio productions.

– David Levy Tom Sahara was a fixture at Turner Sports. It is hard to think about Turner Sports, and not put Tom Sahara in the conversation. Although he was generally very quiet, his presence was quite prominent, and that not only permeated throughout the Turner Sports family, but also the industry. Not only was he good at his job, but he was also an amazing person — and that was often times more important that the tech that was rattling around in his mind. That personability is one of the many legacies that he has left us with at Turner.

– Chris Brown, Turner Sports 50

L

ike many an engineer, former Turner Sports VP, Operations and Technology, Tom Sahara had an inkling at a young age that he had a knack for engineering and broadcast technology.

“One year, I got a transistor radio and I ended up taking it apart,” he recalls. “My mom said I always took everything apart and then, one day, I started putting everything back together. I guess I was always a tinkerer.”

Tinkering would eventually lead to a 20-plus– year career at Turner Sports and a role as a key force in the broadcaster’s becoming a topnotch sports powerhouse. And Sahara’s efforts at Turner Sports — particularly around developments related to HDTV, the move to digital, and next-generation audio — made him a leader on a global scale.

“When I was a teenager,” he says, “I was exposed to electronics through a teacher who happened to be the advisor of the electronics club. I was curious about electronics because these radios and TVs just magically pull something out of the air. That intrigued me.”

Growing up in Hawaii, he began reading anything he could get his hands on about electronics, and an electronics class in high school helped him realize he had a talent for fixing gadgets.

His first professional break was working on live-music technical support for an AV electronics company servicing restaurants, night clubs, and cabarets. It wasn’t long until he made the leap, at age 21, to Don Ho’s live show. Soon, though, he realized that the entertainment business can be difficult.

“That’s when that interest in TV came back,” he says. “I got my FCC license and went around to some of the TV stations and had an interview with the chief engineer [at KITV Honolulu]. He said, ‘There are at least three or four people every day coming in saying I want to work here. Why should I consider you?’ And I said, ‘Well, I have one of these,’ and pulled out my FCC license. He told me to start that weekend.”

Sahara credits a thirst for knowledge and willingness to leap at new opportunities as key to his development.

“What really drove me was always wanting to know about what’s going on and how something works,” he says. “At the TV station, there would be a sign-up sheet to work on remote produc-

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

tions like festivals and parades, and I would be standing right there with a pen in hand to be the first one to sign up. That’s the way I approached everything: if an opportunity came up, I would raise my hand, say yes, and jump in.”

The leap to sports began with ABC’s coverage of surfing events, such as the Pipeline Masters Surfing Championship. With FCC license in hand, Sahara would set up the microwave dish that would send the signal to the station.

One of the early opportunities was on the golf events in Hawaii. NEP would provide technical facilities and support, and it was not long before Sahara met NEP stalwarts and Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famers George Wensel, John Roché, and Tom Shelburne on a production.

“They started bringing me out on bigger and bigger shows,” Sahara says. “Before you know it, I was doing shows like the 1994 World Cup in Dallas. I met people from the Olympics, who asked me to join them for the Atlanta Olympics, and that’s how I ended up in Atlanta.”

That 1996 Olympics gig (he would also work on the 2000 and 2002 Games) gave him a chance to feel part of something really big.

Arriving at Turner in 1997, Sahara served as manager of studio engineering for Turner Studios, responsible for technical operations for all live studio productions.

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> TOM SAHARA continued Tom was a terrific partner and a true Hall of Famer. I am so proud of what CBS Sports and Turner Sports were able to accomplish on our co-production of the Men’s NCAA Basketball Tournament. Tom is a big reason for our initial success and why the partnership continues to be so strong today. Tom’s leadership, creativity and collaboration helped our teams seamlessly blend into one operation across four networks, two studios and a multitude of remote sites each year. Turner Sports and CBS Sports developed one of the most unique relationships in sports television, and that doesn’t happen without Tom’s expertise, support and most importantly, his friendship.

– Patty Power, CBS Sports Tom Sahara was the steady hand on the wheel of innovation for the NBA, always careful to hear any idea or concept out, and ready to apply expertise and engineering to make it work. In the area of audio, he was in the lead always, improving sounds from courtside year to year.

– Steve Hellmuth, NBA Entertainment 52

In his 20 years at Turner Sports, Sahara rose to the role of VP, operations and technology, and made sure technical operations made all the right moves to support NBA All-Star, March Madness, Major League Baseball, NASCAR, golf, and other productions. Toss in the transition to HD, some 3D production, and embracing digital production and new ways of working, and someone who always loved learning something new always had something new to learn.

“In every sports-media division,” says former Turner Sports President David Levy, “there are individuals behind the scenes who are the true hidden treasures, responsible for helping drive groundbreaking innovation and production. For more than 21 years at Turner Sports, that was Tom Sahara. He developed a well-earned reputation as a forward-thinking executive, and his vision and technical prowess helped transform Turner Sports’ remote and studio productions.

Not only is Tom the consummate professional, who served as a mentor to many of his Turner Sports colleagues, but his warm and friendly personality sets him apart.”

Chris Brown, Turner Sports, VP, Sports Production Tech, says it is hard to think about Turner Sports and not put Tom Sahara in the conversation.

“Although he was generally very quiet, his presence was quite prominent, and that not only permeated throughout the Turner Sports family, but also the industry,” he says. “Not only was he good at his job, but he was also an amazing person and that was often times more important than the tech that was rattling around in his mind. That personability is one of the many legacies that he has left us with at Turner Sports.”

On events like the NBA All-Star Game, which eventually grew into a full weekend of activities, Sahara’s efforts were appreciated at the highest league level.

Says NBA EVP, Media Operations and Technology, Steve Hellmuth, “Tom Sahara was a steady hand on the wheel of innovation for the NBA, always careful to hear any idea or concept out, and ready to apply expertise and engineering to make it work. In the area of audio, he was in the lead always, improving sounds from courtside year to year.”

The team at CBS Sports, which worked closely with Sahara and the Turner team on March Madness and other events, is an example of the

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

kind of outside organization that was impacted by Sahara. Patty Power, CBS Sports, EVP, Operations and Engineering, says Sahara was a terrific partner on the event. ” Tom is a big reason for our initial success and why the partnership continues to be so strong today,” she says. “Tom’s leadership, creativity and collaboration helped our teams seamlessly blend into one operation across four networks, two studios and a multitude of remote sites each year. Turner Sports and CBS Sports developed one of the most unique relationships in sports television, and that doesn’t happen without Tom’s expertise, support, and most importantly, his friendship.”

Sahara also served as SVG Chairman from 2013-18, helping oversee the organization’s expansion and growth both domestically and internationally. His vision helped the organization tackle a wider variety of technical areas and his desire to always look to the future always kept the organization moving forward.

Today, Sahara is a consultant, and, once again, learning is important, with things like augmented reality on his current to-do list.

“I didn’t have a plan for each step,” he says.

“It was always a serendipitous meeting of people saying, ‘I’m looking for someone,’ and I would be there, or I would be referred. It was all by chance and luck, and I just happened to have the skills they were looking for. It has been a fantastic ride.” – Ken Kerschbaumer

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SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

BIG FEBRUARY I

n February 2018, NBC Sports pulled off a Super Bowl that was on the opening weekend of the Winter Olympics, but this year the production team tackled an even bigger challenge: producing

the Super Bowl during the Olympics... oh, while also producing a large portion of the Winter Olympics remotely from Stamford. It was no small feat and the production teams at NBC Sports allowed SVG to go inside two epic productions during one epic month.

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY SUPER BOWL LVI

NBC Sports Talks Unique Efforts, Tech Advances at Super Bowl LVI

By Ken Kerschbaumer

W

hen the NBC Sports team saw that NFL season would move Super Bowl LVI from being on the opening week of the Olympics to the middle weekend, that didn’t deter their production efforts. The focus was still on making the scale of the game coverage, the pregame show, and the post-game show, as big as possible. And new workflows allowed for the entire team — which also included Telemundo this year ­— to work cohesively and collectively.

“We say it every year, but the scope of Super Bowl is massive, and it seems to grow every year,” said Craig Bernstein, VP, Remote Technical Operations and Engineering, NBC Sports, speaking prior to Super Bowl LVI. “Especially with the addition of pre-game and the locations that they’re at as well as the Olympics, which will be on five hours before us and five hours after us.”

It’s been four years since NBC Sports last had a Super Bowl, as it swapped Super Bowls with CBS Sports so that it could have a Super Bowl that aligned with a Winter Olympics. In those four years, much has changed, but one thing hasn’t: the production team for Super Bowl LVI was coming off another year where it produced the nation’s highest rated TV show, Sunday Night Football. And that show has nearly 60 cameras every week so, needless to say, the team is well versed in big shows like the Super Bowl.

From left to right: Keith Kice, Craig Bernstein, John Roché, and Ken Goss at Super Bowl LVI in Los Angeles.

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SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

The Lake Set Pulls Double Duty for NBC Sports

T

hroughout Super Bowl Weekend, NBC Sports was all over Los Angeles. There was a set at the Santa Monica pier with a full Newbert flypack, while a set at Universal Studios had a smaller Newbert flypack. And Dale Earnhardt and Rutledge Wood taped pieces all around town and also did a live hit from Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood.

Tom Popple, VP of studio operations, NBC Sports, was onsite and oversaw all the sets, which included the aforementioned locations as well as a Lake Set outside the stadium and standup locations inside the stadium.

“It’s just a huge undertaking,” said Popple as NBC Universal has brought all of its properties to the game in an effort to maximize exposure and increase awareness.

The Lake Set — one of the jewels of NBC’s Super Bowl LVI coverage — was home to Super Bowl and Olympic host Mike Tirico.

Located across the lake next from SoFi Stadium, it offered a dramatic shot of the entire stadium and, when the sun set, dramatic change in color and light.

“It’s a beautiful venue and being brand new it has a lot of new fiber,” he said. “At other stadiums we need to run our own fiber and here it’s just a 3,000 foot run.”

The Lake Set had two looks, one for the Olympics and one for the Super Bowl. Each featured a different desk designed by Chris

“Super Bowl LVI enables us to highlight the cutting-edge technologies that we use to enhance the viewers experience which we also show on a weekly basis during the SNF season,” said Ken Goss, EVP, studio/remote operations planning, NBC Sports. “We have a talented and experienced team here where our focus is to deliver an exceptional and technically sound broadcast.”

The biggest difference between the Super Bowl and a regular season Sunday Night Football game is the addition of a massive pre-game programming slate that brings in a whole new set of challenges. The Super Bowl is also an NBC Universal “Symphony” event where they use every channel and platform to promote it.

“Pierre Moosa who is director of the pre-game show has done an unbelievable job getting all the NBC entities lined up, like Access Hollywood, the Premier League, Telemundo, Regional Sports Nets, and NBC News,” said Tim DeKime, VP of sports operations, NBC Sports.

As for the game itself, Super Bowl LVI Producer Fred Gaudelli 58

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

From left to right: Craig Bernstein, Tom Popple, and Ken Goss on the Lake Set during its Beijing set up look.

Runnells of Innovative Show Design who did all of NBC’s work since 2009. The Super Bowl desk, for example, reflected the curves and design of SoFi Stadium and mirrors the desk inside.

Also at the Lake Set was NEP Supershooter 18, which fed the regionals and handled Premier League for Telemundo, which had a Lake Set as well. NEP Supershooter 3 was also onsite and the set even had a monitor with nine feeds so Tirico could keep on top of all the action in the sports world.

There was also a JitaCam camera crane with Ross augmented reality capabilities on next to the Lake Set and a Boat Cam that was a Sony P1 package with a Canon CJ20ex5 lens on it that was modified by removing the rocker and shaving off some weight. The Boat Cam could rotate 360 degrees and hit speeds of six or seven knots, depending on payload.

A Super Bowl is always a major team effort that takes multiple months, said Tim DeKime, VP of Sports Operations, NBC Sports.

“A special shout out to Keith Kice and John Roché as they have been planning this for a year and a half in advance and as you get closer there is more planning and planning and planning,” said DeKime. “And I think they’ve just done a fantastic job.” – KK

said he typically relies on around 40 cameras to call the show but Keith Kice, senior director, technical operations, NBC Sports, said ahead of the game that the goal is to give Gaudelli and Super Bowl LVI Director Drew Esocoff everything they need to ensure they have all the angles.

“The biggest thing we add to the game production are some specialty angles that can cover different parts of the field and we want to make sure all parts of the field are covered,” he said. “If there’s ever a controversy like toes in or out and things like that we can make sure we have it covered.”

Topping the list this year were 4K cameras mounted on the goal posts that shot the backlines and extra cameras on the goal line.

Core technology included all Canon lenses (including a couple of 122x lenses and then a mix of Sony HDC-5500 and HDC-3500 cameras for primary coverage. Sony HDC-4800 cameras allowed for high-frame-rate HD cut outs while Sony HDC-4300 cameras

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY SUPER BOWL LVI

offered high-frame-rate replays without cutout capabilities.

“We add another dozen cameras besides pylons compared to Sunday Night Football,” he added. “But they do a great job every week already and the goal is to deliver a great game to the people at home. And that’s how we always plan for this.”

Another new addition was a Steadicam outfitted with AR graphics capabilities.

“It’s a Steadicam running an NCAM on it for location, telemetry, and placement of the AR graphics so they are perfect,” said Kice.

“And especially with the thought of doing something with the Infinity screen we wanted to make sure the placements are precise.”

Augmented reality graphics have been a big part of the SNF package for a few seasons now, so the new addition is all about giving the production team what they need to tell the story.

“We provide the technology and they just put it to work,” added Kice.

While that AR Steadicam was obvious to viewers, a big improvement that wasn’t was a 10 Gbps EVS XNET-Via network that replaced SDI and connected 33 EVS servers, according to Bernstein.

“In the past we’ve been challenged to share clips between pregame and game,” said Bernstein. “And as this compound has expanded there’s been more of a need to move files across the compound and the XNET-Via solution works really well. So, we installed it in NEP’s ND1 truck at the beginning of Sunday night this year, put it through its paces and now we’ve made it the largest XNET-Via Network that has been operated to this point. And it’s working very well.”

The 33 EVS replay servers were spread across NEP’s ND1, ND7, and Supershooter 5. ND1 was the core production truck in the compound, which was located inside the stadium while the rest of the domestic and international compounds were outside. ND7 and Supershooter 5 were also located inside the stadium.

NEP played a big role in all the proceedings, and John Roché, 60

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

NEP’s ND1 was the centerpiece of NBC’s production.

NEP Broadcast Services technical manager for Sunday Night Football and Super Bowl LVI, said that the biggest logistical challenge early on was losing a day and a half during move in because the Los Angeles Rams hosted the NFC Championship Game.

“That took some time away from us so just getting the trucks in here was a challenge,” he said. “But with all the support NEP has supplied, whether it is the guys being fantastic with problems and all of the equipment they’ve supplied they already thought things through. And in case of emergencies, they’ve supplied everything that we need and more.”

DeKime credited BaAM, the Toronto-based support company that the NFL works with for stepping up after losing a day of set-up.

“They basically are one-stop shopping for securing our trailers, golf carts, scissor lifts, furniture, etc. and they were really pushed back so a big shout out to them as well as Aggreko who does our power,” he added.

All of the efforts resulted in a TV compound that grew in size and complexity. Bernstein said that as the compound has grown efforts to protect the compound grow as well.

“We tried to root out for hours as many single points of failure as possible. We created disaster recovery scenarios and that isn’t a trivial thing, especially with a compound of this size,” he said.

“That’s been a lot of work with an impressive result. On the transmission side we have three separate trucks from three separate vendors and backed up on fiber, satellite, and bonded cellular.”

ARCTEK Satellite Productions handled all of the transmission needs for NBC and were in the host TV compound all week long. <

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY SUPER BOWL LVI

NFL Media Tackles Super Bowl Programming, Halftime Show, NFL Honors From Home Facility

By Ken Kerschbaumer

T

he Los Angeles Rams weren’t the only ones playing at home in Super Bowl XLVI. The NFL Network’s home production and operations center, NFL West, is located right next door to SoFi Stadium. The 450,000 sq. ft. facility opened in September and, with 74,922 sq. ft. of studio and studio support space, it gives the NFL Media production team to be more creative this week and the technical team to be more responsive.

From left to right: NFL Media’s Jessica Lee, Tony Cole, AJ Wainwright, Bruce Goldfeder, and Dave Shaw.

62

“It’s one thing to do the Super Bowl, which we do every year from whatever city the Super Bowl is in,” said Dave Shaw, VP, head of media operations, NFL Media. “But it’s another thing to do it from our own facility. We have had some curve balls as there were things we planned for and then other things that were added, like doing the Halftime Show from here and supporting NFL Honors. But our whole team has kept focused and everything we planned is coming through.”

The facility is busy enough during a regular week let alone a Super Bowl week. The NFL West production space houses five stages and six production-control rooms and audio-control rooms that serve the five stages and the podcast studio. The studios are led by the 5,970-sq.-ft. Studio 1, which serves as the primary studio for NFL Total Access, Good Morning Football, and Super Bowl Live.

One of the big challenges during Super Bowl Week was accommodating a lot of one-time requests. Jessica Lee, senior director of operations, NFL Media, was tasked with managing those requests and making them a reality.

“When you go around the facility, we have production teams that just want to shoot everywhere because of the decor all over the place, the backdrops of the stadium, and it’s just a beautiful place,” she said.

“Whether it’s an ENG shoot or an event, everyone just wants to be here as we’re so close to the stadium. So, it became a natural thing when our partners were looking for what they wanted to do during Super Bowl week to look here. They’re doing events, whether it’s football ops doing different events or the social team doing things to service clients or partnerships. That’s all the extra stuff that really came with the Super Bowl.”

Shaw said managing those requests required a committee to be formed as requests were coming in from all directions.

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY SUPER BOWL LVI NFL Media’s Lake Set appeared to be floating over the lake.

“We kind of sorted them by events that needed to be televised and needed our technical facilities or things like a pure party,” he said. “It’s been a stress but a fun one.”

A big part of the facilities capabilities was a result of a COTS IP routing switch featuring the Magellan SDN Orchestrator (SDNO) to manage the mix of SMPTE ST 2110 IP and HD-SDI baseband infrastructure. To serve the various operational needs throughout the building beyond just the video-production portion, the NFL created three separate IP networks at NFL LA that interconnect with one another: an IT network for back-office needs, a SMPTE ST 2110 Amber/Blue network for broadcast ops, and a production network that connected to NFL Media’s media storage and handled user authentication.

The NFL LA building also boasts a dual-power A/B plan with UPS and generators with original power backed up by separate city substations.

Bruce Goldfeder, VP, engineering, NFL Media, said being at the home facility instead of on the road offered an extra level of testing and making sure things were good to go.

“We could check all the fibers ahead of time and last week we checked our cameras on everything around the place,” said Goldfeder. “We’re using about 60% of the 1,400 strands of fiber we have as we’re supporting a lot of different entities that are cross patching because the stadium did a good job fibering inside the stadium but the only fiber outside the stadium is ours.”

Tony Cole, VP, media operations, NFL Media, said the big advantage of being so close to the actual game site was that when production comes up with a new idea that creates the usual series of technical requests, it was easier than ever to fulfill them without having to bring in extra gear.

“We have something technically that can match the production needs,” he said. “Creatively there’s hardly anything that they can’t request that we haven’t been able to respond to and that’s pretty darn unique.”

AJ Wainwright, director of technical operations, NFL Media, said other events that were handled out of NFL West included the NFL Commissioner’s press conference while the halftime show press conference was done at the Convention Center, but the signals were transmitted back to the NFL. “From a transmission perspective we have such flexibility with signal management for any entity and that has been a huge advantage,” he said.

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Lee said the Super Bowl efforts began with Inside the NFL shooting onsite followed by the load in for NFL Honors and the groups that were building out the Honors infrastructure in studios two and three.

The NFL Media team had plenty of great shooting locations within its own building but that didn’t prevent them from building out one more: a small stage built out over the water on the lake next to their facility and the stadium. Shaw said Mark Quenzel, SVP, head of content, NFL Media, wanted to take advantage of the manmade lake, which is located next to the stadium.

“What’s so unique about the stadium is the lake that’s right in front of it,” said Shaw. “Mark wanted to show it off, but if you want to do that you don’t want to just put a big box on it. You want to feel like you’re floating in the water. And that was the impetus for it.”

Super Bowl Sunday began early for the team as the first show hit the air at 6:00 a.m. EST and the main studio, the Lake Set, and Champion’s Field were all in play. Augmented Reality added a little more sizzle to the shows, with AR coupled to a jib on Champion’s Field as well as on a robo that covered the lake and AR from a drone.

Helping in those efforts were three portable flypacks, each comprising four cameras and six microphones that could roll out anywhere in SoFi Stadium or across the Hollywood Park complex. They played a big part in the Super Bowl LVI programming and being located next to the stadium gave the team the chance to test things out well ahead of the typical test phase for a remote production.

Super Bowl LVI capped what was arguably one of the most intense seasons ever for NFL Media. Launching a new facility in the midst of a pandemic, getting out all of the kinks, and then getting ready for the biggest sports event on the U.S. sports calendar challenged all the employees. And while usually only a handful of staffers get to experience a Super Bowl week, it’s something everyone was a part of.

“I think it’s been an extra special thing for the employees,” said Shaw. “The NFL made sure that every employee got tickets to the NFL Honors. And every employee got tickets to the NFL Experience.

So, everybody feels a part of it and that’s the excitement, that’s the difference. And being that this is the first Super Bowl here in SoFi it’s pretty special and one we are going to remember.” <

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY SUPER BOWL LVI

Telemundo Deportes Brings Latin Flavor to Its First Over-the-Air Broadcast of the Big Game

By Kristian Hernández

W

hether it was the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, the Winter Olympics in Beijing, or Super Bowl LVI, it’s a great time to be a part of the NBCUniversal family. Telemundo Deportes joined in on the football fun with the network’s first over-the-air broadcast of the Super Bowl on Telemundo and Universo and had a large studio footprint throughout the city.

“This will be the first Super Bowl that is widely distributed, and we’re immensely proud of that,” said Eli Velazquez, EVP, sports content, Telemundo Deportes. “This is a win-win for both of our companies because we can push each other to figure out ways that’ll enhance the viewing experience.”

In previous iterations of the Super Bowl, Telemundo Deportes covered the NFL’s biggest game of the season but at a decreased scale. During the last championship game on NBC airwaves — Super Bowl LII in 2018 — the Spanish-language network provided a presentation of the game on Telemundo Deportes with onsite commentators in the booth and studio shows at its facility in Miami. Gradually, the idea of extending Telemundo’s presence at tentpole events came more into focus.

“The 2004 Summer Games in Athens was the first Olympics that [Telemundo and Universo] did together,” said Velazquez.

“Over time, the footprint for us has grown. When you get to know someone in a new relationship, you have to gain trust, understand what one team brings to the other team, and how to make each other better.

Little by little, we’ve become a bit more integrated.”

This relationship has now flourished and turned into a massive undertaking for Velazquez and his team of 50 onsite staffers. On the linear channels of Telemundo and Universo, Carlos Mauricio Telemundo Deportes had four talent positions at SoFi Stadium.

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY SUPER BOWL LVI From left to right: Miguel Gurwitz, Eli Velazquez, and Ana Jurka pose on the lakeside set.

Ramírez, sports anchor, NBC Bay Area and Telemundo 48, were on the call; former George Mason University tight end Jorge Andres provided game analysis along with former Arizona Cardinals offensive lineman Rolando Cantú.

In addition to the onsite crew, more than 30 employees handled the real-time cutting of the broadcast from a PCR in Telemundo’s Miami facility. Led by Telemundo VP, Sports Content, Robert Pardo, the production crew tapped into all of the camera feeds used by NBC Sports Sunday Night Football director Drew Esocoff and producer Fred Gaudelli. For additional creative control, the team had six unilateral cameras inside SoFi Stadium.

“To make [the broadcast] customizable to the community that we’re serving, I have to have the flexibility of breaking off the feed to do other things,” said Velazquez. “For example, we can cut away when [Esocoff and Gaudelli] show [onfield reporter] Michele Tafoya, call-outs that are specific to NBC programming, or certain animations that we’re not focused on.”

In addition to the six dedicated cameras, Telemundo also had three handheld cameras roaming the field during pregame and will be linked to the compound via two LiveU packs.

Alongside NBC’s physical sets in and around SoFi Stadium, Telemundo Deportes had its own sets within Hollywood Park. At the main set on the concourse level, near the desk of Football Night in America, Miguel Gurwitz hosted, joined by Ana Jurka, Karim Mendiburu, and Cantú. A little farther from the lower bowl, in the atrium area, another set housed studio coverage, and even farther away, near the lake, a Telemundo desk sat next to NBC’s lakeside set.

Ariana Figuera reported from the field in her own dedicated area.

Since the matchup between the Los Angeles Rams and Cincinnati Bengals made history on Telemundo, it’s only fitting to celebrate the accomplishment with a party. Three hours before the pregame show, Telemundo Deportes took over Plaza México — a local area of retailers and restaurants situated 11 miles east of the venue — for Fiesta del Super Bowl LVI, En Casa Con Telemundo 68

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from 2:00 to 5:00 p.m. ET. As Carlos Adyan and Alix Aspe reported live from Plaza México, with Jorge Bernal in Miami, the three-hour special featured musical performances

by Hispanic headliners Elvis Crespo and Gente de Zona. The open-air plaza was inspired by Mexican-style architecture and featured a replica of the Angel of Independence statue found in downtown Mexico City. The backdrop set the tone: bringing Latin flavor to a domestic audience while showcasing the city’s predominantly Hispanic demographic.

“The real goal is to speak to the Hispanic community, regardless of where you’re from,” said Velazquez. “It’s all about being strategic around creating an audience, and we can do that with these musical performances, leaning into the local community, doubling down on culture, and sprinkling in all the great stuff you’re about to see.”

From 5:00 to 6:00 p.m., the festivities shifted to the onsite sets at SoFi Stadium for the pregame show before kickoff at 6:30 p.m.

After the conclusion of the game, the network’s late-night sportsnews and entertainment show Zona Mixta was produced at 11:30 p.m. from the main set with SoFi Stadium as backdrop.

Overall, a heightened sense of corporate synergy is mutually beneficial for both parties. As an added bonus, this new push between Telemundo and NBC is allowing viewers to understand important messaging disseminated from the NFL. For instance, the league’s “Por La Cultura” initiative is highlighting Hispanic voices and leaders at the local and national levels. Internally, this idea of existing on the same platform will be seen at other marquee productions on the NBC Sports calendar, including the Indy 500 on Memorial Day weekend, tournaments on the PGA TOUR schedule, and weekly Premier League matches. This co-branded push will eventually pay off in November during Telemundo’s Spanish-language coverage of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.

With these likeminded goals between the two networks under the NBCUniversal umbrella, and the importance of increased Hispanic representation at high-profile sports events, Super Bowl LVI was a good place to start.

“It has become a very supportive environment,” noted Velazquez. “We all want each other to succeed. They want us to present the same level of quality that they present to their audience, so we want to be authentic and genuine in way that speaks to the experience of the Latino culture.” <

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY SUPER BOWL LVI — ROUNDUP

LEFT: From left: NEP Group’s Scott Nardelli, Michael Pean, Brian Weiland, and Glen Levine on the steps of NEP Super B. CENTER: The cast of NFL Live poses with Mickey and Minnie Mouse. (Credit: Richard Harbaugh/Disneyland Resort).

RIGHT: VWSE’s Nate McCoart (left) and Bob Becker were two of the 75-person production team.

ESPN Calls Disneyland Home for Week-Long Studio Programming Super Bowl LVI brought the entire sports world together, and while prime real estate at the spacious SoFi Stadium and Hollywood Park was available, ESPN chose to bring their week-long slate of NFL studio programming to the Most Magical Place on Earth — Disneyland in Anaheim, CA. Setting up shop at Disney California Adventure, the network took over a prime spot in front of the park’s Pixar Pier.

“We coordinated [this plan] for the last four months and our partners at Disney have been fantastic, but we have to be aware that there are thousands of people trying to enjoy the park,” said Mark Mignini, operations manager, ESPN. “Our set has been cornered in an area and we’ve navigated everything pretty easily and successfully.

As for their physical footprint in the amusement park, a 24 ft. by 30 ft. stage was located on the Paradise Bay viewing area with Pixar Pal-A-Round — the 150-foottall Ferris wheel located in Pixar Pier — and the waters of the World of Color nighttime spectacular as the background.

From a technical perspective, these shows were shot with a total of eight cameras. The camera complement included three hard cameras (with a fourth hard camera for Sunday’s show), a RF Steadicam, a stage jib, and a jib with virtual reality capabilities on a building in the Pacific Wharf section of the park. Game Creek Video’s Gracie mobile production unit housed the production team in Anaheim. – KH

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With 27 Trucks and More Onsite, NEP Group Supports Super Coverage NEP Group once again had a big presence at the biggest sports event in the U.S. “It’s probably one of the largest Super Bowls we’ve done,” said NEP U.S. Broadcast Services President Glen Levine. “We have nine mobile units consisting of 27 trailers here, and it has been a joint venture between the NEP companies.

We’ve been planning this for months, and it has been a team effort across the board on the NBC and the NFL Films side.”

Most notably, NBC Sports relied on ND1 and ND7 as the primary production hub for its Super Bowl game and pre/postgame coverage. The broadcaster deployed Supershooter 5, ST5, and Supershooter 18; Supershooter 3 will be involved with the production at the Lake Set. NFL Films, meanwhile, relied on Supershooter 9 and ST9 for the Super Bowl world feed, and Super B and Cable Truck 2 assisted with game coverage.

The main NBC compound was located inside the stadium, and, according to NEP Group Director, Sales, Michael Pean, almost 80 staff members were onsite supporting trucks and systems: 40 working with NBC, another 40 with other clients.

Other mobile units on hand included Black and Red at the Super Bowl Experience, Summit at NFL Honors, and Atlantic US at the Tailgate on Sunday.

NEP Group’s Fletcher was onsite with a variety of gear supporting NBC’s efforts. It provided seven

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Sony HDC-4800 cameras for high-frame-rate 4K zoom needs, two goal-line camera systems, two sideline systems, two systems over the end zone, a high-end-zone system, and a Sony P43 shooting at 4K from the Skycam. Also, there were six DreamChip POV cameras, three mounted on each goalpost shooting the backline and used for 4K zoom extraction replays; two DreamChip POV coach cameras; and two PeaPod 500 goalpost robotic cameras with virtualgraphics interface. Two HDC-Sony P31 1080p robotic cameras were located in the booth; five Sony HDC-P50 robos, in the hallway.

Five Sony PWS-4500 servers were also in use.

AVS (Aerial Video Systems) and BSI also had a big role. The former provided four RF cameras to NBC’s main-show efforts, seven to pre/ postgame coverage, four to the RocNation halftime show, four to NFL Network, three to Van Wagner for in-venue needs, and three to NFL Honors. BSI provided a mix of wireless gear at both SoFi and the Santa Monica set. A total of 96 handheld radios, 18 high-power IFBs, eight high-power PLs, and 22 1.4-GHz mics were used. – KK Van Wagner Designs Robust Hybrid Workflow for First In-Venue Show at SoFi Stadium After 54 straight years without a team playing in a home championship game, Super Bowl LVI in Los Angeles was the second consecutive season with exactly that. SoFi Stadium is the Rams’ house, but, with Van Wagner Sports & Entertainment (VWSE) managing

the in-person atmosphere, it served Cincinnati Bengals fans as well.

Displaying this particular event on SoFi’s videoboard brought a unique set of challenges.

“This is our Super Bowl crew’s first event in this building,” said Bob Becker, president, productions, VWSE Productions. “We’ll be rebuilding the entire show to make it our own, so fans that are used to attending games at SoFi Stadium will see a completely different videoboard show.”

Unlike any other LED display in professional or collegiate sports, the Infinity Screen by Samsung presented a challenge that disrupted the typical workflows of VWSE’s creative individuals.

Because of its size, rendering any large-scale takeover graphic takes a long time: for example, completing 50 seconds of video of that magnitude takes a full 12 hours.

Nearly a half day dedicated to rendering meant that any mistake, big or small, was amplified — resulting in deadlines being shifted and the possibility of rehearsals being reduced.

“Without a doubt, this venue has been the most challenging project we’ve been fortune enough to work on,” said Ryan Kehn, creative director, VWSE Productions. “From the dual-sided, 360-degree video screens to five levels of asymmetric ribbon boards to 4K resolution at 60 frames per second, this building has stretched every bit of our creative and technical capacity. Finding ways to make the most out of this LED real estate for unique visuals without burying ourselves in render times took a lot of foresight and planning.” – KH

NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS

NBC Olympics’ Dave Mazza on Producing Primetime in Stamford, the Challenges of 1080p HDR, and Navigating the Pandemic

By Jason Dachman

S

ince joining NBC prior to the 1996 Atlanta Games, NBC Olympics SVP/CTO Dave Mazza has seen it all over the course of 13 Olympic Games with the Peacock (17 in his career). But he was floored by the challenges his team faced in broadcasting the 2022 Beijing Winter Games, experiencing the Olympics in a whole new way.

Dave Mazza (right) and Errol Foremaster, VP, Engineering Operations, NEP, in Studio 3 in Stamford

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For one, this marked the first time in Mazza’s Olympics career that he wasn’t onsite in the host city overseeing the broadcaster’s gargantuan operation at the International Broadcast Center. Instead, he was at NBC’s Sports Production Operations Center (SPOC) in Stamford, CT — along with 1,500 other NBC staffers. In fact, because of China’s extensive COVID-mandated closed loop, the majority of NBC’s Beijing 2022 production was handled remotely in Stamford with a much-reduced crew of roughly 600 onsite in China.

SVG sat down with Mazza during the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics to examine the operations in both Stamford and Beijing and how they are different from those of every other Games he has been a part of.

He also discussed how his team managed the ultra-quick turnaround from the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics last summer, the introduction of 1080p HDR workflows into the Stamford plant, and much more. continued on page 76

For in-depth Beijing Olympics reports, check out SVG’s SportsTechLive Blog: Beijing 2022 on www.sportsvideo.org SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS NBC Olympics’ Chip Adams Reports on New Tech at Venues, Living Life in ‘Closed Loop’

E

very Olympic Games has its own set of new and unique challenges, but the onsite operation for the Beijing 2022 Winter Games faced the unprecedented hurdle of operating in a closed loop. Designed to prevent the spread of COVID, this bubble made NBC Olympics’ onsite operations even more complex than usual.

Despite these challenges, NBC Olympics deployed interesting new technologies and workflows at venues across Beijing: the Figure Skating/Short Track venue, Genting Snow Park, the National Alpine Center, and more.

SVG sat down with Chip Adams, VP, venue engineering, NBC Olympics, during the Games to discuss how venue operations have gone so far, how NBC is handling ops for some of the key venues in Beijing, returning to venues from the 2008 Summer Games, the biggest challenges he and his team are facing, and how NBC Olympics’ venue ops have evolved over the years.

SVG: How have things been going with respect to venue operations?

Chip Adams (CA): Our venue operations are proceeding along basically as expected. Of course, there are the differences in operating within the closed loop: the required mask-wearing, temperature checks, and testing that are part of the protocols outlined in the IOC Playbook.

Those are the biggest changes to our operation, along with operating in a very cold winter climate in the mountains.

SVG: Can you provide an overview of some the key venues, and how you are handling operations for these venues?

CA: At Figure Skating/Short Track, we had a challenge getting our flypack [provided by NEP Singapore] delivered and set up. It was a tight compound with a circuitous route to get to it. Our cabins are double-stacked, which adds a little extra effort getting the equipment up to those rooms. We did keep most of the heavy racks in the ground-level cabins.

The other challenge is transitioning from the Figure Skating configuration to the Short Track Speed Skating configuration. We need to remove the cameras along the side of the rink for Figure Skating daily to accommodate the Short Track schedule. We had both Figure Skating and Short Track on one day, and that was a busy, long day!

At Genting Snow Park, we had three finish areas for the nine different disciplines, with several sessions occurring on the same day. That made for a busy reconfiguration of the mobile unit [Game Creek Larkspur] to get it prepared for the different competition sessions.

We also installed extra camera equipment that helped with the quick turnarounds. We relied on OBS and the fiber infrastructure they installed at the venue to help with our RF-camera receive locations and cabled cameras at the venue.

For the National Alpine Center, our larger NBC flypack provided the facilities to cover three courses with two separate finish areas for the 13 events held there, utilizing both NBC and OBS cameras. The challenging schedule there had us re-patching daily to accommodate the OBS split-feed changes between the three courses. Here, we also relied on the OBS fiber infrastructure to help make the reconfiguration a little easier.

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SVG: Many of the venues used in 2008 are making a return appearance. Have they been updated at all? If so, how has that helped you and the NBC team?

CA: National Indoor Stadium, National Aquatics Center, Wukesong Sports Center, and Capital Indoor Stadium are the 2008 venues that have been repurposed for these Games. The most interesting change is at National Aquatics Center, where they have put four curling sheets on top of the pool that was there in 2008.

All the mountain venues are new facilities, along with the National Speed Skating Oval, which is in the Beijing Olympic Park area.

The National Stadium, “The Bird’s Nest,” is essentially unchanged from 2008, except for the new overlay to accommodate the Opening and Closing Ceremonies.

SVG: The mountain cluster is always unique when it comes to venue setup and operations. How have things been going up there?

CA: Things have gone well up in the mountains. The venues are wellprepared for the competition. The only minor inconvenience is related to where things are delivered at the venue — some of the loading zones are in the TV compound and some quite a distance away — but the OCOG has provided facilities to help move items into our compounds.

SVG: What have been some of the biggest challenges? What has gone better than expected?

CA: The struggle at the mountain venues is the weather. The temperature ranges from -30C to -5C, and, with a little wind, it’s cold! When it’s that cold, everything slows down and gets a little more challenging. From patching fiber to moving equipment to other positions, it just takes a lot more time and patience to get things ready.

SVG: How has your team performed under very challenging circumstances? How proud are you of all they have been able to accomplish despite the challenges?

CA: For the people that have gone through the gauntlet of tests to get here, the prevailing attitude is one of pride and focusing on the task at hand. Everybody is helping in different areas when needed. We have members of our team doing everything they can to chip in and bring the action to the millions of viewers at home in the U.S. It’s a great “Team” effort. – JD

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS continued from page 72 SVG: First, let’s go back to Tokyo. How did your team deal with the turnaround of just six months heading into the Beijing Games?

Dave Mazza (DM): Everything was constantly changing and moving right up through Opening Ceremony. Two days before Closing Ceremony in Tokyo was when we decided to move the Primetime control room home [to Stamford instead of Beijing]. We were two days away from starting to tear down, and we had to act quickly to divert a bunch of [equipment] that we needed for conversion to do HDR in Stamford. We pulled a bunch of stuff out of the racks that would’ve been headed for China and sent it instead to Stamford — monitors, scopes, and various things we needed for HDR that we didn’t have in Stamford yet. Everything else shipped to Beijing. Then, [VP, Engineering,] Tim Canary’s and [VP, Post Production and Digital Workflow,] Darryl Jefferson’s teams had to very quickly convert PCR-2 [in Stamford] and bunch of Edits and Ingest channels to be able to do the Primetime show in HDR. SVG: Speaking of HDR, can you detail what was required in Stamford to make that transition to 1080p HDR for the Beijing Games?

DM: Anytime we have made any kind of [engineering] refresh changes over the last three years in Stamford, we have been installing 3G and 1080p HDR-ready gear, as we knew we’d be switching over to HDR [in the future]. However, any changeover was further out on our roadmap. So it was still a big lift to get everything configured and tested in time for the Primetime show. Add to that, the SPOC team was still getting their new IP router to settle down.

During Tokyo, the big lift was at all the venues for [NBC Olympics VP, Venue Engineering,] Chip Adams and his team and all of the OBS team, who had to get going in 4K HDR and 1080p HDR for the first time ever at an Olympic scale. HDR in the Tokyo IBC was more straightforward, because the whole of the NBC IBC pretty much ran in HDR. We had two flavors [HDR and SDR] floating around in the new Grass Valley IP router, but most of the SDR was headed home to Stamford, which had almost all SDR for the cable shows. The only exception was the trucks we pulled up to the building for Golf and Beach Volleyball, which were doing HDR, but those feeds were contained in the truck. So Stamford didn’t have much HDR in the building.

When the shift home was made for Beijing, nearly all of the over 200 feeds coming into Stamford had to have an SDR and HDR copy because we have to make both copies available for the different rooms. PCR-2 is running in HDR with five or six EVS [servers] and about 10 out of 55 edits running in HDR, but all the other PCRs and Edit rooms are running SDR. And keep in mind, all those rooms are running in 50 Hz as well — with the exception of PCR-8, which is in 60 Hz because it’s handling Golf [Channel].

It was quite a challenge to get that all squared away in a plant that was also on the air with all of our regular sports programming.

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Dave Mazza (right) converses with Rebecca Chatman, VP and Coordinating Producer, Olympics, in Stamford.

PCR-2 was also upgraded to handle the 5.1.4 immersive-audio mix for [Dolby] Atmos and all 16 channels of audio in the venuegenerated 1080p HDR feeds to allow for that.

Another thing we were lucky with in Tokyo was we had to train only a small group on HDR. But, in Stamford, it was a much bigger group to train, and we had a lot less time to do it. Getting people to recognize the wrong source from the right source is not easy, especially when it’s a file [in which the only difference is] SDR vs.

HDR levels. If a mistake is made, chances are, you may not notice it until pretty far downstream, and then you have to backtrack and do the forensics to figure out where it happened and how to correct it for next time. That has been a learning experience for everybody here in the plant.

SVG: Would you say the shift to 1080 HDR has been the biggest change for the operation in Stamford compared with Tokyo?

And, if not, what would be the biggest?

DM: Well, certainly HDR was quite a challenge, but I’d have to say having the Primetime show here was the biggest. You can imagine it has much greater production needs than anything else we do, and it requires more [resources]. Most of the cable dayparts primarily use world-feed coverage, a mixed-zone camera or two, plus our announcers, but Primetime just has so many accoutrements. It was a big thing to get all of those pieces in place here for the Primetime show, especially when so many of them are coming from China and all the limitations of movement caused by the pandemic protocols. I should point out that we could not have taken on all this added complexity without the steady leadership of our Coordinating Director Mike Sheehan. He not only coordinated every bit of the production plan but also knows how to push us all to excel, without pushing us over the edge.

NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS SVG: You also have four mobile units pulled up to the dock here in Stamford. What role are they playing in NBC Olympics’ operations?

DM: That has been another big change. We have four full venue coverage trucks here at the dock. Even though we had five remote venue controls for Tokyo — for Golf, Beach Volleyball, Basketball, Indoor Volleyball, and Sky Sports — they were almost totally self-contained. But this time, at the dock, we have trucks doing the Opening and Closing Ceremonies, the Alpine [venue], half of the Extreme venue, Long Track Speed Skating, and Sliding. And one of our small Simply Live control rooms is doing Short Track.

All of those venues hit the Primetime show and utilize various studios and elements in SPOC, so they were much more complex this time. Inside SPOC, we also had a lot more facilities and moving pieces. In all, for [Beijing 2022], we have nine control rooms [four trucks and five PCRs], plus another three control rooms for Golf [Channel] operating here.

SVG: With nearly all your on-air talent at home in Stamford this year, how has the Off-Tube Factory remote commentary operation expanded?

DM: Thankfully, there’s only about half as many sports in a Winter Games as in a Summer, so we’re good on the booth count, but there are a few changes there. First, all the booths now have a 1080p HDR path in addition to the 1080i SDR path. In addition to that, we had to modify the booths to handle some of the Friends & Family feeds spy cams, and a new mix minus router that [NBC Sports Group Director, Broadcast Communications] John Pastore and his team commissioned between Games.

SVG: How did the late decision not to send commentators to Beijing impact the operation in Stamford?

DM: That was a big challenge because the decision was made to move the A-venue announcers to Stamford weeks out from the Games. That [comprised] our announcers for Figure Skating, Alpine, Extreme, and Short Track [Speed Skating]; our Hockey announcers had already been pulled back home. Many of them are now in announce booths, and that is pretty straightforward and similar to what we’ve done in the past. But others are calling events from various studios [in Stamford] back to the venues in China.

The Figure Skating announcers, for example, are here in Studio 2. Johnny [Weir], Tara [Lipinski], and Terry Gannon are sitting in our studio calling the Figure Skating. They can go on camera, but everything they do — including their on-cameras and their voices — goes back to China to get put into the [Figure Skating] truck at the venue. We were expecting [our announcers] to be in Beijing, and, when the last-minute change was made, we didn’t have the [capacity] to light up another control room to mix them here in Stamford.

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After debuting in Stamford last year for the Tokyo Games, NBC brought back the digital network operations center.

Essentially, when they’re calling the Figure Skating, pictures and sound go under the Pacific three different times: the truck output comes here from Beijing; their [provided commentary] and their voices go back to Beijing on MADI, where they get mixed into the show by the [A1 in the Figure Skating truck]; and finally, the program output comes back here, and that’s what goes on-air. It’s three trips under the Pacific, which is a little over 20,000 miles, and we’ve got it down to only ¾ of a second for three of the trips.

SVG: Where does this rank among the hardest Games you’ve been a part of?

DM: I like to say that we thought Tokyo was the hardest Games we had ever done, but this is at least three times, if not five times, more complex and challenging. That is mostly due to the COVID protocols [in China].

There was a big ripple effect from the COVID protocols.

That caused those venue trucks to be in Stamford. It caused the Primetime control to come to Stamford, which then caused the HDR to come to Stamford. We also had the changing nature of this whole [pandemic] when Omicron started to hit and everything was changing on a daily basis.

But everybody has handled it incredibly and been able to adjust on the fly. Rather than complaining, everybody just found new ways to get the job done. The level of professionalism and great attitudes under extreme conditions — especially for the staff in China — was, and still is, extraordinary.

The teamwork between the two plants, all the venues, and the Super Bowl compound has been amazing. We had to split up all of our talented experts across those locations. Even with thousands of miles between them, it has been a huge coordinated team effort.

All of us at NBC are incredibly grateful to everyone who worked so hard to successfully bring both the Olympics and the Super Bowl coverage to our viewers. < This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS

NBC Olympics’ Tim Canary Offers Inside Look at Massive At-Home Operation in Stamford

By Jason Dachman

A

lthough NBC Olympics has been relying heavily on its production facility in Stamford, CT, for several Games over the past decade, the at-home operation was bigger than ever for this year’s Beijing Winter Games. Not only was nearly all commentary done from the Off-Tube Factory in Stamford, but the bulk of primetime and other marquee programming used control rooms at home rather than at the International Broadcast Centre (IBC) in Beijing.

And, on top of that, the NBC Olympics operation in Stamford incorporated 1080p HDR systems and workflows on a large scale for the first time and faced new transmission challenges in producing the primetime shows from three locations: Beijing, Stamford, and Los Angeles.

SVG sat down with Tim Canary, VP, engineering, NBC Olympics, during the Games to discuss workflows and infrastructure in Stamford, how the short turnaround from the Tokyo Summer Games affected preparations for Beijing, an update on the Off-Tube Factory, additional resources that had to be brought into Stamford to handle the additional programming, how the 1080p HDR workflow is going, and more.

SVG: First, how are things going at the Stamford facility, and can you give a quick overview of the operation there? How it has been scaled up in terms of personnel and operations compared with previous Games?

Tim Canary (TC): The team here is doing very well but certainly is very busy handling the demands of nine control rooms and 24/7 production across multiple channels and platforms. In addition to five control rooms in the building, we have four production trucks at our loading dock. All control rooms are running in 50 Hz, with three trucks and two facility-control rooms running at 1080p/50 HDR. Operationally, we have more than 1,500 people in Stamford supporting the 2022 Winter Games, our largest for any Winter Olympics to date. Included in the additional staffing were several of our major vendors, who came to Stamford to provide additional support. Along with the above, we continued to support golf production and other properties in 1080i/60.

SVG: How has the at-home effort affected operations at the IBC in Beijing? Historically, the IBC control room has served as the core hub. Has this changed for Beijing?

TC: During the second week of the Tokyo Games, we started to prepare for potential scenarios to have the NBC Network primetime-control room in Stamford, which reduced the operation in-country. In addition, several venue control rooms (Alpine, Sliding,

For in-depth Beijing Olympics reports, check out SVG’s SportsTechLive Blog: Beijing 2022 on www.sportsvideo.org 80

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS NBC’s Darryl Jefferson on the Epic Efforts

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he first time Darryl Jefferson, VP, broadcast operations and technology, NBC Olympics, worked an Olympics in Beijing, it was for the 2008 Summer Games. At the time, the biggest challenge was adjusting to a massive influx of HD material. This year’s Games, however, provided a whole new range of challenges. During the Games, Jefferson shared his thoughts on the efforts, the workflows, and more.

SVG: Can you give some quick bullet points on the ecosystem at the IBC and how it has adjusted given all the work being done from home?

Darryl Jefferson (DJ): We moved five major venues back wholesale to Stamford, CT, shifting to backhauling feeds back to Stamford, moving talent back to Stamford, and all production around our Primetime presentation back to Stamford. It drastically changed our footprint in country; what used to be 1,600 people in country and 600 at home, directly reversed for this at home effort. It shifted the nerve center of the Olympic efforts back to Stamford.

SVG: You introduced some new file-based workflows at the last games, then HDR and enhanced audio as well. Have those workflows been adjusted at all since Tokyo?

DJ: In Tokyo, the likely contributors to our Primetime show (“A” Venues, for example) were largely in country, with almost every tier of other sports moving back to Stamford. This created a natural division between logically grouping all HDR content in country, and keeping SDR country in Stamford. This Games, many, many more feeds either had to start or deliver into a format that was different than what the project began with, based on which deliverable was assigned.

SVG: Over the years, you have made it clear that there are benefits to having editors onsite. Were editors in Beijing?

DJ: We did have a handful of edits onsite, and a few at neither site as they were editing from home. Some of what is missed is the presence of an understanding of the texture of the host city, first-hand experiences with the inhabitants of each port of call, man-on-the-street explorations of the city’s attractions, and of course, face-to-face athlete interviews

SVG: OBS delivered more content than ever to you and your teams for a Winter Games. Have you adjusted workflows to handle the additional content?

DJ: We have been able to make use of more of the Content + and Multi-Clip Feeds (MCF), and the Multi Distribution Service (MDS) for digital. Because of fewer aggregate sports than a comparable Summer Games, we were able to handle the greater payload.

SVG: In Tokyo you were doing some work with EEG on automated captioning. Was that back for Beijing and how has it gone?

DJ: In addition to the Human Captioning we do with VITAC for linear, we again deployed EEG to execute AI Speech-totext captioning for our digital only services, including Peacock delivery. AI does pretty well, though sometimes requires phonetic pronunciation on proper names.

SVG: Any other new technologies that you would like to discuss?

DJ: We doubled down on our “Friends & Family” efforts that deployed cameras to Olympians family and friends for watch parties, live reactions, and a glimpse into the support systems that help propel these athletes into rarified air.

SVG: How has your team performed under very challenging circumstances?

DJ: The biggest challenge, hands down was the parallel production of the Super Bowl, largely executed by the same individuals that would have executed just the Olympics. The concept of planning and executing the two largest events in parallel was extremely difficult. In a close second was needing to divide the team into thirds to cover in country needs, at home needs, and needs of Super Bowl and other events. It has been a whirlwind, and we are still in Q1. I couldn’t be more proud of the teams that have planned two Olympics and a Superbowl in a single calendar year in the pandemic era. We throw around “best in the business” but the dedication and sacrifice to pull these past months off is nothing short of epic. – KK

Snowboard, and Speedskating, [plus] Opening Ceremony) were also brought back to Stamford. This was a major lift for the technical team in a very short period of time.

the changes for Beijing, which also included preparing for some items (like EVS servers, Avid edit kits, Sony HDR monitors) to be based in Stamford.

SVG: How did the accelerated timeline between Games affect your team’s operations and Stamford engineering plans? When Tokyo wrapped up, did you immediately start preparing for Beijing, and what did those preparations entail?

SVG: With nearly all on-air talent at-home, how has the OffTube Factory operation been expanded or enhanced?

TC: We prepared several potential plans that impacted many areas, including purchasing of long-lead hardware, adding extra facilities to the building (like edit rooms, screening areas, set changes) and a fast-track technical build to modify the planned primetime-control room from 1080i to 1080p HDR. In reality, the Tokyo Games had not finished, and we were already into planning 82

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TC: The Off-Tube Factory was greatly enhanced to provide simultaneous 1080i and 1080p HDR copies of every off-tube event to production. We also added telestration and multiple combination booths of onsite and offsite announcers into a seamless workflow. And we had some instances where commentary had to originate remotely. This provided many challenges intermixing our Lawo in-house commentary system with TieLine Via remote kits.

NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS

SVG: Have you had to expand the Stamford facility to accommodate all the additional operations taking place there?

TC: Yes. [For example], we added production trucks, office trailers, additional Avid edit rooms, additional ingest channels; expanded ingest-automation systems; expanded our Grass Valley/ Cisco 2110 routing system and Evertz control systems, file storage; expanded and modified our EVS network to allow 1080i/60, 1080i/50, and 1080p/50 storage pools; completed the transition of 140 more GV XIP frame syncs for a total of 280 channels. We also expanded our IPTV system; modified our transmission plans with AT&T and over 300 transmission paths between Stamford and China using 100 G of transmission bandwidth; updated SMT hardware in New York; added hundreds of paths of fiber transport at the truck dock; expanded our intercom systems; added Omega timing systems, Dartfish, and Ross AR systems; and expanded our friends-and-family–control room to add I/O, 16 channels of EVS, and additional standards conversion.

In addition to the Olympics, the team was prepping for the Super Bowl transmission, remote edit, communications, and other system needs, working with our remote-operations team.

SVG: Given the tight turnaround and increased risk, are there any new tools/technologies/workflows in Stamford that have been deployed for Beijing, or are you more focused on building on Tokyo workflows?

TC: New to Stamford was the 1080p HDR production needs across some control rooms. We did build on lessons learned during the 84

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Tokyo build but had not anticipated the speed with which we’d need to shift here in Stamford, which took a huge commitment across our teams. Expanding our GV 2110 routing system with its format-independent capability was a critical-path technology that enabled many of our workflows.

SVG: What would you say is the biggest difference between your Stamford operation for the Beijing Games and PyeongChang and/or Tokyo?

TC: Incorporating 1080p systems and workflows was definitely the biggest change, as was the sheer volume of production being done in Stamford with our primetime shows. We also had new transmission challenges and opportunities: producing the primetime shows from three different locations: Beijing, Stamford, and LA. SVG: How proud are you of your team for pulling off such a challenging Games in such a short time?

TC: The team here continues to amaze me with its ability to adapt and show resiliency no matter the challenge. I’m extremely proud of our dedication as well as the opportunity to see the growth across the team with the new technologies. We’re proud of our ability to televise back-to-back Olympics in a six-month span, to tell the stories of the athletes, and to be part of the team that brings the Olympics and the excitement of the Games to the U.S. audience. There is a tremendous sense of pride and teamwork between the groups in Beijing and Stamford as well as throughout multiple locations within NBCUniversal and Comcast across the country. <

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS

NBC Olympics’ Karl Malone on How Audio for the Winter Games Came Together

By Dan Daley

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s the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing moved towards its completion, the most significant accomplishment may be that the Games happened at all, taking place in an environment that required the artificial creation of one of its most basic elements — snow — and during the worst global medical disaster in a century. Meanwhile, its audio ironically benefited from some of the disruption around COVID: the largely diminished numbers of spectators and their concomitant noise, and the decision not to apply artificial crowd sound (a technical feat raised to an art form for sports during the pandemic) meant that viewers could hear the sound of winter sports like they never had before.

“You would think that each Olympic Games should get a little easier,” observed Karl Malone, director, sound design, NBC Sports and NBC Olympics. “In fact, everything was more difficult for the Beijing 2022 Winter Games, not least the fact that it came just six months after the closing of the Tokyo Summer Games. But, as difficult as Tokyo 2020 was, mid pandemic, it was probably the most successful Games from an audio perspective. Even though the Olympic Playbook Rules banned international and local fans from attending, there were enough country team members at certain venues to give a nice opportunity for some crowd reactions.

“More important,” he continued, “we were able to get down into the details of the specific sports sound, which is something we have never had the opportunity to do with an Olympics and with so many sports at one time. [Not using] augmented crowd sound gives us the ability to get closer to the sounds of the Games and the physical endurance and experience of the athletes.”

The logistics of the Winter Olympics were challenging for broadcasters. Not only did the Games take place on the heels of the Summer Games in Tokyo, but the pandemicinduced global supply-chain constrictions added a new layer.

“Having to ship everything directly from Tokyo to Beijing meant we wouldn’t get our hands on all of our technical infrastructure until it was released from Chinese customs and into our Beijing warehouse,” said Malone. “This eventually happened in November, and it was then that we started to rebuild our systems and reconnect them to [NBC Sports headquarters in Stamford, CT] for testing. We decided that we would push on our remote workflows, which we have used in some form or another since Torino 2006 and leaned hard on for PyeongChang 2018, with Calrec RP1s, Tieline VIAs, and Medialinks MADI-over-fiber to the U.S. The challenges in the logistics of just getting into China four

For in-depth Beijing Olympics reports, check out SVG’s SportsTechLive Blog: Beijing 2022 on www.sportsvideo.org 86

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS months ago, alongside the protocols we would be affected by once on the ground, meant we knew we need to rely, in full confidence, on our tried-and-tested remote technologies.”

NBC’s production team relied on its experience with REMI-type production techniques and best practices to make a long-distance production feel and sound seamless.

“We decided to keep three studios in the Beijing International Broadcast Centre and to run all three remotely, with full production coming from our Stamford Production Operations Center,” Malone explained. “We were producing our nightly NBC Network primetime show out of Stamford with a studio in Beijing, one in Stamford, and one in Los Angeles’s SoFi Stadium during the week of the Super Bowl. Bringing the primetime show home to Stamford maxed the facility to a technical capacity of eight studios and productioncontrol rooms alongside four remote trucks on the loading dock producing two Beijing Hockey venues and the Extreme Park Freestyle events, as well as the Opening and Closing Ceremonies. That meant there were no physical audio consoles in Beijing looking after those four venues or the three studios in the Beijing IBC. Everything was controlled from Stamford’s Calrec Artemis consoles using the RP1s in Beijing to build local mix-minuses and route the microphones to embedded vision/camera paths, as well as MADI paths back to the U.S. where we cut the shows live to air.”

Immersive audio was a major focus for this Beijing 2022, and NBC Olympics built on its most recent experience in Tokyo for that, as well as deploying a range of specific equipment and products and dedicating a team to it. NBC Olympics Senior A1/ Audio Design Engineer Mike DiCrescenzo and submix A1 Fred Hedemark were responsible for the nightly live network primetime audio mix and for integrating the height microphones and mixes from each venue into the immersive broadcast.

“NBC produced the primetime network show from Stamford in 1080p HDR with Dolby Atmos immersive sound on its 4K distribution service to the U.S.,” said Malone. “Every truck/flypack facility we had at a Beijing venue, as well as the four trucks in the Stamford loading dock, delivered 16 channels of audio made up of a full-mixed NBC 5.1 program mix with NBC announcers, but also 12 more audio channels made of individual isolated microphones and including up to eight channels of height microphones, which were mixed live into the four overhead channels.

“Having a single location and mix team for producing the broadcast,” he continued, “guarantees us a consistent approach and philosophy on how we want the sports mixes to sound to the primetime audience. The primetime-audio–control room was rebuilt over the holiday break with JBL 708 speakers in a 5.1.4 overhead configuration, along with immersive metering upgrades to our RTW 88

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NBC Olympics’ Mike DiCrescenzo mixing the primetime show in immersive 5.1.4 sound. meters. We made great use at all venues — including our lakeside Super Bowl set — of the new Audio-Technica BP3600, which is an immersive eight-capsule microphone in an 8.0 configuration. Four capsules are for the 4.0 height ambience, and four are for the ‘eyelevel’ ambience part of the 5.1. Again, the consistency of using the same microphones across the Beijing and the U.S. venues helps in our control of the creative aspects of the production.”

The minimal crowds in and around many of the Beijing venues helped isolate and capture many of the critical sounds of the sports. “‘Underwater’ or ‘under-ice’ contact microphones from AudioTechnica help us with the control of the Figure Skating events, beautifully mixed by NBC A1 Ryan O’Gorman,” said Malone. “The nature of contact microphones means that we can get the sound of the skates without any PA slap from the 95-dB venue sound level of the skaters’ music tracks playing directly onto the ice. Delaying the over-ice crowd mics [above the rink] in time with a direct feed of the PA and with ‘clean’ ice mics allows us near total control of the quality of the audio from the venue.”

(Malone emphasizes the “near” total control: “Unfortunately, we cannot control the PA levels that the athlete requests for their music.”)

Looking back on the months-long process of getting the complex array of events into a broadcast package on the other side of the globe, Malone was weary but proud of a remarkable team effort.

“I believe this to be the most challenging Games that many of us have worked on,” he said. “But we feel very fortunate to have the opportunity to be capturing the sound of these games and to be telling the stories of the athletes who have sacrificed so much to be at the pinnacle of their sports. If it wasn’t for the passion of our NBC Olympics leadership, in terms of technology as well as production, I don’t think we would be looking forward to the next Games.” <

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS

Prior to Paralympic Games, NBC Olympics’ Todd Donovan Reflects on Beijing Operations

By Ken Kerschbaumer

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BC Sports aired more than 230 hours of 2022 Paralympic Games coverage, including a first: three hours on NBC Primetime. Todd Donovan, VP, engineering technology, NBC Olympics, has been in Beijing overseeing the technology side of the IBC operations. SVG sat down with Donovan ahead of the Paralympics to discuss the efforts in Beijing.

SVG: How has the massive at-home effort impacted operations at the IBC? Has it changed the role a bit, given that, historically, the IBC control room has served as the core hub?

Todd Donovan (TD): BOC has traditionally been the switching point for every feed between the venues and the U.S. domestic operations, very much a hub model. Every signal has been available as video and could be touched by BOC and used in the production-control rooms and edit facilities. We’ve had some unique situations in the past where a venue [feed] would pass through the IBC only as an encoded transport stream. That shift accelerated to become the primary design for the revised Beijing 2022 design. Instead of being the primary junction, the IBC BOC became a local stop as the overwhelming majority of feeds expressed as encoded transport streams directly from the venues to their venue-control rooms at SPOC. The IBC can decode individual feeds if needed to assist with troubleshooting or monitoring.

SVG: How did the accelerated timeline between Games impact your team’s operations and IBC plans?

TD: Since the delay of Tokyo 2020, we definitely understood we had less than six months between the closing of Tokyo and the opening of Beijing. Most of our groups started in China later than originally scheduled as it took time to navigate the official “playbook” rules on how to operate in Beijing in a pandemic.

NBC’s IBC team for Tokyo 2020 had a quick turnaround to Beijing. Kevin Callahan (left), Lukas Zahas (center), and Todd Donovan inside the NBC Olympics production-control room in Beijing.

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The Beijing playbook rules were more restrictive than those in Tokyo. Most notable were the introduction of a complete and pervasive “closed-loop management,” or bubble, that ran from January through March and a 21-day adaptive quarantine with no co-mingling between travel cohorts before the bubble started. NBC’s first travelers to set up infrastructure arrived in mid October, with our implementation team joining in early November and our first engineers arriving in December for initial testing. The balance of the team arrived throughout January for all areas. Throughout the fall, we were revising and shifting workflows home and re-examining staffing. Our equipment was shipped from Tokyo to meet those travelers’ arrivals.

SVG: What have been the biggest challenges, and has anything surprised you?

TD: Between the Omicron surge around the world during our biggest travel waves and the particularly sensitive COVID PCR tests employed by the Chinese officials, getting travelers to their assignments in Beijing was much tougher than anyone expected. One of the biggest challenges is, nearly every department and every skill is missing a significant number of people, and that is where we found the depth in our team calling on previous experiences, battlefield promotions, on-the-job training, creative multitasking, and just everyone pitching in. It took the typical “get-it-done” culture of the Olympics to a whole new level. I think we’ve collectively done our jobs so well that the audience has no idea the hoops we’ve been doing behind scenes.

SVG: How has your team been performing under difficult circumstances?

TD: NBC Olympics has an amazing team, and they’ve truly risen to the occasion in so many ways. It’s difficult to state how difficult these circumstances have been. Every Olympics is unique to the circumstances in the host country, and that’s even more true here at Beijing 2022. I am so proud of this world-class team across NBC Olympics and Sports. < This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS — OBS

OBS CTO Sotiris Salmouris Discusses 5G, Virtualized OB Vans, and Other Innovations

By Ken Kerschbaumer

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he 2022 Beijing Olympic and Paralympic Games were undoubtedly some of the most difficult efforts undertaken by the team at Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS) and rightsholders around the globe, all of whom had to juggle COVID protocols, production workflows, technical innovation, and more.

Sotiris Salamouris, CTO of OBS, and his team oversaw a number of new innovations at this year’s Games, which he discussed with SVG. SVG: I wanted to roll through some of the technologies and get your thoughts on how things went. Let’s start with 5G that was used at the alpine events. How did that work out?

Sotiris Salamouris (SS): It went really well. We were more aggressive with using 5G than we were in Tokyo where it was essentially a couple of cameras that supported the opening ceremony operations.

But in Beijing we deployed close to 30 cameras on 5G, some of them fully live and some of them that I would call near live ENG. For the alpine events it proved helpful for areas that were difficult to reach and we used it in two or three handheld camera locations along the course in parallel to our “legacy” RF systems that work in COFDM. We had bit rates of around 40+ Mbps doing 5G which is higher than the typical COFDM system, which is usually around 30 Mbps. So, we were able to get an increase in terms of overall quality.

Another good use case was at the opening ceremony where there are always some unknown factors and last minute surprises from the creative team. There were some changes in the fireworks that we found out a couple of weeks before the show and [we needed to change a camera position]. But with the closed-loop management system for the Games we could not really engineer any of our more standard solutions, that is to try to get fiber connectivity or establish a dedicated RF link, so we decided to use 5G [to get the signals from the camera] and it worked great. So, we learned that 5G can be deployed at the last minute with excellent quality, very high bit rates, and can be easily integrated with our workflow.

That is really how the technology works very nicely: as a last-minute transmission over an essentially public network that you can integrate into your production.

SVG: You mentioned working in the closed loop which was designed to minimize the risk of COVID cases. How did that impact your ability to problem solve for production changes that might occur?

SS: It was complex and it did require a lot of detailed planning by the organizers which they did very thoroughly. I have to give accolades to the whole Organizing Committee

For in-depth Beijing Olympics reports, check out SVG’s SportsTechLive Blog: Beijing 2022 on www.sportsvideo.org 92

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NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS — OBS and the Chinese authorities for managing this process. They didn’t want to have any kind of COVID spread from the people who come from abroad to the population and thus the typical back-of-house locations that we need to have access to were part of the loop. However, within that area we could move very quickly and there were no issues as the bubble included the venues, transfer between venues, and accommodations.

But before that closed loop was established, by the end of January, it is where we were mostly affected because a lot of our installation happens before that. In response, however, the committee set up many “mini bubbles” in various locations during that period, corresponding to the specific areas of our interest, and we had all the support to do things properly and do our work.

Inside the IBC at the 2022 Beijing Olympics

SVG: Shifting back to technology, what were some highlights?

SS: At Tokyo we introduced so many new things like the move to UHD, IP, etc., that it almost looks like in Beijing we didn’t do anything new. But this is not really the case as we implemented UHD and HDR plus of course the IP transition to the Winter Games and that is a very different environment as to how it is set up. And proving that those things can work in both environments was innovation number one as for the first we had a full 4K HDR backbone at a Winter Games.

And then there was 5G, which we discussed and the virtual OB van which was a pet project of our whole Engineering team that started like all nice projects in a bar where I had a very relaxed discussion with Iddo Kadim, Intel’s director of Olympic Technology.

We were discussing where broadcast technology was going and things that we could do together in the context of the Olympics.

We all know about the transition to IP and the flexibility it gave to us because a lot of our systems essentially turn to become pure software. And that means you have a lot of advantages like how you are building those systems, and, in our case, the number one challenge is how we can build a complex infrastructure within such a limited amount of time that we always have before every new edition of the Olympic Games.

So, moving to IP give us the ability to move to software but what would be the next stage? And for us that could be a full live broadcast workflow for sports that is all software and running on Commercial-Off-The-Shelf hardware. It is very logical to see this as the next step and even the traditional broadcast equipment providers have started realizing this. They understand that the days of the “bespoke broadcast hardware technologies” may near their end, but this does not mean that it is the end of their contribution to our workflows. They will always deliver the software and actual running applications that we need to do that but maybe we don’t need the traditional bespoke hardware and they could use more standard IT, or better termed: ICT hardware and services.

So, we decided to build a project to see how this would work in the context of an Olympics. It involved Intel as well as key broadcast providers of systems, out of those that you would expect 94

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to find inside an OB van or flypack. So, we took those hardware components and made them software that sat on standardized server and network hardware, in an architecture exactly as you would find in any ICT data center, including of course those that are supporting all the public clouds out there.

SVG: What do you think will be the legacy of the Beijing Games?

SS: The legacy of this particular Games was that under pressure we can do miracles and I will give you a small example of the challenges we faced. We know now that in the eyes of the audiences it was an excellent product in terms of visual quality and storytelling and that was a joint super intense effort from OBS and the individual broadcasters. However, we not only had to solve a lot of problems that were negative side-effects from the pandemic and then, of course, the challenge of having two Olympic Games just few months apart. But as though this was not enough, we had also to deal with the explosion in COVID cases [ahead of the Games] which was a nasty surprise.

We always have a detailed plan for when our Games Time experienced staff would arrive and start working before the Olympics, but because of the positive cases we ended up with almost 15 percent of our personnel not reaching their arrival dates. A big number could not fly so they had to wait until the infection was over and thankfully, we didn’t have any serious cases. And then there was another two or three percent that tested positive in Beijing and had to isolate for several days.

We really lost a big number of workdays by our very important and highly skilled technical personnel before the games. But we still managed to pull through and that was the result of lot of pre-existing and quite sophisticated contingency planning. However, and as it turned out, more important that anything has been the spirit, dedication and experience of all our hands that joined the operations, either on time or delayed due to COVID, which did virtually everything under the sun to guarantee that our project would be a full success. We are greatly indebted to all these marvelous broadcast professionals. < This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

NBC SPORTS’ BIG FEBRUARY BEIJING OLYMPICS — ROUNDUP

TOP LEFT: BBC Sport took viewers to the slopes with a virtual cabin on a mountainside in China.

TOP RIGHT: CBC production personnel delivered a successful Games despite tight timelines between the Tokyo and Beijing Games, the challenge of physically getting to Beijing (especially delivery, transport, and access), strict COVID protocols on entering China, and the closed-loop conditions onsite.

BBC BBC Sport unveiled a new virtual reality (VR) studio for its coverage of the Beijing Winter Olympics that took viewers from a mountainside log cabin to a virtual ski resort, and beyond.

Rightsholding broadcasters at this year’s Games were restricted from being able to roam the local area with camera crews, preventing them from giving people at home a feel of the country. However, the VR studio took viewers to the edge of a mountain range and the excitement of a Winter Olympics in all its snowy glory.

Commented Jonny Bramley, executive producer for major events at BBC Sport: “We did consider whether we’d be looking at some live shots from some of the venues here in Beijing, but you actually come up with a more impressive environment if you kind of let your imagination run away and come up with something that might be your ideal log cabin in a snowy mountain environment.

“We’re pretty happy with the way the studio looks. And again, it’s clearly virtual and we’re not trying to pretend it’s actually real, but it does look pretty impressive, so we can have a bit of fun with that.”

CBC / RADIO CANADA As one of the world’s winter-

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sports centers, Canada is always amped up for the Winter Olympics. And, despite some unique circumstances and unprecedented challenges in Beijing, CBC/Radio Canada once again pulled out all the stops to bring the 2022 Winter Games home to fans.

By the end of the Games, CBC/Radio Canada — along with sublicensees/broadcast partners TSN and Sportsnet — delivered more than 1,200 hours of broadcast coverage, with an additional 2,500 hours of live sports on CBC Gem, cbc.ca/ beijing2022, and the CBC Sports app.

Francois Messier, directeur général, productions and sports, and chef de mission, Tokyo 2020 and Beijing 2022, CBC/ Radio Canada, was among the scaled-down crew in Beijing for the Games. He said the onsite footprint at the IBC and personnel in Beijing have been reduced by roughly 20% from the postponed Tokyo Games and 60% compared with PyeongChang 2018. As usual, the Canadian broadcasters are relying heavily on feeds provided

by OBS but have also added some of their own cameras in events with top Canadian athletes.

“Our approach,” said Messier, “is to base our main coverage on OBS signals, and we are adding

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

some [unilateral cameras] for important sports where we want to have iso shots of our Canadian athletes. We also have a strong presence in the mixed zones to gather athletes’ reactions and interviews after their performances.”

In Beijing, CBC had a presence at both IBC locations — in the city and at the mountain cluster — along with two green-screen interview setups and a handful of interview setups in the Olympic Village with Canada’s National Olympic Committee.

Although the majority of the event commentary was being done remotely from Canada, CBC did have news crews for both the English and French services onsite in Beijing.

However, the ENG crews’ activity is more limited than usual in order to stay within the COVID-mandated closed loop.

Signals were sent from Beijing to control rooms in Toronto for CBC and in Montreal for Radio Canada. The primary studios were also in Toronto and Montreal, where the broadcasters had their respective teams producing for their own channels, as well as providing content to sublicensees Sportsnet and TSN/RDS. For transmission, the Canadians secured a redundant

circuit from Beijing to Tokyo and two 10-Gbps pipes: one going through Los Angeles and Washington to Toronto, the other through Seattle to Montreal. CBC/Radio Canada also has two 10-Gbps circuits between Toronto and Montreal.

DISCOVERY Discovery brought 50 countries and territories live coverage of the Beijing Winter Olympics using an enhanced Cube mixed reality studio and numerous workflow innovations that go over and above its technical achievements at Tokyo 2020.

The broadcaster delivered 1,200 hours of live content for its linear and digital platforms, including discovery+, Eurosport, and the Eurosport app, over the course of the Games, using a completely decentralized remote production model that has hubs all around Europe.

Although the Winter Games, with a maximum of 15 concurrent events happening as opposed to the Summer Games’ 39 simultaneous events, is significantly smaller than last year’s blockbuster, it was no simpler for Discovery to manage technically.

Simon Farnsworth, Former SVP of technology and operations at Discovery, explained: “I guess in theory [the Winter Games] should

TOP LEFT: CBC’s primary studio was in Toronto, while Radio Canada’s was in Montreal.

TOP RIGHT: Discovery took Winter Olympics fans to its new virtual world in the augmented version of The Cube.

RIGHT: ZDF used its centralized production facility in Mainz, Germany, to manage its entire production of the Winter Olympic Games. be simpler, but the way that the Olympics works is that technically at the back end it’s a bit more complex [in China] because in Tokyo, we had one IBC, [whereas] in Beijing, we’ve got two. We’ve got the mountains IBC and we’ll have the Beijing IBC, which really covers what I would call the ice events, so your figure skating.

Coordinating all the circuits across all the two different sites makes it more complex by nature.

“But what we did — which I think was smart — is we are using exactly the same technical IP set up that we used in Tokyo for Beijing,” he goes on. “The same equipment got shipped, because we just simply couldn’t pull all the equipment back to Europe and then send it all again and have everything ready in time; just the sea freight times alone wouldn’t allow us to do that. So in terms of the set up time, it’s much, much quicker in Beijing, because we had it all configured ready for Tokyo.

We’re just essentially a bit more plug and play.”

“Beijing will be the first time that we’ll have everybody on that central editing platform, which is huge for us in terms of searchability of content and distribution of content” Farnsworth added: “The Olympic Games by its very nature is extremely complicated as you have a large number of simultaneous sports going on

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at any one time. For Beijing, the biggest day will have 15 simultaneous events and when you’re broadcasting that across 19 different languages in 50 markets across Europe with 150 control rooms from Norway down to Madrid through those countries, you get complex pretty quick. So, there is an enormous amount of complexity across our network.”

ZDF ZDF delivered coverage of the Beijing Winter Olympics to fans across Germany. It broadcast on nine of the 17 broadcast days for the Games, with Das Erste — fellow German broadcaster ARD’s flagship national television channel — taking the remaining eight days.

As it did for the Summer Games, ZDF used its centralized production facility, the National Broadcast Centre (NBC) based at its headquarters in Mainz, Germany, to manage its entire production of the Winter Olympic Games.

The NBC was originally created by ZDF with ARD in order to cover the 2020 Euros as well as the Summer Olympics, with the build completing in March 2020.

Gunnar Darge, ZDF co-head of engineering, said: “With this production, we have the same workflow as with the Summer Games, except that our studio is now in Mainz in the NBC.”

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

ZDF produced blanket coverage of the Winter Games event, taking the host feeds from Olympic Broadcast Services (OBS) as well as several of its own in China. The opening ceremony will be broadcast by ZDF and the closing ceremony

by Das Erste.

Noted Darge: “We will produce extensively for this Olympic Games. For biathlon and ski jumping and alpine skiing we have our own additional cameras for moderation. We will live broadcast daily on ARD and ZDF, alternating [between the networks] between 2:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m.”

The NBC received all feeds from the broadcaster’s operations at the Beijing IBC. In Beijing ZDF had a small IBC in Zhangjiakou with switch case and five off-tubes. For the biathlon it had four cameras connected remotely via Nimbra Technik from ZDF’s NBC in Mainz, for ski jumping there was one LiveU camera, for alpine ski there was also one LiveU camera, and there was

a presenter platform on OBS Tower with two cameras again connected via Nimbra.

Added Darge: “We have our own cameras for biathlon, ski jumping and alpine skiing for moderation and interviews in the Mix Zones.”

Meanwhile the NBC was equipped with its own technology plus some additional rentals. It boasts an MCR, broadcast control room PCR, subdirector A (biathlon), subdirector B (alpine and ski jumping). It also had a shared ARD and ZDF studio in the NBC with four cameras and two large LED panels, which played via a media control system. The studio was fixed but was set up and designed especially for this production.

There were additionally 15 server-based Avid editing suites, seven EVS VTR places with Nexis Server, three audio mix spots, special formats (SoFo) including the coordination of LiveU signals, 18 off-tubes, streaming direction for six online channels, plus on air and off air graphics. <

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WHITEPAPERS

Capitalizing on Creativity by Incorporating Digital Film Into Sports Broadcasting

By Bob Caniglia, Director of Sales Operations for the Americas, Blackmagic Design

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oday’s limited in-person crowd sizes and the ever-changing sports video climate have demonstrated the need to captivate virtual audiences in new ways. Recently, there has been an increase in utilizing cinema cameras with larger sensors in live sports and sports broadcasting, supplementing the use of traditional broadcast cameras. Even the recent Tokyo Olympics used cinema cameras to leverage high dynamic range (HDR), shallow depth of field, and 4K while capturing footage at the Games. Cinematic broadcasting offers new storytelling options and diversified capabilities for engaging fans and viewers.

As consumers of media, we are so used to seeing cinematic images right at home on our TV screens or even our mobile devices. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, with the explosion of digital film, HDR, 4K (and even 8K), and streaming video, our living rooms turned into movie theaters while we watched the latest releases from our couches. There is a place for that experience in sports broadcasting as well. Sometimes our eyes crave that blockbuster action and in-your-face, in-the-moment entertainment regardless of the medium.

At the same time, the pandemic forced broadcasters, networks, and studios alike to get more creative when it came to capturing and delivering content. For example, virtual fans were used in lieu of empty stadiums, streaming video became even more popular, and broadcasters explored new tactics to engage viewers, like additional and unique camera angles. As spectators began to return in-person, a new hybrid video model Blackmagic Design’s URSA Broadcast G2

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emerged where broadcasters retained the new tools developed during the heart of the pandemic and employed them alongside — and as part of — traditional broadcasts. Even as COVID-19 regulations lessen and life begins to return to normal, the new hybrid video model that emerged over the past two years will likely continue in some capacity, particularly in the sports world. It will be important to continue to adapt and keep finding new ways to make the viewing experience engaging for both in-person and at-home viewers.

> CINEMATIC SPORTS BROADCASTING Cinematic shooting lets you focus on certain aspects of the sports world in a way that most broadcast cameras don’t allow. A more cinematic style will allow you to focus in on things like specific athletes, plays, teams, etc., or focus away from certain elements of the game, such as an empty arena or empty seats due to low attendance numbers. For example, larger sensors are more common to cinema cameras and produce shallow depth of field, which provides the ability to blur a background. With cinematic broadcasting, you can get that much more creative and diversify the visual elements in your video, such as focal point, lighting, location, shot selection, scale, color, and more. As we know, video as a medium is a great way to get a message out there.

Incorporating various new video elements takes the message further and allows us to tell a more interesting story that may resonate with an audience in new ways.

While sports broadcasting has relied solely on broadcast cameras in the past, there is room at the table now for new types of cameras. Of course, adding new cameras to your arsenal is a big decision and can be a significant invest-

ment. But with today’s technological advancements, cameras of all disciplines are becoming more and more affordable while still maintaining high production value, allowing broadcasters of all shapes and sizes to take advantage without interrupting quality or creativity. With affordable cameras, anyone can be a professional broadcaster, from those with at-home setups to small and mid-size athletic programs to web broadcasters and large broadcasting companies.

Affordable cameras and their features can add to your bottom line in numerous ways.

For example, adding more cameras to a job or event increases production value, and being able to change the lens mount means you can work with affordable lenses or even your existing lenses, saving you the expense of new accessories.

All of this might beg the question: what is a cinema camera, and how does it differ from a broadcast camera? Are there any similarities? As time goes on, the lines get more blurred.

> THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS There is no formal definition of a cinema camera. It all depends on who you ask and when you ask them. There are some filmmakers who believe a cinema camera must shoot a certain resolution or feature a sensor of a certain size. Others believe it’s more about overall image quality and professional “cinema” features, such as formats, codecs, metadata, built-in LUTs, etc. If a camera does these things well, it can be considered a cinema camera. The dynamic range and shooting formats we use today are not very old, but “cinema” as a medium has been around for more than a century. With the creation of the digital age, the progression of digital film technology and the infinite advancements in production over the years, our idea of what constitutes a cinema camera is always evolving.

Similarly, there isn’t a strict definition of a broadcast camera.

Typically, they are designed to meet traditional broadcast standards and are not meant to be rigged up elaborately like some cinema cameras. They tend to have smaller sensors than cinema cameras, making it easier to keep everything in focus, and they are more lightweight and portable, which is beneficial for newsgathering or for a person operating the camera solo. They often use motorized zoom lenses, unlike cinema cameras, which allow the camera operator to reframe shots live without noticeable disruption to the viewer.

Historically, these two types of cameras have been manufactured separately and used for entirely different purposes.

However, with technology advancing at incredible rates and the ability to pack more technology into one camera body, these two traditionally disparate camera types have begun to meld together.

There are affordable cameras on the market today that deliver digital film quality for broadcast use, while still including the tools essential to broadcast workflows, offering multiple uses depending on the user’s needs. A single camera can allow you to do everything from run and gun to ENG/unscripted work to studio/ scripted work to streaming to on-location work on the sidelines of any game or sporting match.

Imagine having ENG camera controls positioned around the camera so you can locate them by feel, wide dynamic range for color and accurate skin tones, an incredible low light sensor for amazing images using natural light, a YRGB color corrector built in, full remote camera control and customizable lens mounts, all in one camera body. Additionally, a camera with an interchangeable lens mount provides the ability to get shallow depth of field one day with a PL or EF lens, and use a traditional B4 parfocal lens the next day, thus providing a full range of “looks” for a live event.

Incorporating digital film into your sports broadcasting offers new creative options and opportunities to engage with your audience. Even better, there are cameras on the market today that do both, which makes it easy to capitalize on this new discipline. These cameras easily integrate into today’s existing broadcast systems. With the flexibility of multiple camera applications in one camera body, both traditional and online broadcasters, as well as sports content creators of all sizes, can enjoy the creativity of being able to shoot Hollywoodquality digital film without breaking the bank while engaging audiences in new and innovative ways. <

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

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WHITEPAPERS

The New ‘Content Continuum’: A Growing Spectrum of Cloud Services Powers a Fast-Evolving Array of Sports Coverage

By Robert Szabo-Rowe, SVP Engineering and Product Management, The Switch

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rom the first PC to the introduction of the smartphone, it has always been hard to grasp the precise point in time when the world we inhabit has been fundamentally changed from what it had been up until then. We appear to be experiencing one of these pivotal tipping points now in the world of content consumption — one where younger live sports consumers are shifting away from the traditional habit of watching full-length games to, instead, embracing short, snappy, on-demand highlights. Data from the analytical firm The Maru Group, which partnered with VIP for the “Sports’ New TV Formula” report, found that almost half of young NFL, NBA, and MLB fans prefer watching highlights over a complete game.

Many younger viewers want to experience the highlights and highs without the boredom or the lows of a long game. Many are consuming multiple games — or even multiple sports events — across several sources concurrently. As clips of sports highlights and critical moments revolutionize the way we consume live sports, a question mark arises over where the true value of media content lies today.

It is now unquestionable that there is enormous value in leveraging the cloud to produce a range of broadcast-quality content that appeals to many audiences — from the traditional watch-thewhole-big-game at home sports demographic, to modern anytime anywhere viewers, to fans whose consumption habits sit somewhere in between. Indeed, cloud-based production, clipping and editing, and transmission are already powering a new broader array of connected sports assets that feed all fans’ hunger for sports content. This expanded gamut of content can run from online pre- and post-game shows and the live broadcast itself, to data-driven betting feeds and near-real-time social media highlights, to streamed player-cam feeds and on-demand replays of the whole game.

> AN EMERGING ‘CONTENT CONTINUUM’ The consumer shift away from scheduled TV programming is creating a ‘content continuum’ that spans live, social, replay, shoulder, and on-demand elements of sports properties across a range of screens and devices. As a result, broadcasters, content owners, and other rightsholders are increasingly relying on cloud-based services to power unique and engaging live content.

Cloud capabilities have come to full fruition within live sports production, including clipping and editing for social media highlights and replays, low-latency comms, editing and graphics creation, and transmission. Employing cloud tools for all or any of these functions is simply a matter of having an internet connection and a laptop. It is now clear that a shift to a cloud-first approach can empower leagues, broadcasters, and other rightsholders to enhance the viewing experience across today’s sports viewing landscape.

It is a good time for sports media organizations to look to make this shift. The growth of cloud-based production and delivery in live sports over the past two years has been nothing short of spectacular. Before that, few in the industry would have predicted just how soon it would be that broadcasters and other rightsholders would commonly deploy cloud methods and technologies as a reliable means of capturing and distributing live sports content.

Accelerated by the pandemic, the adoption of cloud video techniques became widespread and proven. Fast forward to today, and the industry-wide acceptance and excitement around cloud production, transmission, and clipping and editing are beyond the most ambitious pre-pandemic predictions. The upshot is greater efficiency, flexibility, scalability, and cost-effectiveness across more live sports and related content than ever.

> A NEW WAY TO DELIVER LIVE SPORTS The transmission capabilities of the cloud bring added flexibility and opportunities for broadcasters and rightsholders, offering IP delivery of feeds from any location to multiple — up to hundreds — of destinations via the internet. They can also tap into cloud and private delivery networks spanning the globe, such as The Switch’s, and often combine these with public internet access.

One of the reasons broadcasters and rightsholders look to the cloud to deliver their feeds is that it enables cost-effective, high-quality trans102

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mission of live feeds in excess of 20mbps, which can enable HD and UHD broadcasts. For events in remote locations with no or limited internet — such as the annual desert-crossing Dakar Rally — cloud-based transmission with bonded cellular services can accommodate either the primary feed or a backup, leveraging 5G connectivity where possible.

A recent cloud transmission project with the Confederation of North, Central America, and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF) saw The Switch deliver global live coverage of its 2021 Gold Cup football tournament. For the project, CONCACAF tapped The Switch’s end-to-end Cloud Video Services platform, MIMiC, to deliver over 2,000 hours of uninterrupted live feeds from stadiums around the U.S. In addition to utilizing The Switch’s first-mile connectivity expertise and fiber transport network to deliver live feeds from each of the 11 U.S. stadiums used in the tournament, CONCACAF relied on the cloud MIMiC Transmission service to ensure soccer fans worldwide had access to uninterrupted coverage via a broad range of international broadcast and streaming platforms.

Cloud capabilities can also act as the glue between elaborate distributed production workflows, enabling talent and production personnel in remote locations to communicate and produce content in real time. The Switch did just this for the 2021 NHL Playoffs and Stanley Cup Finals, launching a new type of pre-game programming for the league. The project enabled the NHL to tailor highly interactive and fun content for its fans on Twitter, airing 30 minutes before each game and including quizzes, re-caps from previous games, and player stats for the upcoming game.

The Switch curated and powered the entire schedule of NHL Twitter programming, deploying a comprehensive suite of live video production and delivery services through MIMiC to support a virtualized production for 21 pregame shows. MIMiC provided low-latency cloud-based communications to connect the remote talent, announcers, graphics operators, and show producers who were located in locations across the U.S., including Long Island, Burbank, New York, Chicago, and Brooklyn.

Flag Football League’s (AFFL) August 2021 Championships and by the Bare Knuckle Fighting Championships (BKFC) for a series of major bouts. The use of cloud tools for these events also demonstrates how the viewing dynamic across all sports is changing.

AFFL utilized MIMiC’s cloud clipping and editing capabilities to instantly clip and post highlights of big plays during its most important games of the year. The AFFL generated a huge amount of social media engagement and activity instantly across its Twitter and LinkedIn channels using streams available in real time as the games were being played. Working via the cloud meant the editors were not restricted to just one social media destination but could reach any platform anytime simultaneously — and they could do that from anywhere. MIMiC supported a total of 14 games over two weekends, including the championships broadcast on CBS Sports Network.

Likewise, BKFC used MIMiC to capture real-time social media highlights within minutes for its Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube channels. In one instance, thanks to the instantaneousness of the cloud, BKFC achieved close to 300,000 views on one social media post before the fight was even over. The cloud is also capable of recording multiple feeds at once. BKFC was able to clip and edit the ‘dirty’ feed — which included broadcast-ready graphics — instantly for social content, while a separate editor used a clean feed from a ringside camera to curate bonus content and incorporate new angles to create and deliver higher-end packages for the broadcaster to use.

> INSTANTANEOUS SOCIAL MEDIA CLIPPING & EDITING

> NO TRADE-OFF IN QUALITY

With a growing number of fans viewing and following sports and entertainment events via social media, the cloud offers the clipping and editing tools needed to create and post-event highlights as they happen. Whether it is for a major league game or a Division III college sports event, social media operators can clip and edit within the cloud all real-time live highpoints as they unfold, preand post-game interviews, half-time commentary, and clips from other games during and after. The result is a content continuum extending far beyond the linear broadcast, reaching a breadth of social media and streaming platforms.

We can see the full scope of cloud-based clipping and editing capabilities in the use of MIMiC to distribute real-time highlights across streaming and social media platforms for the American

The Switch’s MIMIC platform was used by CONCACAF.

Speed is the critical advantage of the cloud in delivering new and dynamic live sports experiences the next generation of sports fans demands with zero compromise on the quality of the broadcast.

Once the audience knows the game’s results — either through social media updates, push notifications from a news app, or a text from their friend — they’re less interested in the content and are potentially lost to the rightsholder.

By leveraging live production in the cloud, with its efficient transmission capabilities and rapid clipping and editing functionalities, broadcasters and sports rightsholders can dramatically extend the lifespan of their content, open exciting new revenue streams, and most importantly, keep their content relevant to today’s on-the-go consumer. < SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

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NAB2022 PREVIEW

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fter a two-year hiatus, the NAB Show finally returns to Las Vegas on April 23-27, promising plenty of exciting new technology and product introductions. Read on for previews from more than 125 SVG sponsors and stay tuned to the SportsTechLive@NAB Show Blog on www.sportsvideo.org for the latest from the Las Vegas Convention Center. >ADDER TECHNOLOGY

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dder Technology, a leader in connectivity solutions and high-performance IP KVM, will be showcasing exciting new updates to the award-winning ADDERLink INFINITY (ALIF) range including HDR10, 5K, and virtualization support, as well as the new space-saving ADDERLink INFINITY 2000 transmitter. Media and entertainment professionals depend on KVM technology to access their highly flexible workflows that deliver bolder colors, brighter lights, and deeper shadows. The introduction of HDR10 support from the ALIF4000 series ensures content can be viewed in the correct color space throughout the entire creative process.

With the latest updates, customers starting their 5K IP KVM journey can build a small matrix of up to 16 endpoints without a management system. As the system evolves, and greater control is required, a management system and additional endpoints can be seamlessly integrated.

Adder will also demonstrate the ALIF3000, with pixel-perfect video, audio, and USB 2.0 delivered to single or dual screens over a single 1GbE link; perfectly suited to support broadcast and production specialists as they look to benefit from the flexibility and growth opportunities provided by virtualized applications. Another Adder showcase will be the new ALIF2000 Series. Designed to optimize rack space, whilst providing powerful, and reliable performance. Dual screen support, including touchscreens, provides flexibility and improved desktop ergonomics combined with instant connectivity over an IP network. Get re-connected with Adder, the IP KVM Experts at NAB this April, on booth W3008!

>AJA VIDEO SYSTEMS

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ince 1993, AJA Video has been a leading manufacturer of video interface technologies, converters, digital video recording solu-

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tions, and professional cameras, bringing highquality, cost-effective products to the professional, broadcast, and postproduction markets.

>ALDEA SOLUTIONS

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ldea Solutions is a leading provider of solutions for the distribution of live content.

Established in Montreal, Canada, in 2000, Aldea offers services that are used by many of the leading television channels, communications platforms, and content owners from around the world, for the live transmission and distribution of sports, news, and other television programs.

Aldea offers customers the complete gamma of services across the video distribution ecosystem, including remote production, distribution via fiber, satellite, or internet, along with OTT and streaming platforms for viewers.

>ALLIED BROADCAST GROUP

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llied Broadcast Group is a premier dealer of new and used broadcast production equipment. We specialize in the sports production and live broadcast industries and now offer new mobile production trailers! COME SEE OUR 16FOOT MODEL ON DISPLAY! Available as rack ready or fully equipped, and in 20-and 24-foot lengths. We are a dealer for major manufacturers: Sony, Ross, Blackmagic, NewTek, Vinten, Hitachi, and more! If your need is more budget conscious, we also have many preowned gear options available. And with our new rental program and rent-to-own options, we can help when last minute needs arise. Or if you have gear you no longer need, we can buy, broker, or consign it to get you cash on hand, or a larger budget to upgrade your compliment of gear!

Come see us at booth C10411. Allied Broadcast Group — Your Ally and Partner for Professional Video Gear.

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

>AMAGI

A

magi is a next-gen SaaS media tech company that provides cloud broadcast and streaming TV solutions to TV networks, content owners, and streaming TV platforms. We enable content owners to launch, distribute, and monetize live linear channels on Free-Ad-Supported TV and SVOD platforms. We also offer 24x7 cloud managed services bringing simplicity, advanced automation, and transparency to the entire broadcast operations for traditional TV networks. Amagi delivers over 2,000 channel deliveries across 40 countries. In 2021, we heralded a new era of cloud for live sports by providing UHD playout with cloud automation for NBC Olympics’ production of the Tokyo Olympic Games, on its Olympics Channel. Amagi leveraged the power of cloud technologies to create unparalleled experience for viewers as well as those involved in managing the Olympics broadcast operations. By being NBC’s cloud technology partner, we created a new milestone in live sports broadcast on a global scale through innovation, superior quality, and reliability.

>AMAZON WEB SERVICES

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emonstrating the transformative power of the cloud in content production, media supply chain and archive, broadcast, direct-toconsumer and streaming, and data and analytics, Amazon Web Services (AWS) will showcase AWS for Media and Entertainment (M&E) technology at NAB 2022. Designed for content creators, rightsholders, producers, broadcasters, and distributors, the AWS for M&E initiative aligns five solution areas with the must purpose-built capabilities of any cloud, including nine AWS services, 11 AWS solutions, dedicated AWS appliances, and over 400 AWS Partners. As audience demand for content rises and the transition to remote workflows continues, AWS for

M&E makes it easier for professionals to select the right tools and partners for priority workloads, accelerate production launches, and see faster time to value. Demonstrations at the AWS booth will illustrate how customers use AWS for M&E solutions, services, and partner integrations to reinvent content creation, optimize media supply chains, and better compete for audience attention across streaming, broadcast, and direct-to-consumer platforms. AWS will also highlight success stories from industry leaders using AWS for M&E to pioneer new ways to entertain, launch new streaming services, expand content catalogs, and set new paradigms for the audience viewing experience. For more details, visit https://aws.amazon.com/media/

>APPEAR AS

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eadquartered in Oslo, Norway, Appear is a leading provider of media processing and delivery technology. Founded in 2004, Appear was spun out of Tandberg Television ASA by 11 former employees and is now renowned in the European market for delivering the highest quality video with the lowest latency and power consumption. Appear now turns west to scale up our business across the pond — embarking on an exciting journey to meet the great demand for our products and solutions in the Americas. At this year’s NAB, we are not only excited to share our track record in contribution and distribution applications, but also to officially introduce our brand and team members to the industry as part of our scaling and expansion strategy. In addition to our existing portfolio, including the renowned X and XC platforms, we will also reveal the latest in our server-based compression solutions, the NEO Series.

>ARISTA NETWORKS

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rista will be showcasing IP High Performance Media networking with Orchestration, Visibility, Monitoring, and Security required for live sports production, rightsholders, and content creators. Come see live demonstrations and get a better understanding of new technologies including 400/800 Gb ethernet switching solutions that will allow you to scale to 16K sports broadcasts.

>ARRI

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RRI is a global player within the motion picture industry. The ARRI Group consists of the business units Camera Systems, Lighting, and Rental, all dedicated to connecting creativity and future technologies for moving images. ARRI is a leading designer and manufacturer of camera and lighting systems as well as system solutions for the film, broadcast, and media industries, with a worldwide distribution and service network.

>AT&T

>BITCENTRAL

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hy AT&T: Technology is complex. Transformation is fast. It can be difficult to know you’re making the right connectivity choices. With experience across all industries, we bring a rich understanding of your business demands — no matter the size of your business — to help deliver the right insights, guidance, and solutions.

>ATEME

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hether you deliver sports content over satellite, cable, IP, terrestrial, or OTT, Ateme helps you captivate your audiences with solutions that transform your video delivery to help you acquire new subscribers, reduce churn, and unleash new monetization potential. At NAB, we’ll be showcasing futureproof solutions that deliver a superior quality of experience while optimizing your operations.

Your Streaming Solution: Get a real-life solution for low-latency streaming — ideal for sports, and already deployed — including encoders, origin/packaging, and CDN. Discover the Dynamic Ad Insertion solution that maximizes your monetization. Optimize Your Operations: Discover our contribution solutions to offload processing in the cloud. Highly automated, metadata-driven next-generation media supply chain for file- and live-to-VoD and to social media Your Next Gen TV. Discover the solution that powers more than half of ATSC 3.0 deployments across North America. Finally solve distribution and C-band.

>ATOMOS

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t Atomos, we make next-generation devices that create new opportunities for filmmakers around the world. Whether you work on set, live production, events, editorial, or grading, Atomos has a device to support and enhance your workflow.

>AUDIO-TECHNICA

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elebrating over 50 years of audio excellence worldwide, Audio-Technica is a leading innovator in transducer technology, renowned for the design and manufacture of microphones, wireless microphones, headphones, mixers, and electronics for the audio industry.

>BIRDDOG

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irdDog is all-in on NDI and will be showing the most complete range of NDI hardware converters, NDI PTZ Cameras, Cloud Connected workflow platforms, and a suite of software applications. BirdDog will also be showcasing a bunch of new (not yet announced) hardware and software products!

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itcentral has recently acquired Powr. tv to provide a more robust streaming platform across all major OTT and mobile platforms. Bitcentral’s Streaming Media Group is integrating its award-winning FUEL platform with Powr.tv to provide a unified workflow that will simplify video management, streaming, and distribution. At NAB 2022 (Booth W5100), we will demonstrate how to accomplish the “manage once, distribute many” ideal, including turnkey premium OTT application deployment; robust monetization business models (AVOD, SVOD, and TVOD); unique community building co-viewing features, such as realtime Live Chat and Watch Party functionality; enhanced broadcast quality live streaming management, linear channel creation (Live and VOD) with dynamic rules-based automation for linear channel creation, and comprehensive distribution and syndication capabilities.

>BLACKMAGIC DESIGN

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lackmagic Design is excited to showcase several new products perfect for the sports industry, including the Blackmagic URSA Broadcast G2 camera, Blackmagic Studio Camera 4K Plus and Blackmagic Studio Camera 4K Pro, and a family of HyperDeck Studio broadcast decks. URSA Broadcast G2 is a nextgeneration broadcast camera with 6K digital film sensor that brings digital film quality to both traditional and online broadcasters.

The advanced 6144x3456 digital film sensor provides exceptional low light performance with dual gain ISO of up to +36dB as well as 13 stops of dynamic range. It also includes H.265 and Blackmagic RAW file formats, Blackmagic Generation 5 Color Science, a USB-C expansion port for external disk recording, and more.

Blackmagic Studio Camera 4K Plus and Blackmagic Studio Camera 4K Pro include integrated 7” viewfinders and are easier to transport and set up than large traditional studio cameras. The optional focus and zoom demands let customers adjust the lens from the tripod handles. The Blackmagic Studio Converter handles all video conversions at the switcher end and adds power to the Ethernet cable. The HyperDeck Studio models support record and playback to H.264, ProRes and DNx files, as well as PCM or AAC audio. All models support SD Cards and UHS-II cards, with the Pro models adding extra SSD support. There are four different models: HyperDeck Studio HD Mini, the larger HyperDeck Studio HD Plus, the full rack HyperDeck Studio HD Pro, and the incredibly powerful HyperDeck Studio 4K Pro.

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otion graphics are so intensely integrated in sports that most can believe that such events are impossible to digest without graphics. The ability to include stats or in-context rich information that enhances the audience’s perception makes it almost impossible to conceive a sport event broadcasted in TV just with the speakers’ voice. Brainstorm is specialized in creating 3D real-time data-driven graphics, virtual sets, and AR/VR/XR applications. This means that our graphics products can integrate with sport data providers to include real-time stats, but at the same time the StormLogic management for graphics interaction are also applicable to realtime AR/VR graphics, allowing for excellent in-context management of the storytelling.

Many broadcasters are taking advantage of AR/VR in-context graphics for sports and entertainment shows, and even go one step beyond to include such graphics within virtual sets, creating impressive IMR (Immersive Mixed Reality) productions. Some, like the WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) use AR to improve the branding of their performers, adding visual impact to the broadcasted events.

Others like the BBC use IMR applications to overcome current social distancing limitations, as they did in the Wimbledon onsite coverage or the remote coverage of the Tokyo Olympics, in which they were able to create practically a 24-hour coverage of the event using a virtual set and AR graphics from the UK while practically resembling being in Tokyo.

>BROADPEAK

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roadpeak will highlight solutions designed to transcend quality of experience expectations for video streaming. With Broadpeak’s advanced CDN solutions, content providers and pay-TV operators can deliver a QoE on par with Netflix and future-proof their video delivery operations. At NAB, you will learn about Broadpeak’s multicastABR solution that brings scalability and low latency to the live multiscreen video environment. Find out how nanoCDN mABR supports the latest trends in live sports rights acquisition and streaming, with real-world examples, such as DAZN for the Serie A in Italy. Discover broadpeak.io — the company’s brand-new software as a service (SaaS). The new API-based platform offers content providers, pay-TV operators, and OTT service providers an easy, fast, and reliable way to deliver advanced streaming quality to

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their subscribers. Also on display: peakVU.TV, a high-quality and reliable video solution for American operators to quickly deploy an IP streaming video service.

>CALREC/DIGICO

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et back to broadcast at NAB 2022 with Calrec. Calrec will demonstrate how the company has been keeping broadcasters on air with a focus on remote working, virtualization, remote production, and IP. Calrec’s centerpiece will be the powerful IP ImPulse core with SMPTE 2110 connectivity. ImPulse can power four independent consoles on a single core, including virtualized production workflows for distributed working. ImPulse has fully redundant hardware and 3D immersive path widths, flexible panning, and downmixing built-in. ImPulse will power Apollo and Artemis consoles, as well as Calrec’s redesigned Assist GUI, enabling live mixes via a standard web interface. Calrec’s RP1 Remote Production Core enables broadcasters to easily mix live events from remote facilities; this year broadcasters like NBC have saved money with RP1 to mix international sports events from studios located in the U.S. Calrec will also show the modular Type R IP mixing system and the plug-and-play Brio console. Type R’s three hardware panels can create a variety of systems and uses Assist to mix in the cloud. Calrec’s compact Brio Duet and Medley consoles come loaded with dynamics and delay on every path and a huge internal router, multiple monitor outputs, and comprehensive built-in I/O.

>CANON

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t NAB 2022, Canon is displaying the company’s best in digital imaging technology, including broadcast lenses, professional camcorders, cinema cameras, PTZ cameras, mirrorless cameras, DSLR cameras, reference displays, and projectors. Perhaps most exciting for Canon at the NAB Show is the debut of Canon’s Free Viewpoint Volumetric Video System. The system utilizes more than 100 Canon cameras positioned around an arena or stadium to render 3D images of the in-game action that can be used during sports telecasts to enhance the viewing experience. Also making their NAB Show debut are a plethora of Canon products that already have or will soon be serving a major impact on the sports broadcasting industry. Products such as the EOS R5 C and EOS R3 Full-Frame Mirrorless Cameras, CR-N 500 4K UHD PTZ Camera, DP-

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V1830 4K HDR Reference Display, XF605 4K UHD Professional Camcorder, CJ20ex5B UHD Portable Zoom Lens, and EOS C70 4K UHD Digital Cinema Camera. Canon products also go beyond the stadiums and studios. Reaching houses of worship to on-location breaking news, Canon solutions were developed to meet the demands of a wide variety of live production and filmmaking environments. This year’s booth was designed with specific end users in mind, and visitors will get to see firsthand how Canon technology could fit the needs of their video production. For more information about Canon products and to be the first to learn about upcoming announcements, please visit usa.canon.com

>CARTONI

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ince 1935, out of Rome, Cartoni has designed, manufactured, and marketed high-end Professional Camera Supports and accessories for the Motion Picture and Television industries.

Cartoni SPORT 200 offers an outstanding torsional rigidity and its innovative and new design aluminum profile is angled and shaped to ensure maximum strength, holding up to 441 lbs. In tune with the operator, Cartoni Master Heads are for large broadcast cameras.

The Cartoni Focus Family of heads for EFP and smaller cameras. Cartoni will introduce the P40 Pedestal. Also featured will be our PTZ Solutions. This includes for various options the Cartoni PTZ Stand, Tripod, and Pedestal. Also showing is the Autopod System from Polecam.

This is a “platform” that is a remotely operated programmable telescopic elevation unit for use with PTZ’s, Teleprompters, and Gyro remotes.

Kinotehnik will have their LED Fresnel series of lights as well as the water resistant 802 panel light.

>CHYRON

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t NAB, Chyron will feature the PRIME Platform, with powerful modules for graphics, software-based switching, video walls, venue control, touchscreen, branding, and more, as well as the brand new Edge module for viewer-controlled graphics and navigation. Edge promises to bring new levels of viewer engagement, viewer retention, and monetization to information-rich broadcasts of all kinds: sports, elections, and even lifestyle programming. Chyron will also show the newly released Chyron LIVE, with a single, user-friendly UI for video source selection, graphics, and illustrated replay clips. LIVE gives

the sportscaster complete control over their visual storytelling, allowing them to illustrate and explain plays, while choosing just the right camera shot and graphics to complete the narrative. Chyron’s VSAR will be on display. It is currently in demand, serving such diverse use cases as Telemundo’s coverage of the Olympics and OS Studios’ coverage of esports events.

Chyron will also be showing Paint, now in its 20th anniversary year, popular across the globe for illustrated replay of all types of sports and VP, used for virtual down lines or off-sides lines, as well as virtual advertisements in venue seating areas, on the field or on virtual billboards.

>CISCO SYSTEMS

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isco is a technology leader in the sports, broadcasting, and entertainment industries.

With installations in more that 350 venues in 35 countries around the world, Cisco solutions are enabling a more connected experience for hundreds of millions of fans. Cisco has created one-stop shopping that allows broadcasters, properties, and IT organizations to leverage the entire stack of solutions from connecting to remote talent, across video, cloud, networking, security, data and analytics, collaboration, and more to create an environment that is centrally and dynamically controlled. For broadcasters, Cisco IP Fabric for Media enables content providers and broadcasters to migrate from legacy SDI to a flexible and scalable IP-based infrastructure. Cisco technology delivers the innovative solutions, remote production capabilities and security that the sports, broadcast and entertainment industry has come to rely on in today’s ever-evolving digital world.

Visit Cisco in the CM|IP Showcase at NAB Show.

>CLARK WIRE & CABLE

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lark Wire & Cable is a leading manufacturer of cabling and connectivity technology for the broadcast and commercial AV markets.

Designed and manufactured in the U.S., Clark cables are engineered to industryleading specifications for HD/SDI, high-speed data, and other next generation professional formats. With unique constructions built for mobile production, postproduction, studio infrastructure, and commercial installation, Clark video cables bring solutions to a wide array of applications. As part of their solutions-based service model, Clark also offers customized interconnect products. From cable assemblies and custom manufactured cables to metal fabrication and custom wired patch bays, Clark can deliver connectivity products built specifically for each system.

>COBALT DIGITAL

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obalt is highlighting the new +Dante, license-based embedding and de-

embedding solution. +Dante brings convenient and cost-effective support to Dante users by adding 16 input/16 output channels to existing Cobalt 9904 processing cards without the need for new hardware. Cobalt is also showing Indigo 2110-DC-01, its openGear-based SMPTE ST2110 solution with dual 25G interfaces and 4K support. This highly integrated factory option offers best-of-class native ST 2110 audio/video processing to the company’s 9904-UDX-4K and 9905-MPx audio/video processor cards. On the compression side, the 9992-ENC/DEC line has been enhanced with support for decoding Dolby AC-4 and Dolby E, as well as transport protocols such as SRT and, soon, Zixi. Cobalt will also conduct multiple demonstrations including ST 2110 processing, multi-link demonstrations of RIST in seamless switching mode using SMPTE ST 2022-7, and a new feature from Technicolor that allows inverse tone mapping SDR to HDR, followed by SL-HDR1 in seamless fashion.

>CREATIVE DIMENSIONS

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reative Dimensions has been in the creativity business for 35 years! We design and fabricate custom broadcast studio sets and desks, branded environments, and interior/ exterior signage. At NAB 2022, we are excited to introduce you to our VERSA CAST line: a customizable, tool-less, easy to set-up wall structure that is your one-stop shop to take your podcast to the next level. The kits can include any combination of lighting, desks, acoustical paneling, equipment, branding, backdrops, and more. Our team of industry experts, visionary designers, versatile project managers and skilled craftsmen have built a reputation as an innovative powerhouse. We strive to be your perfect partner, providing as much or as little support as you require while exemplifying integrity, skill, precision, and on-time delivery.

Check out our in-booth demo and find out why we are BUILT DIFFERENT.

>CROWN CASTLE

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rown Castle owns, operates, and leases more than 40,000 cell towers and more than 80,000 route miles of fiber supporting small cells and fiber solutions across every major U.S. market. This nationwide portfolio of communications infrastructure connects cities and communities to essential data, technology and wireless service — bringing information, ideas, and innovations to the people and businesses that need them.

>DALET

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alet empowers media-rich organizations to transform their production and distribution workflows — accelerating media operations, maximizing collaboration, and creating higher value from content. At NAB

2022, Dalet will showcase its lineup of software solutions enabling greater control, enhanced visibility, and increased productivity for sports content professionals and storytellers around the globe, including Dalet Flex’s new mobile application and state-of-the-art production capabilities for remote editors. Dalet will also introduce its latest SaaS content supply chain offerings that bring increased flexibility and scalability to sporting organizations looking to grow their video strategy without the need to deploy their own infrastructure. World-class teams, leagues, federations, and sports media groups such as Arsenal Football Club, Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment, the National Rugby League, DAZN, and Fox Sports Australia trust Dalet to support their daily sports content production and distribution. Dalet’s fast gameto-audience workflows solutions help them deepen engagement and deliver winning experiences to their viewers, subscribers and fans. Visit Dalet at Booth C4423 and learn more at www.dalet.com/solutions/sports

>DATACORE SOFTWARE

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ataCore offers industry-leading softwaredefined storage (SDS) solutions for block, file, and object storage to help M&E organizations achieve faster time-to-value for video production, distribution, and preservation.

At NAB 2022, DataCore will showcase our SDS products: SANsymphony (for block-based SAN/ HCI environments), vFilO (global file system for NAS and NFS/SMB filers), and Swarm (scalable object storage with intelligent content management), which allow M&E organizations to store, protect, manage, and access data on their choice of hardware. This allows them to eliminate media storage silos, optimize capacity utilization, and reduce total cost of ownership for storage infrastructure. DataCore SDS solutions enable M&E organizations to easily manage media directly on the storage layer or through your preferred asset management solution.

Making content access easier with different access methods, DataCore SDS solutions are ideal for private content streaming, long-tail delivery, origin storage, and enabling over-thetop (OTT) services directly from the archive storage layer.

>DIGIGRAM

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igigram has spent over 30 years developing innovative digital systems so we are offering complete reliable point-to-point encoding and streaming links, from on-thego portable outside broadcast encoders, to strong and efficient studio to transmitter links. As a worldwide audio grade brand, Digigram pioneers in audio innovations. Used by thousands of journalists, broadcasters, and

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industrialists all over the world, Digigram sound cards, audio processing software, and IP audio codecs are conceived with a consistent attention to quality and reliability.

>DIZPLAI

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izplai — formerly known as Never.no — is a cloud data display platform and professional services company, supporting content creators by providing the tools to drive engagement and enhance monetization opportunities on any channel. Working with broadcasters, rightsholders, brands, and event organizers to produce an interactive experience from anywhere in the world. Simply managed from a web browser, Dizplai has access to live data feeds — including sports stats, weather, and betting — and enables producers to capture, interact with, and build content from social, messaging services, and interactive apps. We create ideas, strategy, world-class graphics, including interactive elements, to increase reach and tune-in, connect the audience, and create personalized environments for branding, sponsorship and data capture. At NAB, Dizplai (Booth N2032) will showcase the untapped potential of live data feeds and dynamic graphics. Featuring the very latest best-in-class tools, including real-time QR code creation and display, live sports and weather data, and interactive apps. Contact us now to arrange a demo. www.dizplai.com

>DMC BROADCAST GROUP

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t FOR-A’s new technologies exhibit, DENZ TV will be demonstrating the collaborative end-to-end broadcast encoder, RIST, decoder, and return monitoring from both ends, solution.

All incoming feeds are synchronized. Plus the DENZ Cloud Gateway, VM Software and DENZ Server Side Ad Insertion Technology, network emulators and a full set of 2110 High Density Encoders and Decoders with conversion to any MPEG/TS/IP including JXS, H.264 with WebRTC monitoring. NDI bi-directional conversion to UDP, RTP, and SDI.

>DOLBY

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olby transforms the science of sight and sound into spectacular experiences.

Through our innovative research and engineering, we develop breakthroughs that we share with the world through collaborations with content creators, broadcasters, payTV operators, and consumer entertainment equipment vendors worldwide. When you watch sports in Dolby, you get the unmatched

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experience of Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos to get the best sports experience you can have, no matter where you are. Dolby unleashes the full power of the game or match, providing you with a transformative experience by connecting you deeply with the emotion of the sport. With Dolby, you will feel like you are inside the action.

Partner with Dolby to join the rapidly expanding group of leading broadcasters, pay-TV providers, streaming service providers and live content creators to deliver spectacular live sports and entertainment experiences. Learn how you can take your live sport experiences to the next level with Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos.

of the United States to the family next door. EV’s RE50 and 635A mics are famous in broadcast, television, and radio in-the-field broadcasts, setting the world standard for ENG (electronic news gathering) and EFP (electronic field production). Extremely rugged and able to withstand high humidity, temperature extremes, and corrosive environmental factors such as salt air, Electro-Voice field production microphones combine excellent sound performance with our legendary “Buchanan Hammer” durability. Visit us at NAB 2022 (Booth C6108) and hear for yourself how an EV broadcast mic can elevate the sound of your production. Also new at the show: meet the RE20-BLACK, a new color option for >EDITSHARE the classic RE20 broadcast microphone, sporting ounded in 2004 and headquartered in an elegant, low-reflection dark charcoal finish.

Watertown, MA, EditShare builds network shared storage and media management solutions >EUTELSAT utelsat Communications is one of the powering smart workflows for the media and world’s leading satellite operators. With a entertainment industry. global fleet of satellites and associated ground >EEG VIDEO infrastructure, Eutelsat enables clients across EG, an Ai-Media Company, is the leader in Video, Data, Government, Fixed, and Mobile closed captioning technology, equipping Broadband markets to communicate effectively broadcasters, producers and more with solutions to their customers, irrespective of their location. to reach more audiences. At NAB 2022, attendees Around 7,000 television channels operated by will experience a range of live demonstrations leading media groups are broadcast by Eutelsat and new releases, including the debut of Smart to one billion viewers equipped for DTH Lexi, EEG and Ai-Media’s groundbreaking live reception or connected to terrestrial networks. automatic captioning solution. Smart Lexi layers human curation, custom dictionaries, >EVERTZ vertz is the leading global manufacturer of and machine learning to provide high-accuracy complete end-to-end solutions for media captioning that’s available 24/7, maintained by expert staff and requires no equipment. An companies for content creation, acquisition, addition to the Alta line of captioning solutions, distribution, and delivery. For NAB 2022, CDI Alta, supports AWS CDI and makes Evertz will showcase its next-generation switch captioning cloud-based live video production fabrics, the EXE 3.0 and NAT-X, and the latest easier and more affordable than ever. For orchestration, monitoring, and analytic features captioning in 4K resolution, the iCap Connect of MAGNUM OS, which are core to our IP-based AV650 represents the next generation of EEG’s Software Defined Video Networking (SDVN) industry-standard HD492 iCap encoder. The solutions for production facilities, stadiums, and AV650 provides native support for UHD 12G-SDI arenas. For customers looking for 12G-SDI based caption encoding and decoding. Finally, EEG’s solutions for UHD and HDR applications, Evertz live stream captioning solution, Falcon, now is launching the new NEXX core 12G-SDI router provides extensive support for world language and new virtualized processing features on FPGA/ CPU-based modules on the SCORPION platform. web captioning.

For Live Media Production, Evertz will focus >ELECTRO-VOICE on the new tools for remote and cloud-based n broadcast field production, where production. The new XPS platform provides low unquestioned reliability and spot-on latency and reliable streaming of UHD video over sonic performance are prime requirements, the public Internet and 5G networks for remote Electro-Voice mics are the industry’s go-to contribution. DreamCatcher’s BRAVO Studio is workhorses. For decades, you’ve seen Electro- a virtualized production control room solution Voice microphones in the hands of reporters that include live video / audio mixing, with replay and news correspondents across the globe, and graphics on public and private cloud services. capturing interviews ranging from the President For audio mixing consoles, Evertz will showcase

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the renowned Studer Vista series. Evertz will also highlight Ease Live, the industry leading technology in enhancing the user experience with interactive graphics at the edge.

>EVS BROADCAST EQUIPMENT

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VS is excited to return to the NAB Show, where we will showcase our latest solutions for OB and Flypacks as well as for Production Centers for News and Sports. LiveCeption Signature combines the power of our XT-VIA live production server with the new LSM-VIA to deliver the most advanced live replays and sports highlights. At NAB, we will showcase new features of the solution, such as our XtraMotion cloud-based service, which allows production teams to create smooth super slow-motion replays from any angle. MediaCeption Signature is EVS’ end-to-end live production asset management solution sensuring swift content turnaround in any production environment.

In Las Vegas, EVS will demonstrate how our solution can help to cope with SDR<>HDR conversion, access content from anywhere, and save valuable rack space by virtualizing backend resources. EVS will also be showcasing MediaInfra Strada, a turnkey solution that brings IP routing agility to broadcast infrastructures while continuing to support SDI sources and destinations. Consisting of an advanced customizable router control system and highdensity SDI to IP gateways, in combination with Arista switches, the solution allows media companies to transition to full IP environments with minimal effort. It’s time to discover new ways to empower your teams, transform your business, and take your production to a whole new level! Meet us at Booth N2625.

>EXERTIS BROADCAST

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e are back! Make the Exertis Broadcast (formerly JB&A) Pre-NAB Technology Event your first stop on the way to the NAB Show and set the standard for the rest of the week! Stop by the Sahara Las Vegas on Friday and Saturday, April 22 and 23, to get hands-on with the latest tech and trends in Broadcast, Extended Reality, Production, and AV Workflows.

Experience The Power of XR LIVE on our Show Floor! Enjoy pizza and beer with your colleagues — surrounded by today’s latest technology in an intimate setting with plenty space. PREVIEW featured products. Experience handson DEMOS. Discuss ROAD-MAPS with CEOs. Attendee-only SPECIALS. WIN by spinning our prize wheel, and so much more. Register now at https://www.exertisusa.com/events/

>FLOWICS

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lowics, creator of the most comprehensive platform for powering remote and in-studio production of live graphics and interactive

content, will be exhibiting at NAB 2022 in Las Vegas. Excited to return to in-person shows this year, Flowics will bring its industry-leading cloud-based graphics solutions to Connected Media|IP, an NAB Show destination that focuses on helping organizations deliver connectedcontent experiences. Flowics will showcase Flowics Graphics, its cloud-based HTML5 broadcast graphics solution and its data connectors, which simplify the integration of external live data from different sources to streamline broadcast graphics creation and operation. With data connectors, Flowics Graphics eliminates any need for custom development to parse external data and feed it to on-air graphics, saving precious time and reducing costs for broadcasters.

>FOR-A

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rom SDI to all flavors of IP, FOR-A (Booth C5408) will unveil several unique technology breakthroughs this year. FOR-A’s innovative designs enable the most precise conversion and synchronization for real-time voice and video communication between browser and web pages. With a combination of new and expanded partnerships and an emphasis on software-defined advances, FOR-A Corporation has created a complete ecosystem that addresses content creators transitioning to all flavors of IP, live event producers looking for a 12G 4K video production solution, as well as those looking for a future workflow with low latency, cloud-based services. FOR-A is introducing IP and cloudbased workflows for broadcast, sports, corporate, and houses of worship with new, advanced signal processors and IP gateways, together with high-profile partnerships for a complete IP ecosystem. Two standout updates for sports production being shown as part of FOR-A’s solution at NAB will be an advanced feature set for the FT-ONE-SS4K 2/3-inch sensor, 1,000fps Ultra Slow Motion camera and the introduction of Variant Systems Group’s Envivo Ribbon system.

> FUJIFILM OPTICAL DEVICES DIVISION

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oFi Stadium has designed what has become the premier in-arena experience, and with a suite of Fujinon lenses having been selected to outfit the new stadium — including seven UA125x8 lenses, four UA24x7.8 lenses, and two UA14x4.5 lenses — it is an experience Fujifilm is incredibly proud to be a part of.

>G&D NORTH AMERICA

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ometimes less is more: KVM manufacturer G&D’s new high-end extender product series Vision XS comes with a small housing and big performance. Following the motto “smaller, more compact, more powerful”, G&D developed a new compact multi-purpose KVM tool with a bandwidth of 10G and video transmission for

resolutions up to 4K. Users can expect the best video quality and an even better performance.

With a bandwidth of up to 10 Gbit/s, VisionXS opens up a new dimension of possibilities. Especially fast videos and frequently changing image content now require significantly less compression thus improving the user experience. VisionXS products can either be operated in pairs as an extender line or they can also be integrated into matrix installations. Universal compatibility with G&D’s IP KVM matrix systems thus enables a high degree of flexibility. This makes it even easier to plan and expand KVM installations, even at a later date.

>GENIUS SPORTS

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enius Sports is the official data, technology, and commercial partner that powers the global ecosystem connecting sports, betting, and media. Genius acquired Sportzcast — a leading U.S. manufacturer of sports scoreboard data distribution systems — in 2020 to help enhance the speed, depth, and accuracy of its official live game data. The trusted partner to over 400 sports organizations globally, Genius captures the highest quality data for many of the world’s largest leagues and federations such as the NFL, EPL, FIBA, NCAA, NASCAR, and PGA. Through its Second Spectrum division, Genius is a leading provider of optical tracking technology, augmented video, real-time data insights, and predictive analytics. From enabling leagues to take control of their official data, to creating immersive fan experiences for sports, betting and media organizations, Genius is driven to deliver the difference for its partners. Visit Booth N5035 at NAB to meet the team.

>GLOOKAST

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ounded in 2009, GLOOKAST has established itself as a leading provider of solutions to help media organizations simplify workflows in an increasingly complicated media supply chain. While globally known for file and feed transcode and ingest solutions (HD, UHD/4K, NDI, IP) for news, sports, live production, and entertainment and for its second-to-none integration with AVID-based production environments, GLOOKAST has quickly become a key player in the “post-pandemic” media world with innovative solutions tackling use cases such as real-time remote ingest for news and sports, content digitization, multi-site archive migration, and multiple destination distribution workflows. GLOOKAST’s agnostic workflow approach and API-based integration with diverse platforms including Adobe, Arvato EditMate, EditShare, File Catalyst, LucidLink, Object Matrix, Cloudian, Spectra Logic, Harmonic, Quantum, and Vizrt/NDI continues to empower customers with the freedom to choose the tools

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NAB2022PREVIEW they like from the vendors they prefer. Visit us at NAB 2022 at Booth N725, use the code LV32958 to get a FREE Exhibits Pass to attend the show.

>GRASS VALLEY

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s sports fans continue to demand stunning quality content that brings them closer to the action, Grass Valley meets the challenges — from enabling a complete end-to-end HDR production chain for live productions to delivering robust remote production workflows that add efficiency, reduce travel, emissions, and power concerns, and enable the production of more brilliant content than ever. Grass Valley is the frontrunner in the industry’s charge towards a software-defined future, shining a spotlight on the future of live production with cloud-based applications and cloud computing, as well as single-stream IP workflows. A prime example of this innovation is GV AMPP (Agile Media Processing Platform). The GV AMPP platform is cloud native and cloud agnostic. This flexibility and power bring about a significant paradigm shift, allowing shows to be produced on any engine from any location, with cameras onsite and production personnel working remotely around the globe. GV AMPP is the core technology powering the Grass Valley Media Universe, a comprehensive ecosystem of cloud-based tools and services that revolutionizes the way live media is produced. The open ecosystem of connected devices, services, media content, and applications give creatives familiar interfaces to comprehensive cloud-enabled solutions. The GV Media Universe brings innovative solutions together with existing workflows and equipment to create and distribute premium live content that captures audiences while reducing complexity and cost for users. The GV Media Universe is providing media companies worldwide with the power to thrive during the digital transformation.

>IHSE USA

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HSE is introducing several new KVM display management products at NAB 2022 designed to meet the workflow demands of operators requiring real-time access to computer-based systems. Operators working in broadcast-related environments will be able to access a wide variety of devices, whether they are local, remote, or accessing virtual sources. As more companies come to depend on network-centric solutions, IHSE’s KVM display management systems allow them to integrate all types of workstations in a hybrid concept that can be seamlessly con-

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figured to a physical KVM matrix system that is non-intrusive to critical workflow needs. As a close partner of some of the best names in mobile production, IHSE provides display management systems for A/B truck designs that allow multiple sources to be easily accessed from a single keyboard and mouse, no matter which unit the source resides in. Other highlights for NAB will include 4K multiviewers, high frame rate extenders for esports applications, and a new range of product offerings from our recent acquisition of KVM-TEC. Visit us at Booth N6913 to learn more on how IHSE can simplify your display management requirements.

>IMAGEN

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magen recently announced that their integration with Adobe Premiere Pro is live, helping creatives to discover, preview, and download approved assets all from the comfort of one platform. With Imagen’s Adobe Panel Extension users can connect straight to their Imagen content library from their editing suite and enjoy an incredible choice from one resource. This removes the need to flip between applications to download and upload media, so users can stay in the creative zone and speed up their production workflows. To further speed up editing, the Imagen panel enables the use of low-resolution proxies for fast edits, which will be swapped for high resolution versions when ready to export.

Do you need to align your content creation, management and distribution? Come and see us at NAB 2022 at Booth N2334.

>IMAGINE COMMUNICATIONS

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uilding off its legacy in video processing and routing, Imagine Communications is paving the way for sports and live production companies into IP, UHD, and HDR workflows with the workhorse of the modern age: the Selenio Network Processor (SNP). SNP has changed the game for video processing infrastructure, enabling media companies to buy the hardware once and continually add new functionality by applying software-based feature keys. It offers everything needed in a modern media processing platform, including a UHD/HDR-capable, ultralow latency production multiviewer, which can be mixed and matched with synchronizer and conversion personalities — transforming the SNP from a single-function product into a flexible ecosystem of essential tools. The latest major software releases add several important new capabilities, including an automated changeover switch (ACO); an advanced keyer (DSK); and

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JPEG XS encoding and decoding, providing production-quality, low-latency interconnection to support remote- and split-production workflows. Over the past year, media companies across the industry have used Imagine solutions to make broadcast history, from creating unique live production architectures from preconfigured IP modules for the world’s largest sports events to scoring an industry first in live cloud playout of a high-profile sporting event from an Imaginebased SMPTE ST 2110 production facility.

>INTELSAT

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ntelsat operates the world’s most trusted satellite telecom network. We apply our unparalleled expertise and global scale to connect people, businesses and communities, no matter how difficult the challenge. Intelsat is building the future of global communications with the world’s first hybrid, multi-orbit, software-defined 5G network designed for simple, seamless, and secure coverage precisely when and where our customers most need it.

>JOSEPH ELECTRONICS

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oseph Electronics (JE) is an authorized stocking distributor for more than 100 premier broadcast and pro AV brands with stocking locations in both Illinois and California. JE also designs, manufactures, and supplies innovative custom fiber solutions — such as the Caddie Series, DFT Series, and 4K fiber transport gear — for broadcasters and system integrators alike. Equipped with a state-of-the-art fiber lab staffed with fully certified professionals, JE can fabricate, terminate, or repair any connector, assembly, panel, breakout, or interface in use today. JE has served the broadcast industry for more than 70 years and has representatives in California, New York, Georgia, and London.

>KMH INTEGRATION

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MH Integration gives sports media and production professionals the freedom to spend their time creating content and engaging fans, not worrying about the technology behind the scenes. KMH delivers end-to-end system design, integration, and consulting services for any project of any scope. KMH evaluates new products, configures and installs systems, and designs efficient production workflows to help customers use technology for long-term growth. KMH is continually expanding its services to help customers adapt as the sports production industry evolves. At NAB, KMH will highlight Marquee Pro, a professional streaming

and studio solution for producing, branding, and delivering broadcast-quality content. The turn-key service is NDI and Dante compliant and includes a streaming control center and a customizable, portable studio set. The system scales to any organization’s needs as a rental or fixed installation. For more information visit kmh-integration.com.

>LAWO

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t NAB, Lawo (Booth C6932) will present its latest innovations across their IP broadcast portfolio and provide visitors with the opportunity for hands-on exploration of its exhibits and to discuss current and future projects with Lawo product managers and experts.

A range of new and revamped features for the software-defined V__matrix routing, processing, and multi-viewing platform; a 48-fader version of the mc²36 mixing console ;as well as the latest software and radio product innovations will be among the highlights, along with new VSM and SMART features. In addition to Lawo’s HOME management platform for IPbased media infrastructures, which is now open to third-party vendors, exhibits will include significant software upgrades to the vm_dmv Distributed IP Multiviewer, vm_udx Up/Down/ Cross Converter and vm_avp Gateway and Processing apps, the brand-agnostic VSM IP Broadcast Control System, and the SMART series for System Monitoring and Realtime Telemetry for Broadcast Networks. A new software version for the mc² family of production consoles and the A__UHD Ultra-High-Density IP Audio Engine will be unveiled, and Lawo’s brand-new diamond console will be on display for the radio community. Lawo’s portfolio of products and solutions confirms the company’s vision of IP networks becoming a single, unified infrastructure for all types of signal transport in broadcast and media production — whether onsite or in decentralized setups, with or without links into the public or hybrid cloud — which has cemented the company’s IP-native focus. Discover the power of Lawo’s software-defined approach and the convenience and peace of mind it brings to busy operators.

>LEADER INSTRUMENTS CORPORATION

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eader Instruments Corporation has been moving toward the ever-increasing demand for UHD/IP system and will continuously show its reliable and feasible product line at NAB 2022. ZEN series, LV5600/7600 etc. has capability to accept multiple input of IP and SDI at the same time. It is possible to operation with four independent HD signal to show on one LCD display, with stress-free switching even on NMOS control, which may be useful for cam-

era shading or color matching. LT4610 will be demonstrated as PTP/BB integrated synchronization signal generator. PHABRIX will be demonstrating the latest features on its Qx Series of feature-rich hybrid IP/SDI, 4K/UHD rasterizers.

Updates include a new suite of AMWA NMOS tools, a new EUHD option for Analysis/Generation of UHD/4K YCbCr/RGB 444 47.95P – 60P formats, a new 25G/10G full line rate 4GB/1GB PCAP capture tool and a new Dolby E Decoder and Metadata Analyzer toolset. PHABRIX will also be displaying its Rx Series of 2K/3G/HD/ SD rasterizers and the latest updates on its renowned Sx handheld instruments.

>LIVEU

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iveU is shaping the future of live video, powering video production workflows and cloud services for sports. We’ll be onsite at NAB with a live stage for fireside chats, panels, and workflow demonstrations. Attendees can get a first-hand look at our next-gen live video platform and latest solutions suite, enabling teams, rightsholders, associations, sports broadcasters, and production companies to apply unmatched innovation and automation to the video production workflow. We’re unveiling an addition to our end-to-end live video platform, which is set to play a key role in boosting efficiency in any production set-up. We’ll highlight our endto-end contribution and distribution solutions including the multi-camera LU800 5G production-level field unit and rich remote production tools built on our LRT (LiveU Reliable Transport) protocol. Plus, we will have sports customers on our main stage to talk about their recent 5G and Remote Production workflows. Collaborations with leading cloud production providers including Blackbird, Grass Valley, and Grabyo will be showcased during live workflow demos, highlighting the ongoing removal of traditional and restrictive infrastructure. This provides an enriched seamless live video production experience for increased fan engagement and revenue growth. The LiveU Matrix cloud video management platform will be on display with its new Dynamic Share service. Using Dynamic Share, users can easily define their live feed’s destination ad-hoc, via the Global Directory of 1,000+ customers ranging from news, sports, entertainment. This allows you to support your content strategy and monetization efforts, while cutting costs associated with other occasional feed sharing solutions.

>LTN GLOBAL

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TN Global will be showcasing a range of innovative technologies shaping the future of the media industry at this year’s NAB. LTN Flex, LTN’s highly customizable, centralized video production service enables media organizations to

leverage the potential of remote production. LTN will also demonstrate its capabilities to distribute, decorate, and customize feeds for multiple destinations. In addition, the company will be demoing its latest capabilities that allow broadcast networks to run their programming digitally through third parties or their own-brand platforms. Building on the success of previous panels, LTN will also be hosting four 40-minute keynote panels each morning of the show that will cover a range of topics currently affecting the industry ecosystem. Sessions include the transition to digital, remote production, FAST channels, and cloud workflows that will bring together innovators from leading companies to discuss the challenges and opportunities they have created in this rapidly growing market.

>LUCIDLINK

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ucidLink will highlight many exciting partnerships at NAB 2022. We’ll host exciting conversations in our theater with some of our favorite customers like WebMD, along with strategic partners Adobe and IBM. You’ll get to see LucidLink Filespaces in action, as a video editor from WebMD will be onsite, working live on media projects using LucidLink and her favorite NLE tools. You’ll experience real-time workflows with integration partners, Telestream, Cinedeck, Cloud SoDa, and more in our booth. Hear about our premium SI partnerships with CHESA, CIS Group, and Keycode Media. Learn why a growing number of service providers are taking advantage of LucidLink’s unique capabilities to provide valuable SaaS offerings, like Eclipse Tech, Suite Studios, and BeBop, to name a few. In addition, we’ll be making some exciting announcements around a predictable cost solution designed explicitly for M&E. Explore how LucidLink is quickly becoming a standard in the industry.

>LUMEN TECHNOLOGIES

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his NAB, Lumen will showcase a rich set of end-to-end solutions for sports broadcasters. Our latest offering, Lumen Media Transformation, provides state-of-the-art cloud encoding and enrichment capabilities. When used with our Vyvx managed fiber acquisition and our global CDN, Media Transformation can bring content from stadium to screen via a single platform, thereby streamlining the delivery process while promoting peak performance every step of the way. Our global CDN network continues to grow. With 170 Tbps of delivery capacity in 95 POPs worldwide, Lumen recently invested in the Middle East and Oceania and will continue to build in the future. Lumen has also led CDN standardization efforts within the Streaming Video Alliance, which we will discuss in Open Caching: CDNI Metadata Model Extensions at the BEIT Conference on April 24 at 12:55 p.m.

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NAB2022PREVIEW Alongside our global CDN, Lumen is anticipating the next generation of live sports needs with unique device-side delivery optimization. With distributed peer-to-peer delivery and multiCDN load balancing, providers can customize content delivery to each viewer, mitigate risk, and scale rapidly during even the most unexpected traffic spike. To round out our offering, Lumen released a range of programmable edge functionalities to allow development teams to build directly onto our infrastructure, with applications in esports, streaming, and in-stadium digital experiences. Advanced application security — WAF, API protection, bot management, and layer-7 DDoS — meanwhile protects your platform and your fans wherever they watch the game. Interested in our innovations? Stop

by Booth W4418 and book a product demo at NAB 2022.

>MARKERTEK

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arkertek will showcase the very latest in opticalCON technology — Neutrik’s DragonFly. SMPTE Hybrid Fiber users are quickly adapting the DragonFly system as it ushers in the use of expanded beam technology to the broadcast industry. The system is easier to clean and assures less issues due to dirt and dust when compared to legacy SMPTE Hybrid Fiber connectors. Stop by and speak with our team and you’ll experience customerfirst service like you’ve never known it before.

In these challenging times, you’ll appreciate the consistent communication and timely delivery when choosing Markertek as your broadcast supplier. We are the only supplier in the industry to offer an on-premise shop who offers custom fiber, copper, and metal work. We have now expanded to also bring you cable looming and UV printing capabilities. If you think of it, we’ll build it!

>MARSHALL ELECTRONICS

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or over 40 years, Marshall Electronics has been leading the Broadcast proAV industry with video equipment rich in feature sets at affordable prices. This year at NAB 2022, Marshall will be showcasing a brand-new CV730BHN 30x PTZ Camera with High-Bandwidth NDI (full-NDI), 12GSDI, HDMI, and USB with up to UHD/60fps (9MP) resolutions. Also, its new step-up micro POV Cameras with Global Shutter + Genlock Sync (CV568/CV368), Genlock Sync with new Sony sensor technology (CV566/CV366) as well as the new line of entry-level PTZ cameras (CV605). Finally, it

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wouldn’t be Marshall without showing a new quad rack-mount monitor with up to 12GSDI inputs, waveform, vector scope, and much more.

>MATROX VIDEO

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t NAB 2022, Matrox Video technologies will be powering today’s most in-demand broadcast workflows. As the popularity of remote productions continues to rise, live event producers will discover how the Monarch EDGE encoder/decoder platform enables affordable, low-latency, multi-channel 4:2:2 10-bit-quality REMI productions while allowing them to cover more events using less equipment. In addition, the new ConvertIP standards-based converters will showcase how to monitor ST 2110 signals on SDI or HDMI displays. Extio 3 IP KVM extenders will also be featured at NAB, highlighting secure, zero-compromise 4Kp60/quad-HD 4:4:4 video extension and switching over LAN/WAN/internet to support remote operations for distributed workforces. Lastly, Matrox’s industry-renowned developer portfolio will show why its hardware is the de-facto choice for ST 2110- and SDI-based, on-premise solutions and how its software is helping broadcasters build towards a future of cloud-native live productions.

>MAXON

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axon makes powerful, yet approachable software solutions for content creators working in 2D and 3D design, motion graphics, visual effects, and visualization. Maxon’s innovative product portfolio helps artists supercharge their creative workflows. Our product lines include the award-winning Cinema 4D suite of 3D modeling, simulation, and animation technology; the creativity-on-the-go Forger mobile sculpting app; the diverse Red Giant lineup of revolutionary editing, motion design and filmmaking tools; the leading-edge, blazingly fast Redshift renderer; and ZBrush, the industrystandard digital sculpting and painting solution.

>MEDIA LINKS

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edia Links, manufacturer and pioneer in Media over IP transport technology, will be exhibiting at NAB 2022 in Booth W3922.

Showcasing its entire 100G eco-system of wide area IP transport solutions from the network edge thru core, the company will highlight innovation in remote/distributed production applications. Focus will be on its new MetroXPRESS turnkey solution package, which includes the MDP3020 MAX media gateway supporting low

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latency JPEG-XS 2K/4K compression. Throughout the pandemic, Media Links has continued to leverage its leading position with broadcast networks to transport and deliver more media channels than ever before for all types of live events, including the Summer and Winter Olympics as well as Super Bowl LVI. Every week, Media Links IP transport technology flawlessly delivers pristine, high value media content across local, regional, and national networks for many of the most popular entertainment and sporting events, including WWE, NASCAR, NHL, NBA, NFL, MLB, Soccer, and more. On the world stage, new transport solution installations occurred at a major European Telecom, KDDI Corporation, a Japan-based telecommunications company, as well as with a major Korean broadcaster. Media Links is booking appointments now for NAB 2022 at https://medialinks. com/events/tothemax/#form

>MEDIAKIND

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t NAB 2022, we will be showcasing end-toend media, acquiring amazing live content in real-time on the MediaKind booth, while racing RC cars around our purpose-built track. We will deliver this dynamically through our media processing, storage, and monetized live and ondemand broadcasting and streaming workflows to consumers, where visitors will experience extraordinary and differentiated media services by content owners, channel originators/broadcasters, and multi-channel distributors/operators deployed in the cloud or as a service. We enable the complete media workflow with our key technology partners and demonstrate how we deliver value from across the media technology chain including the Contribution & Distribution, Consumer Delivery, and Consumer Experience enablement areas of our portfolio.

Delivering and monetizing the Live without limits… Key live acquisition applications we will showcase at the event include media workflows in cloud contribution, at-home production, content replacement for distribution, all-IP workflows, and live event pop-up video streaming and monetization.

>MEDIAPRO

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t NAB 2022, Mediapro will be showcasing a basketball-field-theme booth to demonstrate its integrated solutions for sports broadcast, production, playout solutions, and delivery operations. With the AutomaticTV sports automation system onsite, visitors will be able to see Mediapro’s newest automatic sports production

system AutomaticTV ONE and its hybrid automated production system AutomaticTV Full Broadcast. Mediapro will also feature a new aerial camera, the Omnicam4Sky Lite, which is a smaller version of the original Omnicam4Sky which makes it a great option for indoor use. This new system is native IP, native 4K, and it can be used as a four-point, three-point, or two-point camera. Overon will demonstrate its ability to deliver and integrate cloud media services and transport exceptional quality video, on-air graphics, real-time data, video controllers, sports scouting systems, rendering engines, media tools, and video server systems. wTVision will be showcasing its end-to-end software capabilities, covering sports productions, MCR, and PCR. The highlights will be AR³, a solution to add Augmented Reality into live football/soccer matches, ChannelMaker, its flexible playout system, and Studio CG, its on-air graphics and video controller. Mediapro also provides live production and master control room services that are flexible, scalable, and designed to boost playout automation. Becoming one of the leaders in sports rights and production, Mediapro’s end-to-end services and capabilities, along with 25 years of experience within the industry, provide the knowledge to adapt to different broadcast necessities and come up with innovative and effective solutions.

>MEGAPHONE TV

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e’ll be at NAB showcasing our real-time interactive fan engagement platform, as well as giving a preview of our new prediction gaming feature!

>MICROSOFT

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heck out our Azure for Sports podcast featured on Spotify. Hear news, interviews, and conversations with the specialist and customer success teams dedicated to the sports industry at Microsoft.

>MO-SYS ENGINEERING

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o-Sys is an innovative designer and manufacturer of advanced image robotics and virtual and remote production products for the high-end film and broadcast industry. The MoSys product range spans remote heads and motion control, broadcast robotics, mechanical, and optical camera tracking for augmented reality and virtual production, and on-set visualization.

>NEMAL ELECTRONICS

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emal Electronics is an Emmy Award-winning U.S. manufacturer and distributor of a wide range of fiber optic, copper, and hybrid electronic cable, connectors, cable assemblies, panels, and reeler systems for AV, HD broadcast, RF, and data.

>NET INSIGHT

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or over 25 years, Net Insight has driven innovation in WAN contribution, remote production, network and media synchronization, and much more. The world’s leading content providers rely on Net Insight for the highest performing, most open video transport and media cloud technology. They stay with us as we are the industry standard in delivery, flexibility, and service across live contribution, distribution, and production media workflows. We are trusted to deliver the biggest sports events to audiences worldwide. We take responsibility. Whether it’s the big game or breaking news, our cutting-edge technology, robust platforms, and decades of proven expertise make it happen across managed and unmanaged IP networks. We help you to do it your way through a flexible mix of virtualized and physical technology. We are proud to be the only platform that supports all the major industry standards, protocols, and clouds to reduce risk and deliver results.

>OPENDRIVES

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he entire OpenDrives organization is eagerly anticipating the upcoming 2022 NAB Show. After two years of virtual meetings, we’re really looking forward to returning to Las Vegas and greeting old friends and new. As an enterprise data storage company with a solid market reputation for designing simple, flexible, and highly performant solutions, OpenDrives will be upping the ante and debuting our aspirational “Open ecosystem” built upon the principles of open standards, open integration, and inspired by open communications with our customers. We’d love to gain a better understanding of your organization’s unique goals and challenges — we craft each demonstration to showcase the features and functions that address your top priorities and can empower your team to outperform in any operational scenario. If you’d like to know more about the new Open ecosystem, we’d welcome booking an hour of your time during the show so we can concentrate solely on your needs, requirements, and desired outcomes for nextgeneration data storage.

>OPENGEAR PARTNERS

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ee openGear leader partners at NAB Show: AJA Video Systems, Cobalt Digital, D2D Technologies, Decimator Design, MultiDyne, Ross Video, and VITEC. openGear gives you the freedom to choose technology from a wide range of products to meet the needs of your broadcast, production, or distribution facility while maintaining a compatible openGear frame infrastructure. openGear is the industry standard platform of choice for modular signal

processing. openGear is a registered trademark of Ross Video Ltd. Get the new 2022 Ultimate openGear Applications Guide: www.opengear. tv/ultimate-application-guide

>PANASONIC

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anasonic will showcase its latest advancements in video technology, including its industry-leading PTZ ecosystem, full range of broadcast studio cameras, and ROP models designed to complement any requirements and budgets. Panasonic’s technology provides a complete package to support live event production, automated smart studios, and connected communications. Attendees can demo its latest line of live video production and remote camera solutions, including the PTZ Camera lineup and the Tecnopoint Robotic Camera Systems, which provide broadcast-quality movement of the PTZ cameras to enhance production value with broadcast-style on-air movements. Panasonic will also demonstrate the power of live streaming through its PTZ lineup, which make capturing and airing a high-quality live stream fast, easy, and intuitive. Also on display will be the KAIROS live production platform, a flexible, expandable and low latency IP based switcher that offers an open architecture system for live video switching with complete input/output flexibility. KAIROS is the ultimate IT/IP platform solution for unlimited control to craft amazingly immersive experiences.

>PHENIX REAL TIME SOLUTIONS

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henix will be showing several video case studies from clients leveraging our real-time streaming technology. We will highlight our multi-camera feature that allows fans to watch a game from up to seven different camera angles as well as several sports betting use cases.

>PLATINA SYSTEMS

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latina Systems is modernizing one of the largest archives in sports. How? By providing the public cloud benefit of easy operations with the control and economic benefits of your own physical infrastructure. The modern archive relies on agile infrastructure to access, process, and deliver content resources — and to do so dynamically, efficiently, and cost-effectively. Freed from legacy content preservation, your archive provides the foundation for successful monetization efforts. Platina reduces your operational burden by eliminating the complexity that comes along with managing silos of compute, storage, and networking. Unlike DIY solutions that require significant time and expertise to implement, Platina focuses on simplifying the deployment and operations of a cluster, whether in a small test and development environment or a large-scale production environment. Find us in the Dell booth. We’re

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NAB2022PREVIEW excited to demonstrate how to take control of your infrastructure: http://www.platinasystems.com. Looking forward to seeing you at NAB 2022!

>PLIANT TECHNOLOGIES

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liant Technologies is presenting High Density mode for both its CrewCom and CB2 wireless intercom systems at NAB 2022. High Density mode is a selectable mode of operation that increases user densities. For CrewCom, this new software-selectable mode supports up to 32 Radio Packs (RPs) on a single Radio Transceiver (RT) while dynamically allowing any four of the RPs to communicate in full-duplex across four available talk paths. For CB2, the High Density mode supports up to 16 Radio Packs (RPs) on a single BaseStation. In addition, users of both systems will have the flexibility to simultaneously deploy “Normal” mode-enabled RPs and RTs (synced BaseStations for CB2) along with High Density mode-enabled hardware, providing adaptability for application-specific setups.

With this new, downloadable firmware update, both the flagship CrewCom (firmware v1.10) and CrewCom CB2 (firmware v1.1) offers users of all budgets and production sizes an even more feature-packed wireless intercom solution.

>PROGRAM PRODUCTIONS

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s North America’s #1 provider of live event labor, Program Productions crewed more than 25,000 broadcast event days in 2021. PPI’s national reach and local expertise allowed for the great event comeback from Covid. In 2021, Program and affiliated companies launched a new version of our popular enterprise resourcemanagement platform ProCrewz with several groundbreaking new features. Crewers can offer assignments, freelancers can accept gigs, and crew members can punch-in and out from site — all within the mobile app and desktop portal, which already allow users to view schedules and job information, track work hours, submit expenses, and seamlessly process payroll. In 2021, as event days reached record highs and crewing logistics became significantly more challenging, these features were nothing less than essential.

And we’re just getting started. In 2022, expect more updates to ProCrewz as we continue to innovate the live-event space. Catch all the action at ProCrewz.com and ProgramProductions.com.

>PSSI GLOBAL SERVICES

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SSI Global Services’ sole focus is making your television broadcast the best it can be.

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From transmission services and engineering solutions to complete event management, our team is here to support your success. We are the leading experts in our industry, and we support our expertise with cutting-edge technology and the largest fleet of transmission and production vehicles in North America.

>PUGET SYSTEMS

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uget Systems is a custom computer company building high-performance, highly reliable systems. We believe computers should be a pleasure to purchase and own. One of our core missions is to cut through the hype of the industry and get to what it takes to make a highquality workstation that gets work done, and is not a hindrance. To achieve this goal, we make it our mission to be experts in computer hardware and the software you use as well and apply this knowledge to our personal consulting and lifetime technical support.

>Q5X

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5X has evolved audio capture in professional sports and become the leader in wireless sports audio, with installations in dozens of major sporting arenas, most professional sports leagues, and major TV networks. These advancements in sports audio capture have translated exceptionally well into other fields, surpassing traditional audio transmitters with a mature, unrivaled solution for live theatre, reality shows, film and television series, public speaking, and other live events.

>QUANTUM CORPORATION

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t NAB 2022, Quantum is ready to share the next step in empowering creative teams of all sizes in your facility, in the cloud, and everywhere in-between. See Quantum in Booth N4109 and N4106 to hear the latest announcement to help power your agile, insight-driven content production workflows with Quantum StorNext and Quantum CatDV. From independent and mobile content teams that need collaborative shared storage tightly integrated with Quantum CatDV asset management, to hypercompetitive content production teams that need to transform their workflows with powerful new NVMe, AI/ML, remote production, and cloud technologies — Quantum has the tools, technologies, and solutions you need. Learn more about Quantum’s solutions for media and entertainment at www.quantum.com

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>RIEDEL COMMUNICATIONS

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n 2022, Riedel’s MediorNet IP solutions for video and audio processing and distribution will make their much anticipated NAB debut.

At the very heart of the new MediorNet IP products lies the innovative MuoN SFP technology, which offers a flexible, small form-factor where a plethora of processing, such as encoding/decoding, ST 2110 gateways, up/down/ cross-conversion, and even a multiviewer, can essentially fit in the palm of your hand. The density achieved in such a small footprint is astounding and it easily scales! At the Riedel booth, visitors will also get the chance to get up close with MicroN UHD, the big brother to the award-winning MicroN media distribution and processing device, that adds more bandwidth, more I/O, higher resolutions, and more processing power to the MediorNet TDM platform. On the comms side, the company will be presenting a wealth of new additions and updates to their SmartPanel portfolio that will make the multifunctional interfaces of the 1200 and 2300 Series more powerful than ever.

Riedel’s SmartPanel concept decouples a keypanel’s capabilities from its hardware and turns it into a generic device to run apps for different purposes. These apps may unlock features ranging from advanced intercom to control, automation, or monitoring system functionalities. And since Riedel is constantly developing new apps, the SmartPanel’s capabilities continue to evolve with industry demands. Of course, Riedel will also be showcasing innovations and new features for their wired and wireless intercom product lines, Artist and Bolero, as well as a new addition to their headset range.

>ROSS VIDEO

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or the past five years, Van Wagner and Ross Video have been at the production helm of arguably the biggest sports and entertainment event on the planet. From the 2017 edition at NRG Stadium in Houston, TX, to last year’s spectacle at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa Bay, FL, both the Van Wagner and Ross teams have pushed the limits of live-in-stadium production for the NFL’s title game. The 2022 edition took place at the remarkable SoFi Stadium and was powered by the Unified Venue Control Solution from Ross. XPression Tessera engines were responsible for driving content pixel-accurately across all LED displays within the stadium on Sunday. Inside the production control room, two Ultrix Acuity switchers offered game-day operators a hyperconverged production solution that

merges switching, routing, multi-viewing, and signal processing into a single platform. PIERO Live was added for sports graphics analysis as well as virtual Down & Distance lines, and the new integration with the Mira replay system allowed for unmatched speed and total control of Piero replay content. On top of that, the Voyager graphics rendering solution, powered by the Unreal Engine from Epic Games, delivered augmented reality (AR) graphics for the event.

Along with ACID cameras, Furio robotic camera heads, and the Lucid Studio control system, Voyager highlighted scoring drives and other Next Gen Stats content to keep fans engaged and entertained. Tying together the entire production for a Unified Venue Solution was DashBoard.

Ross Video’s venue control software was used to trigger unforgettable take-over elements, providing a truly immersive experience for the more than 70,000 fans in attendance.

>RT SOFTWARE

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T Software will be showing how it has harnessed the power of AI and machine learning to make Tactic the fastest, most compelling, and — crucially — the quickest sports analysis and telestration graphics system available. Tactic now features automatic player and object tracking, automatic chromakeying and pitch calibration, automatic speed, and distance graphics plus intelligent graphical tools that combine together to give operators and presenters an easy-to-use graphics tool for delivering the most insightful sports analysis stories. The modular Swift product family covers off all other broadcast graphics requirements — manual and automated on screen overlays, virtual studios, video walls, and AR. The scalable engine starts with cost-effective NDI / web RTC and HDM output and can take you all the way to UHD HDR SDI and 2110 output. All products can be virtualized and web-based control surfaces makes the RT graphics products perfect for embracing emerging workflows including remote production.

>RTS INTERCOM SYSTEMS

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TS is looking forward to seeing current and new customers at NAB 2022 — a lot has changed since our last in-person NAB, and we’ve got a lot to talk about! Our focus areas for this year’s show will be our state-of-the-art solutions for multi-site and on-the-go productions, making the most cost-effective transition to IP, and our range of SMPTE ST 2110-ready options.

Visit us at Booth C6108 to discover #theRTSdifference and how our solutions can enable you to ride the wave of change. More compatible systems — supporting both open public standards (e.g., ST 2110, AES67, AES70, AES10) and manufacturer protocols (e.g., OMNEO and DANTE) to ensure interoperability. More complete range

of IP-based systems — from matrices to keypanels to beltpacks to intercom in the cloud via app. More intelligent IP connections for plug and play setup — with automatic recognition of devices on the network. Highly scalable systems — architected for users to create systems from 16 ports up to 1024 ports in 16-port increments.

Engineering, manufacturing, and logistics resources reinforced on a global scale as part of the Bosch Group.

>SEAGATE TECHNOLOGY

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upporting a wide-range of digital media workflows, Seagate Technology will showcase its portfolio of data storage solutions that manage the vast amount of digital content media and entertainment companies create. See how Seagate solutions are helping to speed up production and decrease costs while also enabling the technology trends that are revolutionizing the industry. Seagate will highlight multiple advanced data storage solutions meeting today’s requirements for more capacity and less transfer time, end-to-end data security including the data in transit, and ease of use.

Check out solutions for lightning-fast video workflows, sharing of large data files in multiusers environments, and unique block storage infrastructures. Do you need a way to efficiently avoid your network bandwidths when transferring large data sets? Do you need self-healing, self-managed block storage with less human intervention? Or do you need a frictionless cloud as-a-service model with predicable costs? Come see what Seagate is offering.

>SENCORE

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encore, the gateway to better video delivery, is proud to once again be exhibiting at NAB 2022 in Las Vegas. With new and innovative solutions in all aspects of video transmission, Sencore continues its tradition of delivering reliable, efficient, and affordable ways to transport contribution and distribution content. Sencore’s encoding, transcoding, decoding, and monitoring platforms push the boundaries of innovation with support for new compression standards, including protocol agnostic gateways featuring SRT, ZiXi, RIST, HLS, and RTMP support.

As an OEM, Sencore can pivot manufacturing to bring new technologies like ATSC 3.0 to market quickly and effectively. And as always, Sencore’s customer support remains the best in the business. Stop by our Booth (W7000) at NAB 2022 for a discussion on how we’re serving the largest media companies in the world and how your content workflow could benefit from our bestin-class solutions and customer service.

> SENNHEISER

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t NAB 2022, Sennheiser will showcase all of the audio equipment that a broadcaster

needs to take a superior sounding project from inception to broadcast. Sennheiser’s exhibit will include but is not limited to premium shotgun microphones such as the MKH 8060, the recently launched MKE 400 Mobile Kit and Evolution Wireless Digital system as well as headphones and in ear monitors, including some new innovations in these categories. Most importantly, Sennheiser will take it a step further this year with a special immersive audio section of the booth, demonstrating what it takes to create three-dimensional audio in virtual reality. This section will highlight Neumann studio monitors and virtual reality mixing software solutions from Sennheiser subsidiary Dear Reality. As immersive audio is quickly becoming an industry standard, this is a great opportunity for NAB attendees to get a firsthand look at the latest solutions for three-dimensional audio design.

>SHURE INCORPORATED

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hure has been making people sound extraordinary for nearly a century. Founded in 1925, the company is a leading global manufacturer of audio equipment known for quality, performance, and durability. We make microphones, wireless microphone systems, in-ear monitors, earphones and headphones, conferencing systems, and more. For critical listening, or highstakes moments on stage, in the studio, or on location, you can always rely on Shure. This year at NAB, visit our Booth to check out the ADX5D Axient Digital Dual-channel portable receiver.

Axient Digital has been the leading wireless microphone system for live touring. Now we have a portable solution designed specifically for broadcast applications. Whether slotted into a camera, in a sound bag, or on a cart, you can leverage the industry-leading wireless audio of Axient Digital.

>SIGNIANT

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ince we last gathered in Las Vegas in April 2019, Signiant has experienced unprecedented growth supported by our ongoing commitment to innovation. In 2021, Signiant acquired two companies — Lesspain Software and Levels Beyond — for their media industry expertise and technology. Signiant is leveraging these acquisitions to accelerate the delivery of new platform services that facilitate deeper interactions with media assets. At this year’s NAB Show, Signiant is introducing new capabilities on the Signiant Platform that make it easy to find, preview, and take action on media assets across distributed storage.

>SIMPLYLIVE

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implylive is a leading technology company developing innovative, gamechanging solutions for the broadcast and digital industries.

Simplylive is designed on a cutting-edge, flex-

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ible, and futureproof software defined architecture with the vision for an intrinsic migration from traditional hardware to IP, Data Center, and Cloud solutions. Simplylive offers a range of solutions for end-to-end production needs with the ViBox All-in-One live production systems, ViBox instant replay, or the RefBox official and coaching review applications. The Simplylive software architecture allows a seamless transition to remote production requirements or deployment to private data center or cloud models. Building upon our production tools for remote workflows, Simplylive has released the Web-Multiviewer for low latency web browser based multiviewer distribution. Powerful and simple to implement, the Web-Multiviewer offers an unprecedented flexibility and ease to give mutliviewer access for local or remote production needs.

>SKYLINE COMMUNICATIONS

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t Skyline Communications, we deal in world-class solutions that are deployed by leading companies around the globe. But don’t just take our word for it. Check out our proven track record and see how we make our customers’ lives easier by empowering them to take their operations to the next level.

>SOLID STATE LOGIC

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olid State Logic (Booth C8008) has made significant developments to System T, their scalable, AoIP native production platform and the return of NAB for 2022 is the perfect opportunity to experience them. New TE1 and TE2 DSP engines and V3.1 software bring enhanced multi-operator remote production workflows and scalable DSP leveraging cloud technology.

Advanced Dante AoIP implementation featuring full routing control directly from the console with AES67 and ST 2110 integration. To help facilitate NGA workflows, System T offers channel and bus formats with 3D panning, built-in ambisonics decoding, and binaural rendering.

All of these new enhancements and more benefit Solid State Logic’s renowned superior sonic performance and legendary processing tools, as well as unmatched pre and post sale advice and support from their team of AoIP experts. Visit Booth.

>SONY ELECTRONICS

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t Sony, we want to be the driving force that inspires and enables you to enhance your storytelling. The way we create, deliver, store, and consume media is constantly changing, and we’re committed to giving you the tools and ex-

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pertise you need to stay agile, efficient, and creative — no matter what story you’re telling. Join us this year in Booth C10901 and be the first to interact with newly announced products, workflow solutions, and more. Uncover the production tools that can help you capture images that captivate. From our new F5500 Super 35mm system camera offering cinematic bokeh for live productions, to our latest 4K HDR monitors and workflow enhancements. Find out how Sony and Nevion can help you connect and manage your network utilizing media over IP systems.

Learn about our cloud-native solutions that combine innovative workflows with a scalable cloud platform, so you can empower teams to work together no matter where they’re located.

Discover the future of cinematography and the possibilities of Virtual Production, with digital cinema cameras and LED displays. We look forward to seeing you there.

>SPECTRA LOGIC

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pectra Logic has been going through a transformation over the past decade. We now offer a comprehensive suite of solutions that can address all your needs from ingest to distribution.

Whether you are looking to globally manage data across public and private clouds, facilitate distributed workflows, share content across sites and clouds, gain leverage against cloud providers, migrate your content to take advantage of modern platforms, create greater workflow automation, store data securely for any type of workload, protect data on an affordable, scalable platform, or any combination of these, Spectra Logic can help you.

>ST ENGINEERING IDIRECT

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ith a heritage of Media and Broadcast innovation that spans over 35 years, ST Engineering iDirect is a global leader in satellite communications. At NAB, we will launch our Next-Gen Broadcast equipment, designed and developed to meet the most extensive requirements of today’s use cases. ST Engineering iDirect also offers an industry-leading portfolio of products that can meet the needs of any remote production scenario or application. During the event, we will showcase SKYflow, a cutting-edge ABR (Adaptive Bit Rate) live streaming solution over satellite, leveraging multicast-ABR technology. SKYflow offers premium quality, cost-effective, wide reach, low latency delivery of live video to mobile devices and large screens alike and can serve a plethora of applications such as remote and distance learning, maritime entertainment,

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DTH and primary distribution, telco video, inflight entertainment, and enterprise video.

> STUDIO NETWORK SOLUTIONS

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tudio Network Solutions (SNS), the world leader in workflow storage servers for professional media teams, will be exhibiting at Booth N3420 at NAB 2022. Visit SNS to see the latest updates with EVO and the EVO suite of software tools, including enhancements to the powerful and easy-to-use ShareBrowser media asset manager, new cloud storage workflows, enhanced remote editing capabilities, and much more. SNS is a leading media technology company committed to helping audio and video production teams around the world transform the way they store, share, and organize media. By combining scalable, high-performance shared media storage hardware with powerful software and cloud workflow tools for teams working on-premise or remotely with Adobe Premiere Pro, Final Cut Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Avid Media Composer, Pro Tools, and other creative applications, SNS solutions empower post-production, broadcast, and VFX teams in over 70 countries to create amazing content, faster. For more information, visit snsevo.com

>SUITELIFE SYSTEMS

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uiteLife Systems (SLS) newest ‘Software Managed Services’ “Axess” brings remote Station and/or Studio Systems hardware into a single, advanced GUI. Integrating workflows, system management, device management, and control of realtime displays, our scalable and configurable software will further increase your efficiency. SLS Axess can integrate legacy non-API hardware to easily bring them online, as well as provide simultaneous access to the newest hardware with API, all with a single sign on. Axess can bring your Newtec encoder as well as your CPI Amp into a single, efficient, and manageable interface.

SuiteLife also provides MediaProxy lo LOG, and monitor all transport streams (including SCTE and CC.) Manage, monitor, and control your world, your way. Booth W6224.

>SYNAMEDIA

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ynamedia is committed to delivering the undisrupted experiences that viewers count on. Our award-winning portfolio includes intelligence-led anti-piracy, advanced advertising, business analytics, broadband, and video network solutions. At NAB, we look forward to providing demonstrations of our video network portfolio, consisting of solutions helping video service providers deliver ultra-low latency and

compelling video experiences. This includes our toolset supporting broadcasters on their ATSC 3.0 journey, VIVID software-defined workflows powering the transformation of their video infrastructure and our high-performance Edge CDN, optimizing localization of content to scale and deliver high throughput with low latency.

We’ll also showcase our security solutions that equip service providers and content owners with the tools they need to protect their content and services, thereby preserving their revenue.

With a multi-level holistic approach, these solutions help safeguard streaming services against pirates targeting vulnerabilities across the complex OTT ecosystem.

>TAG VIDEO SYSTEMS

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t NAB 2022, TAG will be showing its Media Control System (MCS) — the newest layer in the company’s unique and groundbreaking open-source Realtime Media Platform (RMP).

MCS serves as an aggregation engine that uses the power of the cloud and machine learning to expose data to standard third party analytic and visualization applications such as Elasticsearch, Kibana, Grafana, and Prometheus. The raw data and metrics are aggregated, correlated, validated, and measured to create actionable insights resulting in better performance and improved Quality of Service and Quality of Experience.

Broadcasters can measure internet networks and CDN performance across all signals and know where to shift workloads for optimum performance. Other highlights include TAG’s support for the latest technology, protocols, formats, and delivery methods including the latest series of Intel Xeon processors and PCIe4 architectures, AWS Cloud Digital Interface (AWS CDI), and NDI 5.

>TEDIAL

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rawing on its long-standing IT heritage, Tedial’s transforming and redefining media business efficiency and technology stratagems with the introduction of smartWORK, a unique Media Integration Platform. smartWORK democratizes business processes, empowering users to define integrations autonomously — without vendor participation — creating workflows in a flexible and agile manner eliminating point-to-point paradigms. Aligned with Movielabs’ 2030 Vision for Media Creation, the platform removes complex configurations providing a common User Interface that guarantees optimal user experience and easy access to all applications, Media services (including any MAM), and features self-validation. smartWORK’s NoCode architecture allows non-technical users to concentrate on creativity, not technology, and address rapidly changing customer conditions. Benefits include unprecedented

flexibility, seamless and effortless integrations, reduced costs, enhanced team collaboration, improved profitability, accelerated growth, and dramatically shorter delivery times. Following the Infrastructure as a Code (IaaC) smartWORK can be deployed on-premises, on any cloud, or in a hybrid architecture.

>TELEMETRICS

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elemetrics continues to support its customers and keep them safe with new camera control features and functionality that address the challenges today’s production studios face while simultaneously making them more productive. This year’s expanded lineup to be exhibited at NAB 2022 (Booth C5326) includes updates to the OmniGlide Robotic Roving Platform; new streamlined workflow features and expanded capability for the company’s AIassisted reFrame Talent Tracking and Automatic Shot Correction software (built-into the RCCP2A STS Control System); updates to its popular RoboEye 4K Pan/Tilt Camera system; a new multi-function PS-RM2-48 power supply that can be controlled remotely over Ethernet; and a new extended range (descending) addition to the Televator product line.

>TELESTREAM

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elestream has grown significantly from its original “transcoding roots” to be at the forefront of innovation in the digital video industry. The company currently develops industry-leading products and services for media processing and workflow automation, live capture, streaming, production, video quality assurance, content management, and video and audio test solutions. Telestream products and services directly support the production and postproduction workflows of the world’s largest events, such as the world’s largest sporting events, while also enabling the streaming of smaller productions like local sporting events, worship services, and corporate communications. At NAB 2022, Telestream will be showing the latest solutions for live and studio production, postproduction, advertising, VOD, content management, and monitoring. New offerings in live streaming and secure video hosting will also be in attendance, demonstrating how corporations and content creators can easily create high-quality, fully-branded professional broadcasts. Attendees will be able to see how these solutions can be deployed in a variety of ways, including on-premises, virtually in the cloud, or as software as a service (SaaS).

>TELLYO

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t NAB 2022, Tellyo will be demonstrating the latest version of Stream Studio — our complete cloud production platform for digital and social media teams working in broadcast

and sports. Stream Studio makes frame-perfect switching of a live multi-camera production in the cloud a reality, thanks to a new stream synchronization engine that precisely synchronizes inputs from multiple camera feeds (SMPTE 12M SEI in-band timecode metadata and ‘wallclock’ NTP/PTP timestamps are both supported). Tellyo will also be demonstrating the Tellyo Pro video clipping/editing/publishing solution — enabling you to easily create and publish clips, highlights packages, and montages — and showing how Tellyo Guest helps you bring up to 16 remote contributors into your live production quickly and efficiently. Finally, we’ll be looking at how Tellyo Talent leverages the relationship between your talent/brand ambassadors/sponsors and their social media audience, building reach and engagement through approved content that talent can share with their fans.

>TELSTRA

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elstra Broadcast Services and the wider Americas Enterprise+Technology team will be showcasing multiple existing and new offerings and capabilities tailored to the needs of media companies and broadcasters. World-class media networks, including our Special Events Network, Global Media Network, and our new Internet Delivery Network, which is a new offering through Telstra’s acquisition of MediaCloud.

With this acquisition, Telstra also enhanced its UK broadcast operations with a new master control room in London.

>THE STUDIO-B&H

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he Studio-B&H is a unique service-based environment dedicated to providing comprehensive solutions to all professional media markets. The Studio and its state-of-the-art Technology Center offer unmatched access to high-end technology as well as a superior level of expertise in all aspects of digital cinema, live broadcast production, postproduction, virtual production, emerging technologies, and their related digital workflows. The Studio has assembled a highly skilled team of accomplished professionals to provide solutions for nearly any media environment. These solutions include technology demonstration, testing, and experimentation, as well as a wide range of system design services and integration for all vertical segments of the media industry, from independent filmmakers to major broadcasters.

>THE SWITCH

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n the action-packed world of live video production and distribution, The Switch is always on and always there — setting the industry benchmark for quality, reliability, and unmatched levels of service. Our comprehensive production platform combines mobile and athome/remote services and includes the provi-

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NAB2022PREVIEW sion of highly skilled production personnel to enable our customers to cost-effectively capture, edit and package compelling live coverage. The Switch global transmission network connects over 800 of the world’s largest content producers, distributors, and sports and event venues — seamlessly linking rightsholders, broadcasters, streaming platforms, media outlets, and web services. With connections across the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Switzerland, Australia, New Zealand, and Singapore, all our feeds are monitored for utmost reliability from our 24/7 Network Operation Centers (NOCs) in Los Angeles, New York, and London. Founded in 1991 and headquartered in New York, we’ve been connecting viewers around the world to live events for almost three decades, bringing them the content they want across linear TV, on-demand, and streaming platforms — on multiple screens and devices.

Our services are trusted every day by corporate enterprises and leading sports, esports, news, entertainment, house of worship and government organizations that rely on The Switch to turn on their live content. Our customers include leaders in the Tech industry — Amazon, Facebook, LinkedIn, Microsoft, Twitter and Yahoo; major global broadcasters — BBC, CBS, CNN, Fox, NBC and Sky; and household names in the field of sports — ESPN, MLB, NBA, NHL, NFL, and PGA.

>THE VCC (THE VIDEO CALL CENTER)

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he VCC (The Video Call Center) makes it possible to leverage billions of internetconnected devices to extend reach, lower costs, and facilitate location-agnostic workflow for live production. If you are using smartphones or laptops to create remotes, then no doubt you’ve experienced headaches. Dropped video calls mid-broadcast, high-latency audio looking like a poorly dubbed foreign film, broken conversations, pixelation, contributors struggling to connect, and time-consuming workflows. In short, consumer video conferencing tools simply are not professional broadcast solutions. VCC’s recently launched AirFirst addresses all of these challenges and more. AirFirst is the first cloudcontrolled management platform that provides producers with superior-quality, lag-free workflows for high-speed, high-volume control of live remote contributors anywhere in the world.

VCC customers have reduced acquisition time, improved quality, and impressed contributors, all while improving team communications and

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efficiency. Leading industry news, sports, and entertainment producers have used the platform for more than 20,000 connections.

demonstrating its cloud and IP products at Booth W3806 at NAB 2022.

>TSL PRODUCTS

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t NAB 2022, TSL Products will showcase its new SAM-Q-NET audio monitoring tool.

SAM-Q-NET introduces TSL’s SAM-Q advanced audio monitoring capabilities to an IP networked world, with support for ST 2110-30, ST 2022-7 and multiple control options including NMOS. On board redundant 1G Ethernet connectivity vastly reduces the cost of deployment for audio monitoring where a 10G connection isn’t required. TSL’s new SAM-Q audio monitor is unique in its ability to allow users to tailor operations to different environments. Supporting several operational modes, which can be enabled and disabled as required, the SAM-Q is equally at home in operational positions in studio facilities, OB trucks, master control applications, and playout facilities. SAM-Q-NET is also equipped with both in-band and out-of-band control options, including NMOS support and a TSL RESTful API. SAM-Q-NET offers MADI and loudness software options.

>TVU NETWORKS

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VU has continued to expand its cloud-native remote production offerings with the launch of TVU Channel. Channel is a revolutionary cloud native playout solution developed for the world’s largest broadcasters but made available for anyone to use. It doesn’t operate on traditional infrastructure, which can be both expensive and complicated. Instead, TVU Channel can be deployed in minutes to schedule and manage one or hundreds of live content channels including linear, OTT, and social media. It’s intuitive user interface design borrows from familiar web-based calendars making it quick to get started and easy to use. TVU Channel supports live, pre-recorded, and pre-programmed content and operates continuously 24/7 with no downtime or scheduled interruptions required, making it reliable for primary or backup use. It’s also highly scalable, allowing you to add channels as you need them in minutes. TVU Channel is a part of the TVU cloud ecosystem for video production which includes TVU Producer for multicamera live video production using commodity internet, TVU Remote Commentator for high-quality live sports commentary delivered from anywhere, TVU Partyline for real-time collaboration with low latency and Mix minus audio, and the TVU Anywhere mobile app for HD live transmission. TVU will be

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>VERITONE

eritone is showing a suite of sports solutions to help content creators and rightsholders leverage their assets and scale production. Veritone Digital Media Hub is a cloud-native, AI-enabled digital asset management (DAM) platform that helps everyone from the San Francisco Giants to the NCAA make their assets discoverable, shareable, and easier to monetize. Save time and resources with AI-powered content ingest, metadata, and discovery. And create your own content marketplace to generate revenue off your media faster. As we prepare for more digitally immersive experiences, Veritone Veriverse offers sports entities a way to securely create synthetic media, scale content production, protect their visual and sonic identity, manage and monetize assets of all forms, and safely mint and sell NFTs and other digital assets. With our Metaverse Migration Services sports teams, leagues, federations, and athletes are supported as they begin to engage in metaverse environments.

>VERIZON BUSINESS GROUP

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erizon Business Group: Delivering the connected world. Simply. Securely. Reliably. In today’s rapidly transforming environment, we integrate, secure and operate the networks, and mobile technologies that help businesses in the sports and live events production industry accelerate innovation in the 5G era. To learn more, visit us in the Booth W6416.

>VIDEON LABS

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ideon and its partners from across the industry will be hosting an Innovation Lab on April 23-26 at Conrad Las Vegas at Resorts World. The Innovation Lab will showcase the specialized applications Videon’s partners have been developing and deploying to deliver unique live streaming experiences. Traditional live video workflows rely heavily on sending RTMP files from an encoder to the cloud for processing, increasing latency, OPEX, and overall workflow complexity. Edge computing for live video puts processing power where live video is created.

An edge computing video platform completes a range of functions on premise. Depending on the use case, this powerful platform eliminates the need for cloud workflows or augments the cloud’s capabilities, increasing flexibility, reliability, and efficiency and delivering video with ultra-low latency.

>VIDISPINE – AN ARVATO SYSTEMS BRAND

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he Vidispine portfolio enables companies working with media to focus on their core business by providing easy access to technology that supports their business needs. Our cloudbased media service platform ‘VidiNet’ enables customers to get the maximum value from their assets, rights, media inventory, and market.

One of its latest enhancements allow users to leverage Vidispine partner nablet’s expertise in automating digital supply chains with two powerful new AI-driven features of particular interest to the sports broadcast market; Shrynk and Heightscreen The AI routines have to date been trained on five different sports — football (soccer), ice hockey, basketball, handball, and singleseat motor racing — allowing nablet Shrynk to recognize key events such as a keeper saving a free kick or a missed 3-point shot in a basketball game.

>VISLINK TECHNOLOGIES

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t NAB 2022, Vislink will showcase a significant upgrade to Mobile Viewpoint’s IQ Sports Producer — the AI-powered automated camera system for sports production. With the launch of the new 4K resolution 50/60 frames per second Stellar Cam, production teams can capture a high-resolution panoramic image of the sports field with the ability to pan and zoom to the action as well as deliver close-up, detailed goal-line action. By utilizing the Stellar Cam and Mobile Viewpoint’s high performance AI production engine, the system can automatically track players and ball action effortlessly to capture the pace of the game. With high-resolution imaging covering the complete field of play, IQ Sports Producer can produce the equivalent of a fully manned multi-camera shoot at a fraction of the cost. Sports content producers can now affordably deliver and stream compelling content of sporting events while achieving production values only previously seen in top-tier productions.

>VITAC

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ITAC is thrilled to be a part of this year’s NAB Show in Las Vegas. VITAC offers a variety of accessibility solutions and offerings,

including closed captioning, audio description, subtitling, and transcription services. Captioning hundreds of thousands of programming hours each year, its customers include nearly every broadcast company, cable network, and streaming platform, among others. VITAC’s team of accessibility experts will be on hand to discuss its newest services, solutions, and offerings as well as provide updates on the latest captioning and accessibility trends in M&E. Stop

by Booth N6438 to meet the VITAC team, and learn how VITAC can make all of your projects accessible to everyone.

>VITEC

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ITEC will be exhibiting their Emmy Awardwinning IPTV platform for delivering video content to users on any network, to any device. VITEC’s IPTV platform includes modules for Digital Signage, Video Walls, On-Demand, and Video Archiving to provide a powerful solution for any enterprise network application from broadcast to military to sports venues. At NAB, a live demonstration of VITEC’s patented Multicast-to-the-Edge technology will be available which enables multicast delivery of live and recorded video streams all the way to enterprise users’ computers without going through an intermediate server or an external multi-unicast distribution server. This revolutionary technology will work on any browser (both Windows OS and Mac OS computers), without the need for browser plugins or browser extensions.

VITEC has completed the integration of the Exterity IPTV business and will be showcasing a broad portfolio of IPTV and digital signage solutions for corporate deployments, accommodation applications, and healthcare facilities.

>VIZRT GROUP

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izrt was extremely proud to be working with BBC Sport to deliver a cutting-edge virtual set graphics ecosystem to cover the Beijing Winter Games. BBC Sport’s innovative, integrated system brought sports fans unprecedented access to the action as it happened in China this past February. By utilizing Vizrt’s Viz Engine 4 coupled with the Unreal Engine 4 render pipeline and Vizrt’s Fusion Keyer, all driven

by Vizrt’s virtual set controller, BBC Sport was

able to create a seamless studio environment with easy operator control. One of the challenges the BBC needed to solve with this hybrid Unreal 4- Viz Engine 4 studio was enabling an operator-friendly workflow and streamlining content changes to provide viewers with meaningful information throughout broadcasts. The Viz Engine offers native integration of the Unreal Engine and the Viz Arc control application is the only one on the market where you can seamlessly control aspects of both render pipelines — allowing the producer to focus on the story being told, not the specifics of how the graphics are rendered.

>XYTECH

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ytech will showcase its new MediaPulse 2022, the latest update to its MediaPulse system, at Booth N6314 during NAB 2022.

This update focuses on the personalization of the MediaPulse experience tailored for each user and supported by a fast and robust user interface. Key highlights include the expansion of MediaPulse Mobile to allow users to access contact information, the inclusion of daily rates added into the ‘Personnel and Payroll’ Mobile tile, a ‘Budget Comparison’ function allowing users to select two bids to compare values, a multi-select dropdown menu displaying various budgets for reporting and analysis and the integration of calendar invitations with Google Mail APIs.

>ZERO DENSITY

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t NAB 2022, Zero Density will set up an AR demo space, a virtual studio, and pods to demonstrate the latest products and features.

Signature virtual studio demos showcasing the highest level of photorealism and advanced keying methods will take place every half hour. Reality 5, which is based on Unreal Engine 5 will be previewed in these demos. A dedicated space will be arranged for augmented reality presentation using broadcast graphics. The audience will see Zero Density’s newest hardware products such as RealityEngine AMPERE and TRAXIS talentS, first-hand. RealityEngine AMPERE is the ultimate workstation for virtual sets and broadcast graphics that doubles the rendering performance.

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SPONSOR UPDATE

>3G WIRELESS

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nnovation, Reliability, Customer Service, and Incredibly Talented People. These are the pillars 3g has built as its foundation to lead the way forward in RF video, audio, and specialty camera solutions for the broadcast industry. By combining these qualities with a relentless desire to push the boundaries of technology, 3g creates the partnering relationships that foster collaboration with our customers to find new solutions and efficiencies that deliver higher quality and results. We are and will continue to define the next generation of RF and specialty camera broadcast technology.

>ADVANCED IMAGE ROBOTICS

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IR provides a cloud-native REMI production platform that makes the live event camerato-viewer workflow radically less expensive, simpler, and more sophisticated. We combine connected, app-controlled digital cine-cameras with cloud-based routing, switching, graphics, and comms over a standard internet connection so your crew (including camera ops) can work from anywhere. No production truck needed and fewer crew onsite, means live event broadcasting is easier than ever. The AIR platform is better, faster, and a fraction of the cost of whatever you’re doing now.

> ADVANCED SYSTEMS GROUP

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dvanced Systems Group (ASG), announced its Virtual Production Control Room, a remote production service powered by Google Cloud that allows real-time, broadcast-quality coverage of live events. ASG’s VPCR uses cloudbased production tools from several established industry vendors to deliver a powerful virtual control room solution. A complete cloud solution, VPCR requires no on-prem services to deliver cost-effective content complete with dynamic switching effects, graphics, animations, and captions. Video and audio streams are encrypted for security, and access to each production is fully controlled. The system also supports major videoconferencing applications with multiple live participants. Driven by the need for remote production solutions during the COVID-19 pandemic, the VPCR system was developed around a multi-vendor environment that

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communicated on a standard, unified signal. It has been refined over the past year by addressing real-world challenges, including redundancy and reliability, while producing multiple shows with ASG clients.

>AE LIVE

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E Live continues to be a world-leading provider of broadcast solutions to global sports governing bodies, broadcasters, and production companies. We specialize in capturing, processing, and visualizing live sports data using innovative, creative, and informative on-screen graphics and augmented reality. We create, develop, and deliver virtual studios, on-air graphics, optimized feeds, graphics systems, virtual advertising, and in-stadia solutions across a broad range of platforms in multiple languages. As AE Live celebrates its 30th birthday, our reputation has been forged upon our ability to consistently deliver reliable, market leading innovative services in every corner of the globe with offices in the United Kingdom, South Africa, India, New Zealand, Australia, Malaysia, and the United States.

>ALL MOBILE VIDEO

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s one of the country’s premier providers of end-to-end video and audio solutions, we offer a full spectrum of production services: Mobile Production Units, Sound Stages, Post-Production, Streaming Services, Equipment Sales & Rentals, and Centralized Master Control. The All Mobile Video team commits to serving clients and building relationships, catering to the individual needs of each production with unparalleled attention to detail. From Video and Audio Engineers, Camera Operators, Editors, Graphics Specialists, Sound Designers, to Production Support — AMV boasts an experience level to rival anyone in the broadcast industry with a solid team of smart, strategically driven and highly trained thinkers.

>ALPHA VIDEO

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he Sports Group continues to specialize in helping clients find ways to use technology to engage fans, enhance teams, and expand revenue.

Now more than ever, cutting edge, affordable solutions that allow our clients to connect with fans wherever they can safely be is more

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important than ever. We are remote production experts, having helped multiple media publishers, teams, and leagues pivot some of their postproduction and live production systems to remote and virtual models over the last two years. We are currently working on several new hybrid projects that combine the best of onpremise production facilities with the capabilities of cloud-based, remote production facilities. We are also near completion on several other large projects, including full control room upgrades for the Minnesota Twins, Toronto Blue Jays, and Sporting KC; a control room for Nashville MLS’s new stadium; a new esports production facility for Wisdom Gaming; and more.

> ARCTEK SATELLITE PRODUCTIONS

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RCTEK Satellite Productions will introduce a Ku-band Sprinter in mid-2022 that will pack a ton of capability hitting all your REMI and transmission needs. It joins their recently upgraded trucks (Black, Purple [both C-band] and Magenta [Ku-band]) with the ability to transmit a 10-path HD mux in HDR, 1080p, or 4K. ARCTEK can also service your encodingonly needs with a compact Mercedes Benz Metris outfitted with encoders, decoders, and monitors. In addition to college sports and pro bull riding, ARCTEK transmitted another season of Sunday Night Football and provided pre/ post-game production for BTN’s college football playoff coverage. ARCTEK is the company you want to call when you need reliability. ARCTEK is proud of its talented team who are ready to roll nationwide with its well-equipped Sprinter satellite trucks (three Ku-band and two C-band).

When you think satellite, think ARCTEK. Nothing is more reliable than satellite.

> ASTOUND BUSINESS SOLUTIONS

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stound Business Solutions, formerly RCN Business, provides IT leaders with highcapacity, secure connectivity for mission-critical applications while increasing overall agility and responsiveness to customer needs. As a national telecommunications provider, we offer advanced solutions that are delivered over a

diverse, carrier-grade network that we own and maintain, providing the speed, bandwidth, and reliability businesses need to support growing data demands. While we provide coast-to-coast connectivity to over 70,000 business customers, we maintain a local, customer-centric approach, with dedicated industry experts on-hand around the clock to help you stay on top of today’s evolving IT technology and remain competitive in their markets.

>ASU PRODUCTIONS

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on and Jessica Collopy started American Satellite Uplink in 2007. As the company progressed, they started doing more and more production work forming what eventually would become ASU Productions. Don started his career in the television industry with CBS Sports in New York City. In 1998, he began working for Fox News Channel as a satellite engineer on their New York satellite truck. He did extensive travel during his time at Fox News beyond his duties as a truck engineer. Don has covered some of the biggest news events over the 20 years. We wanted to use our many years of experience to provide a dependable solution for all of your uplink and production needs. We have a team of experienced and talented satellite engineers, photographers, and audio technicians who will provide our clients with the professional result they are expecting. We are looking forward to working with you on one of your future projects. Feel free to call anytime to discuss any of your production or satellite needs.

>ATOM CREEK

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tom Creek is an information technology solutions provider focused on the Media and Entertainment industry that enables businesses to maximize productivity and minimize disruptions. We provide comprehensive services in the design, build, and support of technology infrastructures while assessing and mitigating potential threats to security and business continuity. We are a customer-focused business that applies a consultative approach to evaluate, recommend, and deliver technology solutions for businesses of all sizes. In 2021, Atom Creek worked with a large regional sports customer to provide a centralized and complete storage solution that allowed for a robust data protection and disaster-proof strategy. Through our relationships with best-in-breed technology partners, we were able to design and implement high-performance storage solutions that meet customer requirements with less management and more efficiency.

>AUDAZZIO

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udazzio is a disruptive media company delivering innovative technologies enabling broadcasters and event producers to

seamlessly change fans’ mobile phone content, fully coordinated with their broadcast or event in real-time. Audazzio’s Live QR technology uses inaudible high-frequency sound waves to change the content on mobile phones and tablets. Live QR is seamless; it’s like a QR code, but no one has to physically scan it. Audazzio delivers an entirely new marketing channel for advertisers and valuable new space for creative teams and content producers. The result is a new fan engagement model in live sports, studio shows, mobile gaming, podcasts, and many other applications. Without Audazzio, consumers are engaged in activities on their mobile devices unrelated to your event, diverting revenue to other media properties. With Audazzio, clients will be more connected to your programming than ever before, enjoying exciting new enriching storytelling content, creating an immersive experience.

>AVS

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VS is part of the NEP Broadcast Services Company and the leader in high-bitrate wireless 4K, HD, and aerial production with over 120 Vislink HD and 4K RF systems, including the new HCAM. AVS offers two 4K GSS and four Cineflex gyro-stabilized camera systems for vehicles, boats, helicopters, or its three Partenavia fixed-wing aircraft for aerial coverage. They also collaborated with Vislink and Canon to provide the Canon C-500 shallow depth of field camera with control. AVS inventories the Sony P-50 cameras and was the first to integrate these into RF Steadicam systems with video return and prompter. This is the preferred package for major sporting events including Sunday, Monday and Thursday Night Football; the Super Bowl; NBA All Stars; and virtually every live award and entertainment show. AVS is a part of NEP’s Specialty Capture division alongside BSI and the Fletcher Group.

>AZZURRO HD

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zzurro is excited to announce the rollout of our next generation of studio control software. Azzurro’s NICO application provides an easy-to-use, customizable interface for unlimited control of cameras, lighting, audio, etc. It is scalable for small or large broadcast operations. Real-time video is displayed providing the user a true, live representation without any lag. Browser-based, it is available on all platforms (Mac, PC, mobile, tablet).

Meanwhile, Azzurro just wrapped up a week of Super Bowl coverage in LA. Our Azzurro TX systems provided bi-directional transport streams and comms from the NFL Network stage at Radio Row, as well as backstage interviews at the NFL Honors show. An Azzurro UTX, our remote-controllable

insert studio, was used by Fox Sports for live interviews from their Radio Row set as well.

Azzurro is now gearing up for support at the NFL Combine and Draft. Learn more at www. azzurrogroup.com.

>BCE

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roadcasting Center Europe (BCE) is a European leader in media services, system integration, and software development in the areas of television, radio, production and postproduction, telecommunication, and IT. With more than 200 highly qualified and motivated people, BCE serves about 400 clients in various sectors, such as TV channels, radio stations, film distributors, producers, advertising companies, telecommunications operators, and public services.

>BECKTV

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eckTV is a premier design-build systems integrator. We’ve been serving broadcast customers across the United States for almost 40 years, with clientele ranging from broadcast and cable networks, local TV stations, sports trucks, and stadium venues to educational institutions and houses of worship. We’re proud that our customers come back to us repeatedly and to speak our praises. This year’s planned installs include a CMS upgrade for an NFL stadium (a longtime client); a SMPTE 2110 system upgrade for the Baltimore Ravens; expanding production facilities for the UFC; a full-HD HDR control room for a NHL arena; and a SMPTE 2110 4K HDR setup for an MLB park. We’re excited to continue working with longtime partners and to take on new clients in 2022.

>BELDEN

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elden cabling and connectivity supports the technology that will help make safe re-entry for fans possible. To create touchless, safe, and immersive experiences, sports and entertainment venues are relying on Belden for end-to-end infrastructure solutions that bring connectivity, interaction, and emerging technology to life. Fans can look forward to an innovative experience with mobile ordering, real-time density mapping, mobile betting, and precise wayfinding all within an in-stadium app. Immersive technologies with augmented/mixed realities will enhance the game-day experience like never before. We’re proud to be part of the world’s biggest, most wellknown venues, from SoFi Stadium and the new Climate Pledge Arena to Major League Soccer’s boom with Austin FC and the Columbus Crew venues. We’re so excited to contribute to the return of safe sports and entertainment events — and making them better than ever. Don’t wait!

The time to upgrade your infrastructure is now.

SPONSORUPDATE >BEXEL

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exel, an NEP Broadcast Services Company, is the leading global provider of broadcast solutions. For 40 years, Bexel has supported major broadcasters in bringing the most important events to a global audience. Our team of technicians and engineers build custom, scalable broadcast solutions for a range of services including production equipment rentals, RF audio, 4K technology, fiber optic solutions, virtual production, and systems integration.

Bexel is supported by the strength and resources of the NEP Worldwide Network, ensuring superior, consistent service anywhere in the world, with technical support available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. We have the proven experience and industry-leading technology to cover your live sporting event, entertainment production, studio facility, venue, or house of worship, and government broadcast.

>BITFIRE NETWORKS

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itFire Networks has emerged as the one-stop solution for seamless, distributed broadcast productions, experiencing continued company expansion amid a year of explosive growth. Using BitFire’s custom-developed transport protocol, clients like MLB, CBS Sports, the NHL, PGA Tour, NCAA Tournament, and Tamron Hall relied on BitFire to solve their production needs, reliably and at an extremely cost effective price. BitFire opened a state-of-the-art production studio in Phoenix, unlike any other in the United States, as our team expands our core product offering with an eye towards the ever-changing landscape of content production. This 16,000 sq. ft. facility is complete with two sound stages and immersive LED walls and floors — cutting-edge technology that highlights the use of Virtual Reality. The team at BitFire has combined an advanced IP transport network, with remote production services, all under one roof, playing a unique role in the changing face of traditional broadcasting.

>BLACKBIRD

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lackbird is the world’s fastest, most powerful professional cloud video editing and publishing platform. Enabling remote editing, Blackbird provides rapid access to video content for the easy creation of clips, highlights, and longer form content to multiple devices and platforms.

A fully-featured editor accessed through any browser, easy to learn and needing only limited bandwidth to use, Blackbird powers significant productivity and efficiency benefits for any enterprise organization working with video. An

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ultra-green technology, Blackbird supports the carbon reduction goals of the media production industry. In the past year we’re delighted to have expanded our sports client list to include high profile organizations such as FIFA, Eurovision Sport, BT Sport, and Athletes Unlimited.

>BROADCAST MANAGEMENT GROUP

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roadcast Management Group is leading the industry in utilizing the REMI workflow model to cover sports. BMG is utilizing state of the art technology in a centralized location and leveraging the ability to hire the most talented staff, no matter where they are located in the world. In 2021-2022, we were awarded a contract with the Big West to produce all of their Championship sports events; a contract with Sinclair Broadcast Group to produce Henderson Silver Knights Hockey Games; a contract with ESPN for sports packaging; and a contract with Stadium to produce the weeklong BetM Roadshow at Mandalay Bay. We are also excited have double the capacity of our Las Vegas based REMI Broadcast Hub and rolled out a new REMI mobile unit.

> BROADCAST SERVICES INTERNATIONAL

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roadcast Services International is a recognized leader in domestic and international broadcast markets. Providing full turn-key production solutions including technical consulting, equipment rentals, RF wireless solutions, commentary systems, and host broadcast packages. BSI has recently wrapped up its busiest season in its 30-year history with four snow sport World Championships, two skating events, LAAC Golf, systems integration for BBC Sport in Beijing, Technical Management Services for NBC Olympics in Beijing, and capping the season off providing international commentary services to both the Super Bowl and NBA All Star. Looking forward, BSI will quickly move into an already busy spring and summer months providing production services at the Masters Golf and World Track and Field in Eugene, OR. BSI has also added to its equipment roster with new Sony 4300 cameras, a Calrec Brio, and a host of new gear to ensure BSI’s clients continue to receive world-class production services and equipment.

> BROADCAST SPORTS INTERNATIONAL

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t Broadcast Sports International (BSI), our engineers and operations team are at the leading edge of turnkey custom broadcast

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solutions — we’ve done it for more than 35 years.

Our work spans some of the largest and most important events in broadcast history. Founded in 1979 by an entrepreneurial team of engineers, BSI now employs nearly 200 people worldwide and boasts a 50,000 square foot U.S. headquarters just outside of Baltimore and an international office near London. Our fleet of state-of-the-art production trailers are in action every weekend of the year at major live events. As part of the NEP Worldwide Network, we are focused on delivering innovative solutions for our broadcast partners.

>C360

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360 Technologies is a computer vision SaaS company that provides solutions to broadcasters and sports leagues racing to capture D2C OTT marketshare by producing more immersive media. Our proprietary image processing and ultra-high-quality video output has earned us strategic partner relationships with the NHL, ESPN, Fox Sports, CBS Sports, NBC, NASCAR, and more. If you’ve watched the line to gain immersive video feed during a Monday, Thursday, or Sunday NFL game, then you’ve seen our technology in action.

>CES POWER

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ith over 20 years of power experience, we deliver specialized support services for large-scale festivals, concerts, films, broadcasts, sporting events, disaster response, military exercises, and field hospitals. Our fully integrated power solutions are customized for your event and backed by worldwide, 24/7 service. Our people are committed, our equipment is industryleading, and our experience is unmatched. When all eyes are on your event, trust the name that earns applause every time.

>CHESA

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HESA is a Systems Integrator and Support Provider. With their national team of media technology specialists, they are responsible for complete media workflow consultation, technology design and delivery for production, postproduction, broadcast, and archives, and includes a Federal division. From consultation to design, installation to support, they assess media technology needs, prepare clients for future content demands, and develop systems that optimize workflow with future growth in mind.

>CINESYS

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ineSys is a Broadcast and Media Systems Integrator providing solutions, integration and support for digital content creators across

North America. With extensive IT experience and a foundation in media, CineSys serves a range of industries from postproduction companies to broadcast and sports organizations.

Recently, CineSys has helped businesses of all sizes implement cloud and hybrid solutions by leveraging existing infrastructures and providing secure remote environments. With growing development and MAM teams in-house, CineSys can help you make the most of your workflow with customized collaborative solutions. Are you looking to take advantage of your sports archives, need easy remote access and sharing capabilities, or more efficient storage for the ever increasing amounts of data? Get in touch with CineSys to discuss how they can help strengthen and accelerate your workflow, so that you can focus on growing your business.

>CIS GROUP

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or over 30 years, CIS has been a systems integrator and value-added reseller providing innovative technology solutions to the Media & Entertainment industry and servicing a variety of clients throughout Latin America and the U.S. In doing so, we have delivered dozens of successful projects and continued to support those installations post-deployment in a way that ensures our clients are not having to wrestle with technology, but rather can focus exclusively on their creative process. As a company comprised of engineers and strategists who understand the biggest trends driving the future of MediaTech, our core expertise is around broadcast and entertainment (including news, sports, TV drama, and film, among others), but we also service non-media institutions, such as houses of worship, educational entities, and corporations.

Working with various industry-leading partners like Adobe, Avid, AWS, EditShare, Glookast, Google Cloud, LucidLink, Mjoll, NewTek, Object Matrix, and TVU Networks (to name a few), CIS designs workflows and integrates systems based on proven and reliable technologies.

>CLARK

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lark has over 25 years of history revolutionizing how creative content producers engage their audience and further their mission. From the very beginning, Clark has been on the leading edge of innovation by pioneering practical and relevant solutions to today’s challenges. Clark is partnering with a transformative new sports league, Overtime Elite (OTE), on their new Atlanta-based broadcast facility and venue. Clark’s extensive experience with professional broadcast systems and video transmission has perfectly aligned the partnership with OTE. The desire for creative workflows and the mixing of the cinematic and broadcast worlds within their new facility was

a task Clark was ready to tackle. The team and Clark’s experience in sports broadcasting has charted a path for expansion and growth well into the future.

>CP COMMUNICATIONS

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P Communications recently launched its FastReturn secure video management platform, one of two new Red House Streaming solutions along with Virtual Media Center, a platform built for journalists remotely covering sports and events. Both use WebRTC cloudbased technology and were proven in the field during the Fall 2021 editions of TCS New York City Marathon and Bank of America Chicago Marathon. FastReturn allows users to access production content on smartphones, tablets, laptops, desktops, and certain digital media players. It can ingest any H.264 baseline profile RTMP stream, supporting HD resolution and 128kbit stereo audio with bitrates up to 10 MBps with less than 400ms of latency. FastReturn can also spin up edge servers around the world that are geographically closer to the production, providing lower latency and better reliability. The base package includes five streams and supports up to 100 users, and scales to support additional sources and larger crews.

>CREATIVE MOBILE SOLUTIONS

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reative Mobile Solutions provides tapeless workflow solutions for live events and studio-based shows. We stay on the cutting edge of tapeless workflow and use our expertise daily in live production environments. Our goals are increasing efficiency and saving your production time and money. We provide services for television, film, commercial and other video productions. The experts on our team have worked with TV shows like Survivor and The Apprentice, films including Iron Man and Sex and the City: The Movie, award show like the Oscars, the Golden Globes, and the MTV VMAs, and major sporting events such as ESPN’s ESPY Awards, the Grand Prix de Trois-Rivières, the US Open (Golf Channel and ESPN), ESPN College Football Gameday, the NBA Finals, and the Super Bowl.

>CSP MOBILE PRODUCTIONS

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n business for over 25 years, CSP Mobile Productions is one of the fastest growing mobile HD and digital television production companies in the U.S. The company provides clients with the highest quality mobile television facilities, the most professional and service-oriented staff, and the best equipment at reasonable prices. With one of the industry’s newest fleets, CSP’s mobile units are cutting-edge, powerful, and efficient, and they can be on location for any level of need in the majority of North America. In a competitive business where you are only as good as your last

job, CSP has earned its reputation for being on time, on budget, and on target.

>CTI

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TI recently completed a $2.5 million upgrade to the Philadelphia Union video system.

Philly Union, an MLS club, makes their home at Subaru Park in Philadelphia. The technology revamp included giving the Union’s creative team HDR and native 4K capabilities. This mission critical system can be maintained remotely. At a moment’s notice, CTI can connect through the network and work with the Philly Union’s systems. The Subaru Park renovation is an example of partnering with both the client, the manufacturer, and an integrator like CTI to deliver an unmatched game-day experience for the fans.

>DAKTRONICS

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aktronics Creative Services partnered with the Central Collegiate Hockey Association (CCHA) for the 2021 season. The CCHA needed cohesive branding to lead the conference and their affiliated schools. The addition of Daktronics AJT Live Book technology for live streaming productions delivered a new level of professionalism and unlocked new capabilities that also required intuitive graphics. To deliver the desired functionality and brand experience, as well as maximize the capabilities of the Live Book for each of the eight CCHA schools, Creative Services leveraged their expertise in technical functionality and paired it with the creative elements for the entire package. This allowed each of the eight schools in the conference to be using the same system for game-day productions as well as carry consistent, professional-level conference graphics. The conference and its teams are now on a professional level with a graphics presentation that rivals the highest levels of the sport.

>DALE PRO AUDIO

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he broadcast audio world may be constantly changing, but one thing has stayed the same at Dale Pro Audio: over 65 years of commitment to customer service and expertise. We have a sales and support team second to none, carry hundreds of the industry’s best brands, and stock thousands of products in our NYC warehouse.

We’re tirelessly helping audio professionals find ways to maximize their workflows, face logistical challenges, and get sound where it needs to go as efficiently as possible. Whatever today’s (or tomorrow’s) audio landscape may look like, you can count on us to continue to be “A Partner in Your Success”.

>DELTATRE

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eltatre’s market-leading product and services portfolio has helped redefine the way the

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SPONSORUPDATE world consumes sport, media, and entertainment by offering specialist innovations in over-thetop streaming, websites and apps, graphics, data, officiating systems, user experience, and product design. Under our new CEO, Andrea Marini, our global growth continues. Deltatre is proud to employ more than 1,000 staff who are globally distributed across its hubs in 18 key cities. In the last 12 months, we’ve brought to market bestin-class solutions for industry luminaries such as Rogers Sports and Media, Bally Sports, Major League Soccer and Volleyball World. Our product development continues apace. We’ve expanded the sporting capabilities of our renowned targeted UX Management tool AXIS, and extended our integration with LiveLike to enhance the fan-first functionality in our video player, DIVA.

>DEVLIN DESIGN GROUP

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hen it comes to sports and esports set design, the team at Devlin Design Group covers all the bases. We understand engaging your fans is at the top of your game winning strategy.

We’re all in it to help you win them over! Fans like stories and react to captivating content about their favorite teams and players. Content comes alive with custom scenic design for your on-air team’s expert analysis of the day’s match, insightful interviews with your fan’s favorite athletes, and dynamic visuals. Our recent clients, the Tennis Channel, Riot Games LCS, Marquee Sports Network, and VENN, chose us because of what makes us different in sports and esports production. We’re constantly seeking out new ways to offer a fresh aesthetic to set design. We stand by our mantra: Creativity, Knowledge, and Innovation.

Our services include scenic design, lighting direction, virtual set design, fabrication, and lighting equipment.

>DISGUISE

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isguise is the platform to imagine, create, and deliver spectacular visual experiences.

Its award-winning extended reality (xR) solution has powered over 400 productions across live entertainment for music artists such as Katy Perry and Billie Eilish; film and episodic TV productions for Netflix and Amazon Prime; corporate presentations for Siemens and Verizon; and live broadcast programs from Eurosport, MTV, and ITV, in more than 40 countries. disguise xR enables production teams to create fully immersive production environments in LED volumes while allowing for real-time edits and iterations, speeding up production and increasing end quality. Recognized as one of the Financial Times’ top 1000 fastest

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growing businesses for 2021, disguise has recently announced new majority backing from investment firm Carlyle Group, with Epic Games taking a minority stake. With an ever-increasing global partner network, disguise is building the next generation of collaborative tools to help artists and technologists realize their vision.

>DIVERSIFIED

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echnology surrounds and engages, permeating the consciousness with sights and sounds. It’s facts, data. Pitch speed. 3-pointers shot and made. Yards needed in a game of inches.

But it’s much more. It’s a link. A connection between you and your fans. An announcer recounting the goal to thunderous roars. A fourth quarter hype video bringing the crowd’s soul to your team’s ear. Excitement. Engagement.

Empowerment. Images and sounds connecting you, telling your story. With more real-world experience than any other sports technology solutions provider, Diversified understands your technology needs. Replay control rooms, sound, core IT networks, social media platforms, IPTV, electronic security, structured cabling, mobile production units, storage, and archive.

Even how to expertly navigate your transition to IP. Diversified is enabling a digital future by designing, building, commissioning and managing everything for you. For your fans. Your brand. Diversified is imagination engineered.

Learn more at onediversified.com/sports.

>DNA STUDIOS

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NA Studios, a Houston-based mobile provider has just completed their new broadcast facility near IAH Airport. The REMI studio boasts several control rooms, two full studios, offices, warehouse space, and truck parking. DNA has the ability to produce up to 12 events a day utilizing the Ross Carbonite switchers, EVS replay, Dante audio, and much more. From California to Florida, DNA Studios has exactly what you need for your next live production.

>DOME PRODUCTIONS

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ome Productions is one of North America’s leading production facilities providers, offering mobile production facilities, transmission services, studio facilities, and full turnkey host broadcast services. Dome has worked with all major broadcasters, leagues, teams, rightsholders, production companies, government parties, and other content creators. Dome has provided Host Broadcast production, engineering and transmission services to OBS, HBS, and many

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other international and domestic rightsholders and broadcasters on major international sporting events, and to the Government of Canada on many high-profile government events.

>DX3 MEDIA

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X3 Media is a media production management and consulting company. Its Managing Director has a reputation unparalleled in the industry with over 25 years experience providing cost-effective client options on a variety of projects. DX3 Media excels at providing out-of-the-box thinking resulting in creative solutions for clients’ project.

>EDGECAST

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he Edgecast Platform is the simplest way to prepare, deliver, display, and monetize your content. We give you all the benefits of the cloud in a pre-built solution optimized for live sporting event delivery. As live streaming experts, rest assured that we provide you with the best technology and engineers available to keep your live sporting events looking great with the personalization features you need to delight and engage your growing audiences for years to come. The platform is built on the world’s largest, most connected delivery network, ensuring highquality, instant-on viewing of digital content on every device, every time, everywhere. More than 10,000 of the world’s largest broadcasters and enterprises count on us to deliver seamless digital content for today’s demanding online viewers.

Visit us at edgecast.com

>ELUVIO

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021 was a breakthrough year for the adoption of blockchain technology and NFTs for monetization of digital content at scale. Over the span of less than 12 months, the field expanded from static digital art NFTs to encompass virtually every digital media format conceivable.

For example, NFTs can now serve as a secure, digital ticket to enter and watch a stream, or media/sports entities can mint derivative NFTs of collectable moments (i.e. video clips or images) from a streaming event, and sell it as a digital collectable. Blockchain decentralized distribution is an effective alternative to today’s conventional streaming video distribution approaches and part of the Web3 transition that is beginning to take place. Eluvio provides a novel blockchainbased streaming and ticketing platform for sporting events, concerts and more, distributed directly to global audiences with 4K streaming, NFTs, ticketing, and turnkey-marketplaces for any premium content.

>ENCOMPASS DIGITAL MEDIA

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ncompass provides world-class media services to professional sports leagues, top-tier networks and platforms, including content acquisition, media processing, playout, distribution, and disaster recovery.

On average, Encompass acquires/distributes 100,000 live events/feeds annually and services approximately 1,500 full-time channels globally on a daily basis. As a strategic technology partner, Encompass offers continuous innovation, supporting its customers’ business needs as the next generation of media workflows evolve to a fully managed virtual environment. The company’s private Altitude Media Cloud is designed around broadcast media interfaces, protocols, performance, and service levels.

Channels are deployed across diverse geographic regions, supporting both pre-recorded and live events with built-in disaster recovery. Not only does Altitude solve the issue of running critical broadcast applications on virtualized infrastructure, but it also provides exclusive and direct access to Encompass’ global satellite and video fiber footprint. Services: channel playout, global distribution, streaming, live events, disaster recovery, radio. YOUR SPORTS CONTENT. DELIVERED.

>EQUINIX

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quinix is the global digital infrastructure company for the world’s leading Media & Entertainment businesses allowing them to create, manage, and distribute high-quality, ondemand content anywhere and bridge the virtual and physical worlds to their artists, creators, employees, end-users, and partners inside the most-interconnected data centers. In 66 markets across 27 countries, Equinix is where the Media & Entertainment ecosystem comes together to digitize and create new opportunities to accelerate Content Creation, Management and Delivery. Our trusted global platform brings together and interconnects the foundational infrastructure that fuels your success. In a digital economy focused on the end-user experience, interconnection is essential to make content available to audiences, and relevant monetization structures, on any platform or device irrespective of when, where, and how the audience consumes it. With Equinix, digital leaders scale with agility, speed the launch of digital services, seamlessly connect to customers and partners, and deliver world-class experiences.

>ES BROADCAST

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S Broadcast specializes in service provision to the broadcast, TV production, and film production industries. The company is an international reseller of both new and used professional broadcast and production

equipment, and is an approved dealer for Sony, Grass Valley, Ross, Canon, Fujinon, Panasonic, EVS, NewTek, JVC, and many other leading manufacturers. ES Broadcast provides systems integration services and has delivered projects as diverse as OB trucks, studios, portable production units, and esports arenas.

consisted of four megawatts of backup generator power coupled with two megawatts of UPS for a live broadcast event. The power division wrapped up the year touring with the PGA, ESPN College Game Day, and WWE, including their Saudi Arabia show. CBS Sports kept the power group busy with both NFL and SEC football games.

>EUROVISION SERVICES

>FINGERWORKS TELESTRATORS

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>FASTLY

>FLETCHER SPORTS

urovision Services (ES) world-class customer service allows our clients around the world to focus on what matters: creating amazing experiences for their fans as the world begins to emerge from a global pandemic. 2021 was another challenging year, as postponed events from 2020 came almost head-to-head with scheduled events in 2021. Despite the constraints of working in the pandemic, we continued to provide faultless global distribution for the year’s biggest major sports events, including delivery of the full NBA and PGA schedules to their broadcast partners worldwide. We continue to roll out our Content Hub service, with more and more broadcasters connecting directly to our Eurovision Global Network through Points of Presence that allow them to receive all our content over fiber. Also last year, we launched our new SRT delivery services over IP, which offer a choice of cost-effective managed and unmanaged options to meet different needs. This year will no doubt be equally challenging, but our customers can be confident that we will continue to deliver our world-class broadcast services to more than 200 countries.

ingerWorks6 is available in three new modes!

FingerWorks6 LIVE mode (FWLIVE) used by broadcasters worldwide, FWLIVE mode gives your on-air analyst immediate access to custom analysis tools, Web pages, and social media assets, all in one interface. FWLIVE supports all formats and now with computer vision real-time field tracking. FingerWorks6 Presenter mode (FWPresenter) includes the features of FWLIVE, but adds clip ingest and control. Used extensively in esports plus in-studio sports productions that require large on-camera touchscreens, the user interface can be customized and skinned to your own look and feel. FingerWorks6 Producer mode (FWProducer) allows analysts to ingest clips, trim and analyse them using FingerWorks6 Telestration tools. Then add voice over and publish. This enables analysts to create a complete package that can be used for training sessions or delivered on any broadcast medium. Recent wins: RIOT GAMES Los Angeles Esports studios; PGATE, NBC, and CBS live PGA tour coverage supporting NEP facilities; and Game Creek Video new six-arena contract for NBC regionals, NHL, and NBA coverage.

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>FILMWERKS

>FLYCAM INTERNATIONAL

astly is upgrading the internet experience to give people and organizations more control, faster content, and more dynamic applications. By combining the world’s fastest global edge cloud network with powerful software, Fastly helps customers develop, deliver, and secure modern distributed applications and compelling digital experiences. Fastly’s customers include many of the world’s most prominent companies, including Pinterest, The New York Times, and GitHub.

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ilmwerks experienced a major increase in business across all divisions in 2021. The structures division, in conjunction with the scenic division, celebrated the successful execution of many jobs, including sets for the Super Bowl, Field of Dreams, and ESPN PGA Championship.

Other wins for the scenic division include sets for Proctor and Gamble, and The International Monetary Fund. The joint efforts did not stop there. The power and structures division teamed up providing structures and power for the FOX Big Noon Kickoff tour and Thursday Night Football. Other major achievements for the power division include a massive UPS job that

or over 25 years, Emmy Award-winning Fletcher Sports has created some of the most innovative and memorable images for the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, plus many other sports broadcasts. Fletcher also provides specialty cameras to a variety of Entertainment shows, concerts, and Special Events for broadcast or in-house production. Fletcher serves the international sports broadcasting market with our Fletcher London operation.

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his Side Up Productions has been involved with innovative camera technologies since its inception in 1994. The company has continued to develop and perfect the ultralight aerial FlyCam following its incredible debut in February 1998 during the Papal Visit in Mexico City. FlyCam has flown over nearly every sport imaginable, capturing some of the most awe-striking moments in modern memory. With technology at its most impressive today, FlyCam has had the opportunity to help shape the movies you watch, the sports you root for, and the commercials you fast forward through.

SPONSORUPDATE >FRIEND MTS

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riend MTS is a company dedicated to innovation in content and platform security.

Since its inception, Friend MTS has developed a comprehensive suite of security services, powered by a unique set of proprietary technologies, to deliver the right solution in any situation.

>FUJITSU

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ujitsu is a global leader in video compression solutions. Our real-time IP series video products are available directly from Fujitsu in North America for high-quality video transmission applications. This distribution channel provides world-class service and support for broadcast media production companies.

Fujitsu’s IP series video transmission product line, with Fujitsu QoS, include real-time H.265/ HEVC and H.264/AVC encoders/decoders optimized for reliable, low-latency transmission over public and private IP networks.

>GAME CREEK VIDEO

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ame Creek Video sets the industry standard for facilitating successful live broadcasts and recordings. As a family-run, privately owned company, Game Creek works with the world’s largest television networks, production companies, and news organizations to provide them with comprehensive mobile production solutions. We combine an advanced, state-ofthe-art fleet of mobile production units with an accomplished, reliable team of experts to ensure that the largest events in the world are televised flawlessly. For clients requiring dependable technology, exceptional response time, and consistent quality results in high-pressure environments, Game Creek Video delivers awardwinning productions of sporting events, concerts, awards ceremonies, corporate events, and more.

>GEARTECH USA

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eartech Technologies is poised to be your technology partner. In the age of social distancing, Geartech and our solutions are more relevant than ever.With a stable of loyal customers throughout North America, we are ready to help you. Sporting outlets are looking for ways to engage their audiences with remote content quickly and with low cost. Geartech is positioned to provide quick turn services for remote production, IP contribution/transmission and subscriber and IPTV distribution and security.

Our glass-to-glass approach includes a broad set of solutions including: Net Insight, Verimatrix, Imagine, Skyworth, and eero. Geartech provides direct sales, engineering, planning, vendor

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management, and support. We have a stable of high-quality partner manufacturers and solution providers with leading-edge solutions for complex challenges. Geartech Technologies has offices in Montreal, New York, Toronto, Calgary, Nevada, and Boston.

>GLOBECAST

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he power of sport to bring people together via a shared experience has been fully revealed during the past two years. We’ve played a key role in getting events to air. Globecast and Gravity Media are partnering to provide end-toend production and connectivity to customers at this year’s major soccer event. Gravity Media will be providing a range of onsite technical facilities from standup positions to complete temporary studios for broadcasters, supported by Globecast’s marketing-leading, fully redundant satellite and fibre connectivity as well as public internet reach. Late 2021 also saw us announce significant enhancements to our Managed Cloud Network (MCN) solution, tailored for sports broadcasters and rightsholders, launching 2.0.

It allows customers to add value to an event, providing highly cost-effective, secure, cloudbased distribution of additional content. 2.0 now includes integration direct from the venue site to affiliates. It also includes support for the SRT (Secure Reliable Transport) protocol alongside existing Zixi protocol support.

>GOOGLE CLOUD

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oogle Cloud accelerates organizations’ ability to digitally transform their business with the best infrastructure, platform, industry solutions, and expertise. We deliver enterprise-grade cloud solutions that leverage Google’s cutting-edge technology to help companies operate more efficiently and adapt to changing needs, giving customers a foundation for the future. Customers in more than 200 countries and territories turn to Google Cloud as their trusted partner to solve their most critical business problems.

>GRABYO

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s the shift to remote, cloud-production accelerates, Grabyo has taken a step forward towards delivering broadcast-quality live productions in the cloud, by adding a customizable, multiviewer accessible via a webbrowser. Multiviewers are an essential part of live production workflows, enabling directors and producers to view multiple feeds and sources in a single screen. This development is the first in a series of planned upgrades to Grabyo’s cloudnative live production platform, Grabyo Producer.

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The addition of the multiviewer features — combined with Grabyo’s powerful low-latency, frame-accurate switching capabilities, playlisting tools, graphics authoring, and multi-platform distribution — means production teams can use Grabyo for a broad range of live broadcasts in the cloud. The adoption of cloud-native broadcast tools removes onsite constraints for production teams, allowing teams to work remotely and collaborate in real-time. Cloud production enables hi-fidelity broadcasting to all major digital platforms, as well as TV.

>GRAVITY MEDIA

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ravity Media is a new company with a 30-year pedigree, formed by the coming together of four established broadcast and production houses: Gearhouse Broadcast, HyperActive Broadcast, Input Media, and Chief Entertainment.

Gravity Media’s broadcast packages are both modular and integrated, meaning Gravity Media can flex its offering to match your requirements.

Come to Gravity Media for a single service, or a complete end-to-end solution.

>HAIVISION

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aivision is a leading provider of missioncritical, real-time video streaming and networking solutions. Our connected cloud and intelligent edge technologies enable global organizations to engage audiences, enhance collaboration, and support decision making. We provide high-quality, low-latency, secure, and reliable live video at a global scale. Haivision continues to innovate with the latest update to the Makito X4 Video Encoder which adds support for SMPTE ST 2110. The Makito X4 can now encode uncompressed SMPTE 2110 video as highly efficient H.264 or HEVC streams, along with the audio and ancillary metadata, with ultralow latency. The Makito X4 can directly connect to central production facilities, cloud resources, or remote locations over the public internet using the Haivision-developed SRT protocol making it the ideal solution for remote or cloud production workflows.

>HLW INTERNATIONAL

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LW, a full-service design firm, has been a leader in sports broadcast facilities design for more than 25 years. Our dedicated Media & Entertainment Studio comprises architects, interior designers, and industry specialists with expertise in building elegant spaces that feature efficient workflow and fully integrated, top-tier technology. Our client list includes ESPN, Fox Sports, NBC Sports, CBS Sports, PAC 12, and

PGA Tour Entertainment. HLW is currently working on a new media production building for PGA Tour Entertainment. Located in Ponte Vedra Beach, FL, PGA Tour’s new home brings the entire organization under one roof for the first time. Spread over 150,000 square feet, HLW is assisting with the design and detailing of production studios, control rooms, a newsroom, a café, and open office workspace to the project.

Additionally, HLW is the Architect of Record for this new building.

>ILLUMINATION DYNAMICS

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llumination Dynamics (ID) services Live Broadcast, Film, Television, Theatrical, and Special Events providing Automated and Film Lighting equipment, transportation, redundant power systems, technical services, and crew.

Our main locations are in Santa Clarita, CA, and Charlotte, NC, with additional ARRI Rental facilities available to us for support. ID operates nation-wide as well as providing lighting services internationally. Our Broadcast division is an essential component of ID’s success providing reliable redundant generator power, UPS Systems, lighting design, equipment, and crew to multiple events. ID’s staff strives to provide a premium service for our customers and we recognize their loyalty has driven our success. Our staff remains on call for support 24 hours 7 days a week. Throughout 2021 into 2022, ID has continued its excellent service for PGA Golf, the NFL, college football, MLB, supercross, extreme sports, and many more.

> INTEGRATED MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES

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ntegrated Media Technologies (IMT) is a leading technology solutions and managed services provider with offices in Los Angeles, Boston, and Dallas. IMT services the Telecommunications, Media & Entertainment, Corporate IT, Legal, Financial Services Healthcare, Education, and Defense sectors with a broad range of technology solutions and services designed to drive new value and efficiencies from technology. IMT’s operations are segmented into three principal businesses: Consulting and Systems Integration, Video Collaboration, and Software.

>JVC PROFESSIONAL VIDEO

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VC Professional Video’s new 4K KY-PZ400N and HD KY-PZ200N CONNECTED CAM PTZ cameras provide optimal streaming image quality and performance for sports and remote production over the internet and are equipped with NDI|HX and SRT streaming, H.265/H.264/MJPEG encoding and VITC (Vertical Interval Timecode) multi-camera synchronization technologies. With integrated NDI|HX technology, JVC’s new PTZ cameras offer a high-quality, low-latency IP video

transmission standard that is ideal for streaming in an ever-evolving sports landscape. In addition to NDI|HX, the new cameras include SRT, HTTP, RTSP, RTMP/RTMPS, and standard protocols. The advanced streaming capabilities of the incorporated SRT technology adds automatic repeat request (ARQ) and forward error correction (FEC) to prevent packet loss typically found on internet connections. It also offers stream encryption for content protection.

Additionally, with the incorporated Vertical Interval Time Code (VITC) with Network Time Protocol (NTP), the new JVC PTZ cameras also feature multi-camera synchronization for sports production.

>KEY CODE MEDIA

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ey Code Media: U.S. Systems Integrator Celebrates 20 Years! Key Code Media is a solution provider for all AV, Broadcast, and Postproduction equipment design, install, systems integration, and training — backed by a 24/7 engineering team. Key Code Media is well-positioned to provide businesses with a better process for making investments with technology, through product solution education, scope evaluation, and development of a holistic workflow. Recently, we transitioned all systems, processes, dashboards, and alerts into the cloud — giving customers greater visibility into equipment availability, equipment delivery, project deliverables, and timelines, which leads to creating an exceptional customer experience.

Combined with our unique ability to get businesses the best price, Key Code Media is ready to lead the industry for another 20 years.

Keeping You Ahead of Technology. “I want to thank our 7,000+ customers, 400+ vendors, and 100 employees that made a commitment to our collective success.” – President, Mike Cavanagh

>KISWE

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iswe is the interactive video company that links content owners directly with their global audiences. With its world-class Cloud Video Engine, Kiswe has delivered the world’s largest digital pay-per-view events and serves the largest sports, media, and entertainment companies with its production, content distribution, and direct audience data solutions.

Kiswe is leading the advanced video revolution with its interactive video technology, where audiences both consume and contribute to live digital content. Kiswe is headquartered in New Jersey, and has offices in New York, Seoul, and Hasselt. Learn more at www.kiswe.com.

>LEGRAND AV

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egrand | AV brands create amazing AV experiences through innovative solutions and exceptional service. As industry leaders and partners, our brands unite to form a union that

is greater than the sum of its parts to provide a comprehensive offering that connects people through technology in education, corporate, house of worship, government and more. We are committed to a culture of sustainability both globally and locally.

>LH COMPUTER SERVICES

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H Computer Services is a reseller specializing in video storage solutions for professional and collegiate sports. LH offers solutions that provide next-generation storage platforms providing content production, distribution, and archive with the performance and reliability needed to meet extreme production and delivery deadlines.

The company offers solutions with file systems, optimized for video, in an end-to-end solution from ingest to archive that are designed for performance from the ground up and built on the foundation of providing high-performance collaboration to leading post and broadcast organizations. LH has a variety of manufacturers to draw from providing direct-attached storage, FCSANs, as well as a traditional NAS, to meet the demanding needs of your workflow. Trust a partner like LH Computer Services that has a proven history of architecting and providing solutions to clients in the NBA, NCAA, and more.

>LIVE CGI

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ive CGI is a software platform to enable you to make live branded content. From games to education to entertainment, our tool kit combines everything you need to bring your vision to life in almost any format (AR, VR, flatscreens) in realtime.

>LIVE MEDIA GROUP

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ive Media Group offers a complete turnkey solution for our clients and their audience.

The company was founded on the fundamental principle of creating the highest quality product and experience for our clients and their viewers.

“Status quo” was not good enough, so we created the ultimate turnkey solution. How do we do it? Ownership and invention. Our experienced, interdisciplinary team developed all of our internal systems and processes for encoding and transmission. Furthermore, we own our own production and broadcast equipment (including production vehicles) to reduce cost and maximize control and redundancy. In response to our clients wanting a better solution to less-than satisfactory video players, we created the fully interactive nowlive video platform, which also provides payper-view capabilities with our Virtual Wristband technology. With our comprehensive suite of services and products, Live Media Group can handle every aspect of a live campaign, from initial concept to final delivery to your audience, all with measurable result.

SPONSORUPDATE >MEYERPRO

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eyerPro works hard every day to equip clients with the best tools to effectively communicate their message to their audience.

This means high-quality equipment and highquality people who are passionate about what they do. Audio-visual services, broadcast services, and rentals. MeyerPro is here to help and would love to hear from you!

>MOBILE TV GROUP

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obile TV Group (MTVG) has recently launched IP mobile unit 50 FLEX and 50 VMU. Mobile unit #51 is set to launch this summer. MTVG’s Cloud Control has continued to flourish with 21 Cloud Control rooms spread out across the U.S, giving its clients remote access to all of MTVG’s services. Cloud Control is a complete live production ecosystem that allows for broadcast level equipment, unlimited cameras, SSMO, and even 4K HDR to be controlled remotely with low bandwidth.

>MOVICOM

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ovicom is a world leader in robotic specialty camera equipment for live, studio, and outside broadcasting applications.

Featuring the Robycam line of cable-suspended camera systems that easily incorporate AR graphics and automated control with gyrostabilized camera heads in 4-point and 2-point configurations for all major sports in any time of environment. Recently Movicom provided SuperSlow-Mo Polecam camera services for Concacaf Tournaments as well as MLS and U.S. Men’s National Team coverage. In addition to aerial camera systems, Movicom manufactures rail camera and robotic heads that provide positional information compatible with all major vendor AR graphics systems. Movicom has provided specialty cameras like RefCams and TowerCams for the Olympics and major international hockey tournaments. Movicom has done custom installs like RTVE’s La Hora de la Uno studio, as well as sports stadiums in the EU. Integrating hardware, software, and for camera motion is the company’s hallmark.

>MPE

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otion Picture Enterprises (MPE) is a full service post-production facility based in New York City, offering all-encompassing, cost effective resources and solutions nationwide.

MPE offers both out-of-house rentals, as well as remote hosting, enabling your entire team to work from any location safely, securely, and without lag. MPE’s remote infrastructure includes state-

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of-the-art data centers with dedicated internet circuits and firewalls, operating across separate fiber-optic networks through carriers that run at 10 Gigabits p/s. MPE’s in-house technical support team and IT engineers monitor all systems 24/7/365. MPE’s 60,000 sq. ft. NYC facility is available for a flexible, hybrid work model should your team need to operate in person for editing, onsite collaboration sessions, screenings, and finishing. Finish your projects, either in person or remote, in MPE’s Dolby Atmos Certified Sound Mix Studios and Dolby Vision 4K UHD Online and Color Correct Suites.

>NECF

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ECF is e-Commerce for the media industry.

We take under-utilized resources and offer them for a fraction of the cost, providing new opportunities for revenue and work. The resources include people, cloud-based production assets, virtualized hardware, and content. This saves producers and broadcasters time while increasing productivity. For creators, we provide access to previously unaffordable, unknown, or unavailable technologies. We offer a traditional provider or a direct consultant relationship. In the short term, we provide resources like on-demand directors, a virtual control room or international content. In the long term, we offer long-term, integrated, economic planning. Using patentpending models and technologies, NECF allows you to architect unused media resources for any production or distribution needs, anywhere in the world.

>NEP GROUP

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EP Group is the leading technology partner for content creators around the globe. For more than 35 years, we have created innovative products and services for Live Production, Virtual Production, and Media Processing to enable our clients to make, manage, and show the world their content — anywhere, anytime, on any platform. NEP offers a complete set of end-to-end solutions, from content capture to distribution — including a growing portfolio of transformational cloud-based, software-based and virtualized technologies. In addition to growing and maintaining our industry-leading fleet of mobile units, NEP continues to innovate and develop new technologies for centralized and cloud-based production. After adding Vista Worldlink — leaders in centralized production, to our global network earlier this year — NEP will launch two brand new U.S.-based centralized production facilities this fall. Based in New York

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and Los Angeles, these adaptable and forwardthinking facilities can flex to meet the needs of any production large or small. NEP’s Virtual Production solutions start at the creative stage and end with exceptional execution across ICVFX, augmented reality, LED stages, and more.

And, our Media Processing solutions provide the tools and products our clients need to ingest, edit, store, search, manage, and distribute their digital assets to rightsholders across multiple platforms. Headquartered in the United States, NEP has offices in 25 countries with over 4,000+ employees supporting content creators worldwide. Learn how we are helping clients bring their creative visions, content, live sports, and entertainment to life at nepgroup.com

>NETSCOUT

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etscout Systems assures digital business services against disruptions in availability, performance, and security. Our market and technology leadership stems from combining our patented smart data technology with smart analytics. We provide real-time, pervasive visibility, and insights customers need to accelerate, and secure their digital transformation.

Our approach transforms the way organizations plan, deliver, integrate, test, and deploy services and applications. Our mission is protecting the global leaders of industry from the risks of disruption, allowing them to solve their most challenging network performance and security problems, ensuring the connected world runs safely and smoothly.

>OBJECT MATRIX

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atrixStore object storage (Cloud and OnPrem) business continued to grow in 2021 with new sports-related customers in the UK, U.S., and beyond. Last summer, MatrixStore Cloud was used during a major rugby tournament in South Africa to protect and share dailies with global teams, and we are currently hosting a new sports championship in the U.S. Existing customer ATP Media recently signed up for an additional 500TB, ensuring more of their archive content is available via MatrixStore Cloud and the built-in Vision media management application.

This was needed for even greater remote access of content, specifically during the pandemic.

A case study is available on the Object Matrix website. Object Matrix is the award-winning software company that pioneered object storage and the modernisation of media archives. Our on-prem, hybrid, and cloud storage solutions bring operational and financial benefits to our

customers by securely managing content at every stage of its lifecycle.

>PARSEC

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e grew up in front of tiny CRT TVs, 640×480 computer monitors, and LCD screens with no backlight — and loved every minute of it. Eventually you come to realize it isn’t the games themselves, but the people you’re with that make these memories so magical. The world loses far too many of these awesome memories because of problems of time and distance — let’s fix that, shall we? Parsec is dedicated to those who want to keep laughing — to those who don’t really mean it when they say “this is my last game” — to those who want to make new friends who love what they love — and especially, to the indie game devs who fight so hard to keep their dreams alive.

>PIXELLOT

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sed by the leading sports clubs around the world, Pixellot pioneered the concept of automated sports production and has been leading the market in automated production and broadcasting for professional and semiprofessional sporting events. Although COVID-19 put sports into a deep-freeze, thanks to fan restrictions at events, Pixellot saw a surge in demand. With 50 new installations daily at schools and universities, we are already deployed at 15,000 venues. We started 2021 off cracking the million milestone of total live games broadcast!

We now produce over 70,000 games monthly as well as 150 leagues and tournaments in 55 countries. Pixellot recently introduced YOU — production software for the youth market that delivers high-quality video, highlights for fans, athletes, and families, as well as analytics for coaches. It uses a wide-angle action cam or Pixellot’s newly launched Air camera — an affordable, portable camera for high-quality capture of games and practices.

>PIXERA

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V Stumpfl is an award-winning Austrian company that designs, manufactures, and markets a range of high-performance mobile and installation projection screens and media server software for professional and business applications. As a family business, its founders started the company out of a passion for the advancement of presentation and installation technologies. The product range is warranted for 24/7 usage. AV Stumpfl is located in Wallern, Austria, and is supported by a global network of distribution and service partners.

>PIXOTOPE

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ixotope Technologies is an international award-winning software company dedicated to developing the next generation of visual

storytelling tools and experiences. Pixotope is headquartered in Oslo, Norway, with regional offices in Croatia, Spain, UK, and the U.S.

control room, 30-ft. mobile unit, and additional production support space.

>PRG

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RG is the world’s leading provider of sports and event production solutions with a diverse resume featuring major live and broadcast sporting events worldwide, including the Super Bowl, Olympics, and World Cup. Clients and partners depend on PRG’s innovation, knowledge, and depth of experience in broadcasting, audio, video, lighting, rigging, staging, scenery, virtual production, and automated systems. PRG offers the industry’s largest and most diverse inventory of rental production equipment including all major broadcast cameras, audio, media servers, remote production gear, rigging, edit facilities, operations trailers, LED walls, and more. For customized solutions, PRG’s resourceful team of experts create proprietary tools to move the industry forward like Emmy-winning Front Row Cam, UltraView 4K director’s finder, 35LIVE! multi-camera workflow, Flex Solutions Trucks, and production suites. When it comes to lighting, no one surpasses PRG and its array of sophisticated tech, including proprietary systems like the Engineering Emmy Award-winning GroundControl Followspot. For sporting events, awards, halftime shows, and tributes, PRG can deliver turnkey production through live upload. For the current landscape, the company offers drive-in solutions, extended reality workflows, and a network of Digital Studios across the U.S. and Europe, plus 65 offices throughout the globe, allowing the flexibility to execute anytime, anywhere. PRG regularly draws on talent, technology, and local insight in support of a project. This network also results in significant advantages in cost, time, and environmental impact by reducing the need to move people and gear.

>PRIMEVIEW

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rimeview is a privately held global manufacturing company that was launched in 1997 specializing in advanced display solutions, with a focus on the industrial market.

Primeview manufactures on the most advanced ISO-certified production lines, maintaining high-quality control standards to build products for the most demanding markets. Primeview offers a true “one-stop shop” for display solutions from touchscreens, video walls, and specialty.

The company’s solutions can be found in board rooms, museums, casinos, retail stores, hotels, and properties around the globe.

>PRODUCTION ROCKSTARS

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roduction Rockstars recently signed a lease on a 10,000-sq.-ft. production facility in Atlanta.

The studio will host a 5,400-sq.-ft. sound stage,

>PRODUCTIONHUB fter nearly 20 years, ProductionHUB has grown beyond an alternative to production guides and the yellow pages into the largest global network of film and video professionals ready to bring your content to life. ProductionHUB has come a long way since their lean beginnings. No matter what you need for a production, they’ll help you find it with plenty of time before the cameras start rolling. Search their growing network of over 150,000 professionals, place a request for something specific, post a full-time job, or let them do all the crewing for you. Beyond their crewing services, they keep you up to date with emerging trends in the industry with their blog and press from leading, innovative companies.

Whether you’re a seasoned pro or looking to hire someone from the industry, ProductionHUB is your resource for everything in the film and video production industry.

>PURE MOBILE PRODUCTIONS

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ure Mobile Productions has a fleet of two advanced, state-of-the-art HD mobile production trucks and five production support trucks, providing live sports broadcasts for the NBA’s Utah Jazz; MLS’ Real Salt Lake; the Utah Royals FC; ESPN events including Monday Night Football and College GameDay, as well as NBC Universal’s The Golf Channel in the United States and Canada. Pure Mobile Productions has also provided trucks for the NBA Finals, NFL Playoff games, the NFL Draft, numerous College Football Bowl Games, and UFC Events, to name a few.

>REALITY CHECK SOLUTIONS

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CS continues to drive innovation and new solutions for clients all over the world. With a greater drive towards AR, cloud, and remote production from our clients, we’ve been busy supporting them across a wide range of projects and platforms. Our work with UFC includes delivering a new graphics build across three platforms (Vizrt, XPression, and Singular).

We’ve been helping MLB expand their use of the Singular.live platform across their digital productions and also developing a betting L-Bar for the NBA, again using Singular. We have supported our clients as they introduce new systems as well as cloud and remote workflows for their live productions, including UFC, Eredivisie, SPFL, DFL and DAZN. RCS continues to deliver groundbreaking custom graphics, AR, and data solutions alongside innovative cloud-based workflows and technologies to clients all over the world. There is a lot more to come in 2022.

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SPONSORUPDATE >ROBOVISION

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obovision is a team of over 100 people from multiple disciplines who are dedicated to the mission of building artificial intelligence (AI) to enable collaborative intelligence.

Robovision has been a trusted partner in the agri-food, manufacturing and healthcare sectors to be innovative and to deliver computer visionenabled automation.

>RUSH MEDIA GROUP

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ith clients that include every major network and sports league, Rush Media Company has a proven track record of producing, packaging, and innovating live television productions at every level. With a fleet of more than 23 mobile production units, offices, and facilities located around the country, Rush Media Company is the leader in packaging live events.

With 23 production vehicles currently in our fleet, Rush Media Company is uniquely positioned to provide you with the best production vehicle to fit your needs. All of our production vehicles are equipped with state-of-the-art equipment and world class engineers to ensure that your production is delivered with innovation and creativity.

>SDTV

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ounded in 1990 by industry professionals, SDTV began with a simple idea to bring an efficient and valuable product to the television industry. We have since designed, built, and operated mobile production units that have become the industry standard. We have the capacity to provide an instantaneous television or data feed to locations around the world. We are setting a new standard by offering cost-effective high definition television production solutions while using the most advanced broadcasting equipment to clients of all sizes. SDTV is committed to leading the industry in innovation to create the best possible productions for our clientele. Adding this to our reputable customer relations and our benchmark network of reliable contractors is sure to make the future bright.

>SES

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ES has a bold vision to deliver amazing experiences everywhere on earth by distributing the highest quality video content and providing seamless connectivity around the world. As the leader in global content connectivity solutions, SES operates the world’s only multi-orbit constellation of satellites with the unique combination of global coverage and high performance, including the commercially proven,

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low-latency Medium Earth Orbit O3b system. By leveraging a vast and intelligent, cloud-enabled network, SES is able to deliver high-quality connectivity solutions anywhere on land, at sea or in the air, and is a trusted partner to the world’s leading telecommunications companies, mobile network operators, governments, connectivity and cloud service providers, broadcasters, video platform operators, and content owners.

SES’s video network carries over 8,650 channels and has an unparalleled reach of 361 million households, delivering managed media services for both linear and non-linear content.

virtual ads, skills clock, OPTICS, and NHL HITS. A glow puck developed by SMT was introduced for the Skills Competition’s Fountain Face-Off, 21 in ’22, and Hardest Shot. In-stadium and broadcast production were made possible by SMT’s OASIS Platform, which works in tandem with IR cameras to generate tracking data that delivers stats such as player speed, shift time, goals/assists, shot speed, team comparisons, leaderboards, and player spotlights. Data integration via OPTICS provided broadcasters with graphic presentations such as player inserts, instant replays, and package replays.

>SINGULAR.LIVE

>SOS GLOBAL EXPESS

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>SKYCAM/CABLECAM

>SOURCE DIGITAL

ver the last year, our industry-leading cloudnative graphics platform has continued to grow clients and partners. We’ve launched new projects with the Scottish Premier League, DAZN, BT Sport, and many more. Our Singular For Good program continues to grow and supports 500 schools and nonprofits with free Pro accounts. This is one way in which we hope to help support and encourage the next generation of professionals into our industry. We launched a new set of dynamic, mobile-friendly templates called UNOs and most recently led an IBC Accelerator Project on Sustainable Live Production that included BT Sport, Sky, BBC, The English Premier League, Microsoft, AWS, and more. In collaboration with the other participants we will be releasing a white paper in Q1 of 2022 that will detail more of our findings on what we can all do as an industry to make Live Production more sustainable, accessible, and inclusive.

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kycam is a leading designer, manufacturer, and operator of mobile aerial camera systems.

Skycam plays a significant role in changing the way sports are broadcasted in America, appearing at marquee broadcast events such as the Super Bowl, US Tennis Open, NCAA Final Four, NFL Pro Bowl, Monday Night Football, Sunday Night Football, and NCAA College Football.

>SMT

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or the first time in hockey history, SMT provided in-stadium videoboard production featuring Puck and Player Tracking and realtime stats for fans attending the 2022 NHL AllStar Game. SMT’s Creative Studio designed the L-Bar that displayed fan-engagement stats on the center-ice videoboard and in-venue screens throughout T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. For ESPN, SNET, and NHL international broadcasts, SMT showcased Puck and Player Tracking,

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ogistics has always been a bit of a puzzle, with worldwide pieces needing to fit together to create success, and 2022 is stacking up to create even more challenges. Squeezed trade lanes, cascading flights and cancelations, closed ports due to historical backlog, and congestion is creating more disruption in the supply chain than ever experienced in the past couple of decades.

SOS Global Express is committed to facing these challenges and bringing customized solutions to our clients that impact their continued success in the global event space. With four decades of continuous service and experience, our team of over 160 employees, and a network of thousands of partners worldwide, ensure our clients have additional solutions brought forward when traditional routes and services are stressed. SOS Global Express has a 7/24/365 customer service team, so please reach out to us for any domestic or international needs. www.sosglobal.com

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ource Digital is an overlay technology that works on any video player and allows content publishers and streamers to create new, measurable CPM, CPE, CPC, and CPA video inventory overnight. Use existing video content to grow new subscribers, sell products, and promote upcoming events and programming.

>SOUTHWORKS

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OUTHWORKS is a global software development company that builds solutions to accelerate value for organizations and people.

Operating at the intersection of new technology and industry to create competitive advantage for sports organizations and better fan experiences, SOUTHWORKS works with some of the biggest names in sports and broadcasting on cloud video engineering, cognitive transformation, big data, machine learning, and application modernization projects. SOUTHWORKS developers, engineers,

and architects build cloud-native delivery platforms that bring your organization to its audience; deliver seamless fan experiences at scale and at speed, reliably; and help sports organizations employ data management tools, AI, and machine learning to construct and stream data pipelines, deliver analytics, and surface insight.

>SPIIDEO

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piideo’s automated sports video recording solutions are successfully used in everyday work in clubs, leagues and federations all around the world — in a wide variety of sports and levels.

>SPORTRADAR

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portradar recently signed a deal with MSG Networks (including MSG 2 and MSG Plus) for their broadcast productions. We are supporting them with our radar 360 database, our research team, betting data and insights, APIs, and graphics. In total, MSG airs five professional sports teams (New York Knicks, New Jersey Devils, New York Rangers, New York Islanders, and Buffalo Sabres). In addition to game productions, we’re also supporting their new sports betting program, The Betting Exchange, as well as other sports betting studio shows they have planned. MSG’s studio shows are using our odds, props, and betting insights to support engaging graphics and storylines.

Lastly, we are supporting MSG’s “betcast” viewing experiences, starting with the Knicks, where people can tune into the alternate channels to have live odds, probabilities, and props shown during live broadcasts.

>STATS PERFORM

S

tats Perform is the market leader in SportsTech, providing the most trusted sports data and the latest advancements in applying AI and machine learning to deliver better predictions for teams, sportsbooks and a more engaging broadcast, media, and fan experience. The company collects the most detailed sports data to create new experiences across sports. Leveraging the richest sports database, Stats Perform enhances sports competition and entertainment through machine learning and computer vision to create advanced predictions and analysis — be that for digital and broadcast media with differentiated storytelling, tech companies with reliable and fast data to power their innovations, sportsbooks with inplay betting and integrity services, or teams with first-of-its-kind AI analysis software.

>STORAGEDNA

S

ince 2004, we have been helping film, video, and broadcast professionals master their digital workflow, enabling them to work more efficiently and save costs. Advanced technologies and a commitment to innovation are the backbone

of our company. Our mission is to engage with our community of customers, resellers, and partners; evolve our product offerings; and provide these solutions at an unparalleled value.

Many media professionals face a number of challenges as a result of the phenomenal growth of digital file-based workflows, including how to cost-effectively backup and store content; protect digital assets long-term; and easily archive, search, find, restore, and/or directly access content when needed. DNA Evolution, StorageDNA’s intelligent workflow solution built on Linear Tape Open (LTO) and Linear Tape File System (LTFS) technologies, allows users to streamline their file-based workflows, work more efficiently, and save significant storage costs.

>STREANN MEDIA

S

treann Media is the most innovative and interactive OTT streaming platform in the world. With Streann, content providers and broadcasters can build the next Netflix or Spotify, with more than 100 proprietary features for distribution, engagement, gamification, and market-first monetization technologies.

Established in 2014 in Miami, FL, the company has earned several industry awards thanks to its user-friendly, all-in-one solution, and has been deployed in 141 countries.

>TECHNICOLOR

A

dvanced HDR by Technicolor will be showing Sinclair’s ATSC 3.0 broadcast in Advanced HDR by Technicolor using Cobalt Digital equipment. In 2022 the Sinclair Broadcast Group will implementing several Sport Content using Advanced HDR by Technicolor and distributing to the consumer through their various sports outlets.

>TELOS ALLIANCE

>SUPPONOR

P

roven during a decade of live broadcast deployment, our recent commercial success globally, and accelerated business growth means that Supponor is now the clear solutions leader in the virtual advertising market. We offer powerful and complete technology solutions that are being increasingly adopted at scale by the world’s leading sports rights owners. Launched commercially in 2021, Supponor AIR dramatically reduces the complexity and operational overhead required to implement broadcast grade virtual advertising solutions, which enhance the value of media and marketing rights for mass-audience sporting events for sports rights holders, their brand sponsors and broadcast partners. Supponor AIR is a true software only technology platform that relies on leading-edge Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) approaches to deliver authentic virtual placement or overlay advertising on any surface, in any sport, and in any weather condition. Supponor AIR delivers the gold standard in operational quality, reliability, and flexibility, including traditional onsite operations or fully remote integration (REMI); and is capable of delivering unlimited targeted feeds downstream of TV production.

>TATA COMMUNICATIONS

T

including content acquisition, processing, and distribution at scale. Our #BuiltForMedia network, ecosystem, and cloud have been driving innovation and delivering business efficiencies for leading broadcasters, sport federations, OTT platforms, streaming, content owners, and gaming and esports players. Over the past decade, our agile and seamless solutions supported by a dedicated team of experienced media services personnel have enabled several world-first achievements — Live 2K, 4K, and 8K deliveries; Live 360-degree video stream; cloudbased remote production; and, most recently, a virtual video assisted referee solution for ‘anywhere refereeing’. Find out more about our work in golf, motorsport, cricket, among other sports, and how it has made us #TrustedToWin. To know more, watch the video, or visit www. tatacommunications.com/media-entertainment/

ata Communications’ Media and Entertainment Services offers comprehensive solutions covering the entire media value chain

T

elos Infinity IP Intercom platform helps Progressive American Flat Track Racing streamline event comms, saving time and money.

Progressive American Flat Track (AFT) racing started experiencing comms that were difficult to set up with an overcomplicated software interface. Additionally, some device settings were only available on the hardware itself, and there were multiple areas in the signal flow to set input and output gain making it extremely difficult troubleshooting. Integration into any of AFT’s current equipment was also challenging. With AFT utilizing a rack of Blackmagic Design ATEM hardware, they needed an Intercom system that could handle integration with enough play in levels to make Comms crystal clear in the control room and in the field. AFT purchased an Infinity system with six Telos Infinity Master Panels, two Telos Infinity Beltpacks, and Telos Alliance xNodes to tie in camera Comms with analog ins and outs for two-way radio intercoms. The Announcer’s Booth, Pit Talent, and Race Control now have full communication from the field back to the production control room and can now ensure a smooth event. It all adds up to Telos Infinity IP Intercom saving AFT time and money due to the ability to cut shows live with no need for off-premise editing.

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SPONSORUPDATE >TEMPUS EX MACHINA

T

empus Ex Machina is the technological vanguard for the sports and entertainment industry. Merging sports, video, and data with innovation and accessibility, Tempus Ex technology enables the creation of new interactive experiences around live events.

Harnessing the latest AI, machine learning, and data science technologies, Tempus Ex has partnered with the National Football League, premier global sports leagues, broadcasters, gaming companies, and world-class athletes to deliver cutting-edge solutions that will forever change the sports consumption experience.

>TERADEK

S

ports broadcasters everywhere are switching to 4K HDR for live games — thanks to Prism.

Prism is Teradek’s top-of-the-line H.264/HEVC encoder/decoder solution. There’s no need to replace your SDI cables and copper wiring around the arena. Prism gives you unlimited flexibility to route live video feeds via point-topoint, live streaming, and the cloud — all over IP. Send game footage, highlights, replays, and segments from master control to anywhere in the world — including sports networks, news stations, social platforms, and even private viewing streams. Prism has room for up to nine codec cards in a 2RU chassis (up to three codec cards in 1RU chassis). It can encode or decode up to 4Kp60 video with stunning 10-bit 4:2:2 image fidelity. Prism supports many common streaming protocols such as MPEG-TS, RTP, RTMPS, and SRT. Top brands like NASA, Netflix, NBC, and BBC trust Prism to deliver their mission-critical live video with the highest quality and security.

Finally, you can get 4K HDR off your roadmap and into master control with Teradek Prism.

>THUMBWAR

T

HUMBWAR co-founders David Vottero and Brian Carr met at Emerson College, where they collaborated often, putting their technical and creative skills to synergistic use. When they moved to Los Angeles and found success as problem-solving freelancers, they quickly decided their clients would be better served by an alliance between their skillsets. Brian is a multitalented engineer and technical problem solver, coming from systems design and project management with a background as a broadcast technician; David is a visionary creative director and producer with a background in broadcast television. Together, they created THUMBWAR — a meeting of the technical and creative minds.

132

>UNIQFEED

u

niqFEED develops software-only virtual advertising solutions that enable sports rightsholders to maximize the commercial potential of TV-visible advertising real-estate within sports venues during live broadcasts. The technology allows for the creation of separate localized feeds with unique virtual advertising messages tailored for specific markets. The technology is designed to be non-intrusive, flexible, and scalable, and requires no additional hardware within the venue. providing a solution that is simple to implement and hassle-free for sports rights holders. In 2021, Roger Hall joined uniqFEED as CEO. Roger Hall, a leading management consultant within the media, technology, and sports sectors is working on driving uniqFEED’s commercial and product development objectives. 2021 also saw the eagerly awaited return of live sport and the uniqFEED team seized on this opportunity to thoroughly test our solution in a live environment and develop solutions for additional sports.

>UNREAL ENGINE

I

n a few short years, Unreal Engine has established itself as a “must-have” tool for virtual studios and augmented/mixed reality for live sports broadcasts. The use of high-fidelity visuals is growing faster than ever, because more and more productions have seen how real-time rendering turns blue sky ideas into captivating content. And while easy access to photorealistic materials/textures from Quixel, over 3 million 3D models from Sketchfab, and strong integrations to C4D and Maya is a current boon, many productions are still learning just how far our ecosystem really goes. Virtual production tools for major films, particle effects for games, digital humans, and clothing for fashion — these tools are never siloed. Everyone gets the same updates, so content creators are free to take what they need and run. With the launch of UE5, our nextgeneration render engine, broadcasts will be able to push the boundaries of realism even further, bringing more attention to their productions and more power to their stories. If you’ve been toying with something big, 2022 is the year to do it.

>VARIANT SYSTEM GROUP

L

ive Production is due for a change that revolutionizes workflows, delivers simplistic integration, and significantly lowers the learning curve. Our approach is to challenge traditional live production tools by using an intuitive framework paired with a user interface that is so easy to use, anyone can become an operator.

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

>VENUE EDGE

V

enue Edge delivers and supports collegiate and professional sports organizations by aligning innovative content, activations, and new technology together to form an improved fan experience. Since its inception, the organization has consulted and delivered live production and creative support to long-standing partners, Florida Citrus Sports, Mountain West, and the Orlando City Soccer (MLS) club. Since the start of 2021, Venue Edge has developed and enjoyed partnerships with the Big West, Las Vegas Bowl and the Holiday Bowl.

>VERSUS SYSTEMS

V

ersus has built a platform that lets content creators of all types put real-world prizes and rewards inside their content. Our patented choice-based, earned-rewards system is better for brands, for content companies, broadcasters, streamers, app developers, and audiences.

>VIDOVATION

V

idOvation relieves the sports community by simplifying its workflow and saving costs in live television production, broadcast, distribution, and streaming systems. Golf, fishing, soccer, and other live sports and network reality TV productions benefit from our at-home Remote Production (REMI) solutions using unmanaged networks (cellular and the public Internet) and extremely low latency configurations over managed networks. The sports industry utilizes our at-home Remote Production solutions to maintain frame-accurate video genlock and seamless lip-sync across many handheld mobile and ENG cameras. In addition, many sports production facilities use our IPTV and digital signage systems to distribute live television, cable TV, DirecTV, satellite, studio feeds, stage feeds, and digital signage over their corporate networks.

The VidOvation IPTV system supports many endpoints, including smart TVs, set-top boxes, computer desktops, mobile devices, and tablets.

In addition, many media companies are taking advantage of our enterprise IPTV system with industry-approved Veramatrix and Pro:Idiom encryption and digital rights management.

>VISAIC

V

isaic is a full-service digital content distribution platform empowering sports leagues and clubs, media companies, and others to reach, engage, monetize, and grow their viewer and fan bases. Visaic’s founding team brings years of domain experience and strong industry relationships to offer scalable cloud enabled,

end-to-end solutions for creating, launching, and monetizing media applications. Visaic offers clients and partners a range of engagement and monetization models on a modern cloud-based video platform leveraging AI, advanced analytics, and customer-focused managed services with the latest UI/UX experiences. Visaic believes in the deep connection between people, entertainment, and the communities it creates.

>VISTA (NEP BROADCAST SERVICES)

V

ISTA, now part of NEP Broadcast Services, sees 2022 as a promising year with a full schedule of shows and increased volume of events from many clients. VISTA kicked off the new year with providing centralized production workflows for coverage of the 2022 MLS Super Draft, live from the VISTA Centralized Facility.

Remote locations were outfitted with ENG Crews capturing content from the homes of specific draftees backhauling all content to VISTA’s facility via bonded cellular technology. Three analysts provided coverage from the VISTA facility, and MLS War Rooms were connected to VISTA for seamless integration into the production, allowing the MLS Teams to make their draft picks live. The VISTA facility continues to be busy throughout the first quarter, managing and producing approximately 85 International Soccer Events utilizing VISTA’s centralized production workflows where cameras are cut, all graphics and highlights are integrated, announcers calling the event off monitor and various versions of the shows are created for different rightsholders around the world. As VISTA prepares for the 2022 Soccer Season, the VISTA team continues to service combat sports, hockey, basketball, and corporate events onsite and via centralized production workflows.

>WAVES AUDIO

F

or 25+ years, Waves has been the world’s leading developer of professional audio plugins for music production, mixing, mastering, live sound, and postproduction. In 2011, Waves received a Technical GRAMMY Award to honor its innovative software, which is used to create hit recordings, major motion pictures,

and top-selling video games. Waves also offers licensable algorithms for consumer electronics to dramatically enhance audio performance in products by Dell, Google, Fitbit, Asus, and more.

>WILDMOKA

M

ore than 120 leading sports and news broadcasters globally have chosen the Wildmoka Digital Media Factory to fuel their ambitious digital strategies. The Wildmoka cloud-native platform streamlines the creation and distribution of digital content such as clips, highlight reels, or live streams across every OTT and social media channel — all this delivered at scale, at speed and with the reliability needed to support the largest events. Part of the Digital Media Factory, the StoryBot solution leverages the latest AI/ML technologies to create content automatically, intelligently crafting videos such as near-live in-game moments, match summaries, or ‘best-of’ compilations. Powered by a patented AI/ML engine, the Auto ReZone solution allows to deliver a top-notch live viewing experience regardless of the device used to watch it. For that, it transforms live streams (in real time) or short-form videos into responsive videos so that the video production remains excellent across various aspect ratios (e.g. 9:16).

>WORLDWIDE TECHNOLOGY

W

WT is a future forward, global technology company uniquely positioned to solve complex problems for our customers to allow them to accelerate growth. Utilize our Advanced Technology Center, a collaborative ecosystem to design, build, educate, demonstrate, and deploy at scale innovative technology products and integrated architectural solutions for customers.

Together we make a new world happen!

>WOWZA MEDIA SYSTEMS

W

owza Media Systems is the recognized gold standard of streaming, with more than a decade of experience working with 35,000+ organizations, in 170+ countries. By reducing the complexities of video and audio delivery to any device, Wowza enables organizations to expand their reach and more deeply engage their audiences, in industries ranging from education to sports broadcasting.

>WSC SPORTS

W

SC Sports works with over 200 sports organizations worldwide to help them maximize the use of their video content, increase their reach, and provide new monetization opportunities. Our AI cloud platform enables sports media right owners to generate personalized and customized sports videos automatically and in real-time and reach every fan on every platform with the right piece of content.

>ZIXI

T

he Zixi Software Defined Video Platform (SDVP) is the market-leading suite of tools for enabling live video delivery over any IP network, using any live video delivery protocol, through any cloud provider, to any target destination. 2021 was a busy year, with Zixi launching Zixi-as-aService (ZaaS). ZaaS not only unlocks all features of the Zixi SDVP, but is inclusive of infrastructure to rapidly spin up IP video routes from any source to any destination. Zixi also launched the Zixi ContentXchange (CXE). Zixi CXE makes it easier than ever for content owners and platform operators to seamlessly orchestrate live video sharing with everything including transport rights secured through Zixi. Zixi’s new Intelligent Data Platform leverages trained AI/ML services to sort through three billion daily telemetry data points, identifying performance outliers and behavioral anomalies. Operations teams receive actionable insights and predictive analytics help the team proactively get in front of challenges before they impact the audience. Working with partners Verizon and AWS, Zixi recently completed implementation of groundbreaking live video solutions over 5G networks and through AWS Wavelength Zones, enabling ultralow latency 4K/HDR video delivery for a new generation of video applications. Finally, Zixi continued to expand the Zixi Enabled Network of integrated partners, enabling ubiquitous edge device support and rapid spin up of new live video routes. Zixi delivered 20,000 live linear channels and thousands of live events in 2021 and expects 2022 to continue to see explosive growth.

INTERESTED IN LEARNING MORE ABOUT WHAT YOU’VE READ? Find contact information for every SVG sponsor starting on page 134 and get in touch today!

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

133

SPONSORINDEX

AD PAGE

SPONSOR

LEVEL

CONTACT

EMAIL

PHONE

Mobile

Greg Robinson

GregR@3gwireless.tv

443-603-2906

Premier

Vic Jimenez

vic.jimenez@adder.com

888-932-3337

ADVANCED IMAGE ROBOTICS

Mobile

Kevin McClave

kevin@advancedimagerobotics.com

858-775-3984

AE LIVE

Mobile

Stuart Coles

Stuart.Coles@ae.live

+44 7815 935011

AERIAL VIDEO SYSTEMS

Mobile

Argyle Nelson

anelson@aerialvideo.com

818-954-8842

AJA VIDEO SYSTEMS

Corporate

Christina Oliver

christinao@aja.com

530-271-3326

ALDEA SOLUTIONS

Corporate

Larry Tonon

larry.tonon@aldea.tv

514-461-4136 x 3025

ALL MOBILE VIDEO

Mobile

Eric Duke

eduke@amvchelsea.com

212-727-9862

ALLIED BROADCAST GROUP

Mobile

Bradley Chapman

brad@alliedbroadcastgroup.com

918-250-5353 x2

ALPHA VIDEO

Mobile

Jeffrey Volk

jeff.volk@alphavideo.com

612-719-6234

Platinum

Sanjay Kirimanjeshwar

sanjay@amagi.com

+91 98440 39275

Premier

Tracy Geist

tgeist@amazon.com

415-298-1290

Corporate

Bianca de Tschaschell

bianca.de.tschaschell@appear.net

+47 949 89 524

ARCTEK SATELLITE PRODUCTIONS

Mobile

Brian Stanley

bstanley@arcteksat.com

612-308-9079

ARISTA NETWORKS

Corporate

Ed Chapman

echapman@arista.com

408-547-5567

ARRI

Corporate

Debra Kasparian

DKasparian@ARRI.com

818-618-2665

ARTEL

Corporate

Rafael Fonseca

rfonseca@artel.com

978-795-4585

Mobile

Paul Weiser

pweiser@asgllc.com

818-519-1751

ASTOUND BUSINESS SERVICES

Corporate

Sean Sullivan

sean.sullivan@astound.com

571-623-4332

ASU PRODUCTIONS

Mobile

Don Collopy

don@asuproductions.com

917-861-0468

3G WIRELESS ADDER TECHNOLOGY

27

AMAGI AMAZON WEB SERVICES

91

APPEAR

ASG (ADVANCED SYSTEMS GROUP)

AT&T

Platinum

Catherine A. Palaia

cp286m@att.com

972-936-2612

ATEME

29

Corporate

Dave Brass

d.brass@ateme.com

484-860-0358

ATOM CREEK

Corporate

Kimberly Miles

kmiles@atomcreek.com

720-613-3028

ATOMOS

Corporate

Brad Rumler

brad.rumler@atomos.com

917-331-6811

AUDAZZIO

Corporate

Michele Klumb

Michele@Audazzio.com

855-697-6627

AUDIO-TECHNICA

Corporate

Kurt Van Scoy

kvanscoy@atus.com

330-686-2600 x2780

AZZURRO GROUP

Mobile

John Bonaccorso

jbonaccorso@azzurrohd.com

212-625-2069

BCE

Mobile

Laurent Seve

Laurent_Seve@bce.lu

+352 24 80 7111

BECK TV

Mobile

Matt Weiss

mweiss@becktv.com

512-271-6818

BELDEN

Corporate

Christine Williamson

Christine.Williamson@belden.com

412-327-9973

Platinum

Craig Schiller

cschiller@bexel.com

818-565-4202

BEXEL

45

BIRDDOG

95

Premier

Eamon Drew

eamon@bird-dog.tv

+61 421382474

BITCENTRAL

Corporate

Teresa Sarte

tsarte@bitcentral.com

949-783-3253

BITFIRE NETWORKS

Corporate

Ben Grafchik

bgrafchik@bitfirenetworks.com

502-523-0268

BLACKBIRD VIDEO

Corporate

Adrian Lambert

A.Lambert@blackbird.video

+44 7905863352

Platinum

Blackmagic Design

info-usa@blackmagicdesign.com

408-954-0500

BLACKMAGIC DESIGN BRAINSTORM

7

Corporate

Miguel Churruca

mchurruca@brainstorm3d.com

+34 91 781 6750

BROADCAST MANANGMENT GROUP

Mobile

Joe Scionti

jscionti@broadcastmgmt.com

847-372-0487

BROADCAST SERVICES INTERNATIONAL (BSI)

Mobile

Brooke Eady

Brooke@bsi-tv.com

905-332-2171

134

SPORTSTECHJOURNAL / SPRING 2022

SPONSOR INDEX SPONSOR

AD PAGE

BROADCAST SPORTS INTERNATIONAL (BSI) BROADPEAK C360

LEVEL

CONTACT

EMAIL

PHONE

Mobile

Peter Larsson

Peter.Larsson@BSINTL.COM

410-564-2612

Corporte

Mario Rainville

mario.rainville@broadpeak.tv

267-346-1260

Mobile

Evan Wimer

info@c360live.com

724-940-3277

CALREC AUDIO/DIGICO

87

Premier

Dave Letson

dave.letson@calrec.com

+441422842159

CANON

57

Platinum

Richard Eilers

reilers@cusa.canon.com

609-480-6019

CARTONI

Mobile

Steven Manios

steve@maniosdigital.com

805-660-1700

CES POWER

Mobile

Mike Hone

mhone@cespower.com

407-472-6215

CHESA

Mobile

Amy Lounsbury

amy@chesa.com

949-295-3370

Premier

Carol Bettencourt

carol.bettencourt@chyron.com

631-845-2000

Mobile

Brent Angle

brent@cinesys.io

866-905-2050

CIS GROUP

Corporate

Matt Silva

matt.silva@cisgroup.tv

954-257-9938

CISCO SYSTEMS

Corporate

Susan Friedman

sufriedm@cisco.com

908-433-6948

Mobile

JB Bowling

jb.bowling@clark.is

678-578-3451

CHYRON

79

CINESYS

CLARK CLARK WIRE & CABLE

Corporate

Dan Collins

dan.collins@clarkwire.com

847-949-9944

COBALT DIGITAL

Corporate

Suzana Brady

suzana.brady@cobaltdigital.com

703-431-8810

CP COMMUNICATIONS

Mobile

Aaron Segarra

Aaron.Segarra@cpcomms.com

800-762-4254

CREATIVE DIMENSIONS

Corporate

Daniel Kiley

dkiley@gowithcd.com

203-250-6512

Mobile

Noah Gusdorff

noah@cmsi.tv

818-847-7390

Corporate

Sergio Amatangelo

sergio.amatangelo@crowncastle. com

724-416-2710

CSP MOBILE PRODUCTIONS

Mobile

Len Chase

len@cspmobile.com

207-282-9680

CTI (CONFERENCE TECHNOLOGIES INC.)

Mobile

Tim Albright

tim.albright@cti.com

314-356-2585

DAKTRONICS

Corporate

Jesa Pace

jesa.pace@daktronics.com

712-539-2855

DALE PRO AUDIO

Corporate

Eric Eldredge

eric@daleproaudio.com

212-475-1124 x 7137

DALET

Corporate

Karin Piscart

kpiscart@dalet.com

+33 6 12 94 22 67

DATACORE

Corporate

Shawne Dickerson

Shawne.Dickerson@datacore.com

512-590-9322

DELTATRE

Corporate

Claire Bell

Claire.Bell@deltatre.com

+44 208 545 1500

DEVLIN DESIGN GROUP

Corporate

Dan Devlin

ddevlin@ddgtv.com

970-349-5836

DIGIGRAM

Corporate

Brittany Hilton

brittany@synthax.com

828-399-0819

DISGUISE

Mobile

Joni Lindes

marketing@disguise.one

+44 20 7234 9840

DIVERSIFIED

Mobile

Duane Yoslov

dyoslov@diversifiedus.com

415-305-8047

Corporate

Harry Macey

harry.macey@dizplai.com

+44 754-580-84-81

Corporate

Don Cardone

Don.Cardone@DENZ.tv

908-998-1080

Mobile

Sam Schrade

sam@dnastudios.tv

281-802-8000

Platinum

Ellis Reid

ereid@dolby.com

415-250-6985

DOME PRODUCTIONS

Mobile

Mary Ellen Carlyle

mcarlyle@domeprod.com

416-341-2022

DX3 MEDIA

Mobile

Dale Smith

dalesmith@DX3media.ca

416-433-3261

EDGECAST

Corporate

Ryan Daniel

ryan.daniel@edgecast.com

213-435-4221

CREATIVE MOBILE SOLUTIONS CROWN CASTLE

DIZPLAI

97

DMC BROADCAST GROUP DNA STUDIOS DOLBY

EDITSHARE

13

Premier

Gregory Lawler

gregory.lawlwer@editshare.com

562-537-9610

EEG / AI-MEDIA

Corporate

Regina Vilenskaya

regina.vilenskaya@ai-media.tv

516-293-7472 x138

ELECTRO-VOICE

Corporate

Rob Ferguson

Robert.Ferguson2@us.bosch.com

315-310-0370

ELUVIO INC

Corporate

Eluvio

LIVE@eluv.io

510-207-2489

ENCOMPASS DIGITAL MEDIA

Corporate

Peter Ostapiuk

postapiuk@encompass.tv

770-331-2890

Platinum

Ilana Trinkenreich

itrinkenreich@equinix.com

+55 21 98666-6560

EQUINIX

89

2

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SPONSOR INDEX SPONSOR

AD PAGE

LEVEL

CONTACT

EMAIL

PHONE

Mobile

Ryhaan Williams

ryhaan.williams@esbroadcast.com

908-500-0532

33

Platinum

Jim Scott

jim.scott@eurovision.net

973-650-9577

Corporate

Jim Carroccia

jcarroccia@eutelsat.com

786-609-9637

ES BROADCAST EUROVISION SERVICES EUTELSAT EVERTZ

83

Premier

Tony Silvestri

tony@evertz.com

905-335-3700

EVS

61

Premier

David Pinkel

d.pinkel@evs.com

818-846-9603

EXERTIS BROADCAST

Corporate

Exertis Broadcast

BroadcastMarketing@ExertisNA. com

800-398-5652

FASTLY

Corporate

John Agger

jagger@fastly.com

844-432-7859

Mobile

Michael Satrazemis

michaels@filmwerksintl.com

910-297-8000

Corporate

Bryan McKoen

bryan@telestrator.com

604-762-1477

Mobile

Dan Grainge

dan@fletch.com

312-932-2704

Corporate

Gabriel Baños

gabriel@flowics.com

415-894-5732

Mobile

Patrick Hally

patrick@flycamUSA.com

610-420-6383

Corporate

Gerry Nazimek

Nazimek@for-a.com

973-220-8471

FILMWERKS INTERNATIONAL FINGERWORKS TELESTRATORS FLETCHER SPORTS FLOWICS FLYCAM INTERNATIONAL FOR-A FRIEND MTS

Corporate

Julia Gracheva

jgracheva@friendmts.com

+44 121633 5780

Platinum

Thomas Fletcher

Thomas.fletcher@fujifilm.com

312-909-3204

FUJITSU

Corporate

Richard Harvey

Richard.Harvey@fujitsu.com

925-251-0070

G&D NORTH AMERICA

Corporate

Craig Abrams

craig.abrams@gdsys.com

818-748-3383

GAME CREEK VIDEO

Mobile

Pat Sullivan

psullivan@gamecreekvideo.com

603-821-2205

GEARTECH USA

Mobile

Brad Wensley

bwensley@geartech.ca

647-295-6672 321-888-3800

FUJIFILM

17

GENIUS SPORTS

Corporate

Samuel Provencher

samuel.provencher@geniussports. com

GLOBECAST

Corporate

Jodi Morelli

jodi.morelli.ext@globecast.com

203-249-2839

GLOOKAST

Corporate

Matt Silva

matt.silva@cisgroup.tv

954-257-9938

GOOGLE CLOUD GRABYO GRASS VALLEY

75

GRAVITY MEDIA

23

HAIVISION HLW INTERNATIONAL IHSE USA

93

Premer

Richard Lee

itsrichard@google.com

206-688-4169

Corporate

Jorge Ramirez

jorge@grabyo.com

646-844-6634

Platinum

Elpi Klapa

elpi.klapa@grassvalley.com

514-333-1772

Premier

William Wright

William.Wright@gravitymedia.com

818-955-9449

Corporate

Mark Villamor

mvillamor@haivision.com

438-887-6467

Mobile

Keith Hanadel

khanadel@hlw.com

212-353-4946

Premier

Dan Holland

dholland@ihseusa.com

732-738-8780

Mobile

Rich Williams

rich@illuminationdynamics.com

818-686-6400

Corporate

Nick Ashwin

nick.ashwin@imagen.io

214-418-3064

Premier

Mary Schoof

mary.schoof@ imaginecommunications.com

703-869-2042

Mobile

Tom McGowan

tom.mcgowan@imtglobalinc.com

818-761-9770

INTELSAT

Corporate

Jon Sonsteby

jon.sonsteby@intelsat.com

703-559-7914

JOSEPH ELECTRONICS

Corporate

John Cleary

jcleary@josephelectronics.com

800-323-5925

JVC PROFESSIONAL VIDEO

Corporate

Dan Skirpan

dskirpan@us.jvckenwood.com

724-747-9301

ILLUMINATION DYNAMICS IMAGEN IMAGINE COMMUNICATIONS

31

INTEGRATED MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES

KEY CODE MEDIA

Mobile

Matt McClain

mmcclain@keycodemedia.com

818-303-3900

KISWE MOBILE

47

Premier

Khee Lee

khee.lee@kiswe.com

240-497-0981

KMH AUDIO-VIDEO INTEGRATION

49

Mobile

Kevin Henneman

khenneman@kmh-integration.com

800-590-2520

LAWO

3

Platinum

Forrest Sussman

Forrest.Sussman@lawo.com

914-514-5600

136

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SPONSOR INDEX SPONSOR

AD PAGE

LEVEL

CONTACT

EMAIL

PHONE

LEADER INSTRUMENTS

Corporate

Joe Castellano

josephc@leaderamerica.com

201-245-5063

LEGRAND AV

Corporate

Gordon Wason

Gordon.wason@legrand.com

516-350-2327

Mobile

Doug Cole

dcole@lhcomp.com

954-752-5805

Corporate

Marc Rowley

marc.rowley@liveCGI.com

860-833-6757

Mobile

Brad Sexton

brad@livemediagroup.com

818-435-3006

Platinum

Janel Fleming

janelf@liveu.tv

201-742-5229

LTN GLOBAL

Corporate

Connie Petrides

connie.petrides@ltnglobal.com

201-280-9875

LUCIDLINK

Corporate

Julie O’Grady

julie.ogrady@lucinlink.com

650-269-9989

Platinum

Courtney Underhill

Courtney.Underhill@lumen.com

503-416-1553

LH COMPUTER SERVICES LIVE CGI LIVE MEDIA GROUP LIVEU

77

LUMEN TECHNOLOGIES

19

MARKERTEK

73

Premier

Adam June

ajune@markertek.com

800-522-2025x7361

MARSHALL ELECTRONICS

Corporate

Tod Musgrave

tod@marshall-usa.com

310-333-0606

MATROX VIDEO

Corporate

Zahraa Al-Haideri

zalhaide@matrox.com

514-822-6000 x7391

MAXON

Corporate

Paul Babb

p_babb@maxon.net

805-376-3333

MEDIA LINKS

Corporate

Tom Canavan

tcanavan@medialinks.com

860-206-9163

MEDIAKIND

Corporate

Murray Barker

murray.barker@mediakind.com

+44 (0) 7826 952355

MEDIAPRO

69

Platinum

Mario Sousa

msousa@mediapro.tv

305-357-6000

MEGAPHONE TV

67

Premier

Jamie MacDonald

jamie@megaphonetv.com

412-422-0903

Mobile

Steve Meyer

steve@meyerproinc.com

503-638-2096

25

Premier

Charlotte Bielecki

charlotte.bielecki@microsoft.com

617-528-5638

MO-SYS ENGINEERING

Corporate

Tom Shelburne

tom@mo-sys.com

860-202-6430

MOBILE TV GROUP

Corporate

Mark Chiolis

mchiolis@mobiletvgroup.com

818-292-5583

Mobile

Greg Salman

gsalman@movicom.com

323-633-7033

MEYERPRO MICROSOFT

MOVICOM MPE

Corporate

Neal Pilzer

neal@mpenyc.com

212-245-0969

NECF

Corporate

Joseph Maar

Joseph.Maar@necfglobal.com

860-881-360

NEMAL ELECTRONICS

Corporate

Benjamin Nemser

bnemser@nemal.com

305-899-0900

NEP GROUP

Platinum

Susan Matis

smatis@nepgroup.com

412-423-1339

NET INSIGHT

Corporate

Per Johansson

per.johansson@netinsight.net

703-945-3739

NETSCOUT

Corporate

Amy Dion

amy.dion@netscout.com

978-614-4136

OBJECT-MATRIX

Corporate

Leanne Tomlin

leanne.tomlin@object-matrix.com

+44 02920 382308

OPENDRIVES

Corporate

Jaclyn Taroc

j.taroc@opendrives.com

818-642-0969

OPENGEAR PARTNER NETWORK

Corporate

Cindy Zuelsdorf

hello@opengear.tv

530-203-5703

Premier

Kate Lajeunesse

Kate.Lajeunesse@us.panasonic.com

973-289-1909

PARSEC

Corporate

Adrienne MerrickTagore

adrienne.mt@unity3d.com

707-364-0029

PHENIX REAL TIME SOLUTIONS

Corporate

Jed Corenthal

jed.corenthal@phenixrts.com

917-494-1942

PIXELLOT

Corporate

Yossi Tarablus

yossit@pixellot.tv

+972 522890297

PANASONIC

59

51

PIXERA

Mobile

Conor McGill

conor@avstumpflusa.com

678-330-2980

PIXOTOPE

Corporate

David Dowling

david.dowling@pixotope.com

+47 901 49 006

PLATINA SYSTEMS

Corporate

Mark Yin

Mark@platinasystems.com

408-829-4010

PLIANT TECHNOLOGIES

Corporate

Gary Rosen

Gary.rosen@plianttechnologies.com

818-264-9730

Platinum

Erin Bates

ebates@prg.com

916-761-0726

Corporate

Chanan Averbuch

chanan@primeview.biz

212-730-4905

Adam Ledgister

adam.ledgister@ productionrockstars.com

678-608-6767

PRG PRIMEVIEW PRODUCTION ROCKSTARS

39

Mobile

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SPONSOR INDEX AD PAGE

SPONSOR

LEVEL

CONTACT

EMAIL

PHONE

Corporate

Steve Rotz

srotz@productionhub.com

877-629-4122

PROGRAM PRODUCTIONS

Mobile

Amy Scheller

ascheller@programproductions. com

617-480-3541

PSSI GLOBAL SERVICES

Mobile

Clint Bergeson

info@pssiglobal.com

310-575-4400

PUGET SYSTEMS

Premier

Eric Brown

eric@pugetsystems.com

425-458-0273

PRODUCTIONHUB

PURE MOBILE PRODUCTIONS QUANTUM

43

QUANTUM5X REALITY CHECK SYSTEMS RF WIRELESS

Mobile

Jim Neely

JimN@Puremobileproductions.com

801-824-1118

Premier

Skip Levens

skip.levens@Quantum.com

949-856-7800

Corporate

Mike Chapin

mike.chapin@q5x.com

519-520-9784

Mobile

Jeff Heimbold

j.heimbold@rcs.live

323-465-3900

Mobile

Rob Bunn

rob.bunn@rfwireless.com

416-803-9301

Platinum

Sara Kudrle

Sara.Kudrle@riedel.net

530-559-9986

Mobile

Richard Glandorf

rich@robovision.com

973-879-1096

Platinum

Kevin Cottam

kcottam@rossvideo.com

613-228-0688 x4366

RT SOFTWARE

Corporate

Mike Fredriksen

mike@rtsw.co.uk

+447787551541

RTS INTERCOM SYSTEMS

Corporate

Angelo Piga

angelo.piga@us.bosch.com

952-736-4209

Mobile

Tim Eichorst

timeichorst@rushmediaco.com

608-850-7411

RIEDEL COMMUNICATIONS

9

ROBOVISION ROSS VIDEO

5

RUSH MEDIA GROUP SDTV

Mobile

Mark Parikka

operations@sdtv.com

619-293-7777

SEAGATE TECHNOLOGY

Corporate

Mark Anderson

Mark.B.Anderson@Seagate.com

310-500-6275

SENCORE

Corporate

Brandon Baker

brandon.baker@sencore.com

605-978-4600

SENNHEISER

Corporate

Jennifer Lee

Jennifer.Lee@sennheiser.com

860-575-3450

SES

Corporate

Miriam Benedicto

miriam.benedito@ses.com

(609) 240-5571

SHURE

Corporate

Celino Ullegue

ulleguc@shure.com

847-420-9371

Premier

Jon Finegold

jfinegold@signiant.com

781-312-6786

SIMPLYLIVE

Corporate

Greg Macchia

g.macchia@simplylive.tv

484-273-0760

SINGULAR.LIVE

Corporate

Jeff Heimbold

jeff@singular.live

Mobile

Stephen Wharton

stephen.wharton@skycam.tv

719-963-4150

SKYLINE COMMUNICATIONS

Corporate

Thomas Gunkel

thomas.gunkel@skyline.de

+32 51 31 35 69

SMT

Corporate

Patricia Hopkins

p.hopkins@smt.com

919-602-4392

Corporate

Ross Gilbert

rossg@solidstatelogic.com

631-396-0184

Platinum

Rob Willox

Robert.Willox@sony.com

201-930-7349

SOS GLOBAL

Corporate

Michelle Truman

mtruman@sosglobal.com

602-418-1811

SOURCE DIGITAL

Corporate

Hank Frecon

hank@sourcedigital.com

703-338-5493

SIGNIANT

85

SKYCAM

SOLID STATE LOGIC SONY

37

SOUTHWORKS

Mobile

Nicole Revers

nicole.revers@southworks.com

+44 7783 517780

SPECTRA LOGIC

Corporate

Hossein ZiaShakeri

hosseinz@spectralogic.com

303-641-1790

SPIIDEO

Corporate

Todd Patton

todd.patton@spiideo.com

+ (46) 70 294 6148

SPORTRADAR

Corporate

Steve Byrd

s.byrd@sportradar.com

847-274-3322

ST ENGINEERING IDIRECT

Mobile

Lincoln Biederbeck

lbie@idirect.net

703-648-8002

STATS PERFORM

Corporate

Stephanie Brown

sbrown@stats.com

646-324-2444

STORAGEDNA

Corporate

Tridib Chakravarty

tridib.chakravarty@storagedna.com

949-480-7937

STREANN MEDIA

Corporate

Leandro Finol

leandro@streann.com

866-70-ON-AIR

STUDIO NETWORK SOLUTIONS (SNS)

Corporate

Steve McKenna

smckenna@ studionetworksolutions.com

314-733-0551

SUITELIFE SYSTEMS

Mobile

Bobby Stevens

bstevens@nfbconsulting.com

661-238-9004

SUPPONOR

Corporate

David Patton

david.patton@supponor.com

+44 7894 995 655

SYNAMEDIA

Corporate

Janice Pearson

jpearson@synamedia.com

323-513-6396

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SPONSOR INDEX SPONSOR

AD PAGE

LEVEL

CONTACT

EMAIL

PHONE

TAG V.S.

Corporate

Danna Mann

danna@tagvs.com

315-646-8410

TATA COMMUNICATIONS

Corporate

Utkarsh Gosain

utkarsh.gosain@ tatacommunications.com

917-499-0236

TECHNICOLOR

Corporate

Tony Bozinni

tony.bozzini@philips.com

408-910-4689

TEDIAL

Corporate

Claudine Cecille

ccecille@tedial.com

+33 607865552

TELEMETRICS

Corporate

Anthony Cuomo

aec@telemetricsinc.com

201-848-9818

Premier

Doug Hansel

Doug@highrezpr.com

603-537-9248

Corporate

Stuart Russell

stuart.russell@tellyo.com

+44 (0)7827 019494

Premier

Lindsay Klinger

lindsay.klinger@telosalliance.com

330-268-4844

Corporate

Telstra Broadcast Services

telstrabroadcastbookings@team. telstra.com

+61 2 8258 7900

Corporate

Annie Gerhart

annie@tempus-ex.com

813-502-1038

Corporate

Andrew Ng

pr@cs.inc

888-941-2111

Corporate

Michel Suissa

michels@bandh.com

212-239-7500 x2240

Platinum

Christian Kneuer

christian.kneuer@theswitch.tv

212-239-3715

TELESTREAM

81

TELLYO TELOS ALLIANCE

41

TELSTRA TEMPUS EX MACHINA TERADEK

99

THE STUDIO B&H THE SWITCH

35

THE VIDEO CALL CENTER

Corporate

Larry Thaler

LThaler@TheVCC.TV

212-235-7019 x720

THUMBWAR

Mobile

Brian Carr

brian@thumbwar.tv

310-910-9030

TRANSMIT

Premier

Rob Friedlander

robert@transmit.live

415-297-6709

Corporate

Greg Siers

greg.siers@tslproducts.com

301-272-0434

TSL PRODUCTS TVU NETWORKS

53

Platinum

Eric Chang

echang@tvunetworks.com

650-969-6732

Corporate

Marcel Naef

marcel.naef@uniqfeed.com

347-401-2020

Premier

Craig Laliberte

craig.laliberte@epicgames.com

310-948-4148

VARIANT SYSTEMS GROUP

Corporate

Olaf Bahr

olaf@vsglive.com

503-881-2211

VENUE EDGE

Corporate

David Saphirstein

david@venueedgepro.com

407-505-9410

Premier

Billy Gil

bgil@veritone.com

310-283-6305

Premier

Steve Walter

stephen.walter@verizon.com

929-226-5943

VERSUS SYSTEMS

Corporate

Celena Georgia

celena.georgia@versussystems.com

424-226-8588

VIDEON

Corporate

Ken Ruck

ken.ruck@videonlabs.com

917-406-4789

VIDISPINE, AN ARVATO SYSTEMS BRAND

Corporate

Kurt Krinke

kurt.krinke@arvatosystems.com

646-930-6010

UNIQFEED UNREAL ENGINE

63

VERITONE VERIZON BUSINESS GROUP

65

VIDOVATION

Mobile

Rich Anderson

ricka@vidovation.com

949-954-5282

VISAIC

Corporate

Jason Nicol

jnicol@visaic.com

858-444-6086

VISLINK TECHNOLOGIES

Corporate

Daniel Carpini

daniel.carpini@vislink.com

908-852-3700

VISTA WORLDLINK

Corporate

Joshua Liemer

jliemer@vistaworldlink.com

954-838-0900

VITAC

Corporate

Dave Titmus

david.titmus@vitac.com

724-350-3520

VITEC

Corporate

Bryan Reksten

bryan.reksten@vitec.com

770-331-4802

Premier

Sam Leadsom

sleadsom@vizrt.com

+44 7973 132236

VIZRT GROUP

71

WAVES AUDIO

Corporate

Greg Kopchinski

gregk@waves.com

925-325-2807

WILDMOKA

Corporate

Catherine Cywinska

catherine@wildmoka.com

+33 07 64 89 14 79

WORLD WIDE TECHNOLOGY

Corporate

Eric Heet

eric.heet@wwt.com

314-608-7188

WOWZA MEDIA SYSTEMS

Corporate

Tim Dougherty

tim@wowza.com

720-608-4417

WSC SPORTS

Corporate

Joe DaCosta

joe.dacosta@wsc-sports.com

832-330-6556

XYTECH SYSTEMS

Corporate

Alexandra Kuipers

akuipers@xytechsystems.com

818-698-4958

Mobile

Birim Yamanlar

birim.yamanlar@zerodensity.tv

+90 5339171552

Platinum

John Wastcoat

john.wastcoat@zixi.com

617-319-0928

ZERO DENSITY ZIXI

21

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139

THE FINAL BUZZER

WILL NAB SIGNAL THE DAWN OF A NEW AGE?

By Ken Kerschbaumer Sports Video Group, Executive Director, Editorial This column has been a long time coming, around 1,108 days to be exact. That’s the time that has passed since the last time the industry came together at NAB in Las Vegas.

I will be the first to admit it might take a few minutes to shake off the rust. First, I need to get used to new locations like the West Hall, which is located where the old parking lot used to be across from North Hall. I also need to get used to not going to old locations like the South Hall.

And then there are the great mysteries like how my feet will hold up and whether the new show hours will be a hit or a miss with attendees and exhibitors.

The one thing I won’t need to shake off is the desire to see industry colleagues, check out some new technology, and get a sense of where the industry is headed.

It’s amazing to think that it has been three years since the industry has gotten together to celebrate tremendous advances and changes. Even more amazing is that those advances and changes happened without the industry gathering together in a meaningful way. Does the reality that the industry seemed to get along fine without trade shows mean that trade shows are irrelevant? No. First, it’s important to remember that, while the industry did manage to innovate and — in some instances — even thrive during the past three years, there is a good chance that innovation would have accelerated even faster with trade shows. Trade shows provide the kind of opportunities for discovery that can lead to kismet that, in turn, can result in stronger companies, better technologies, and improved workflows.

Simply put, a small company has a much better chance to thrive if its technology can be discovered on an exhibit floor rather than via a Google search. And larger companies can more easily get a sense of whether a new strategic direction is a winner or a loser and then retool accordingly.

So, what am I looking forward to at this year’s show? We’ve had three years of development around virtualized hardware, new remote production workflows, and cloud-based live production, but I want to see how the pieces from various manufacturers will come together in a cohesive manner. I also want to see how compression will make a difference for signal quality as 4K and HDR continue to become of more interest to industry professionals. And, sure, let’s toss in nextgeneration broadcasting via ATSC 3.0, cool demonstrations of camera tracking and automated production, immersive audio, and lots of mind-blowing augmented reality technologies.

But those are only the things I expect to see. The real fun is always in the new discovery. I am not sure if a lot of the smaller companies that have existed in the nooks and crannies of NAB over the years will be there this year. It’s possible the continuing pandemic, inflation, and transportation costs will keep attendance down and that smaller companies will wait another year. But I hope that is not the case. I hope that NAB is filled with old friendly faces. I hope that NAB is filled with opportunities to meet new friendly faces. And I hope that NAB signals a new dawn in sports content creation workflows, technologies, and possibilities. <

PUBLISHED BY SPORTS VIDEO GROUP 19 West 21st St., Ste. 301 • New York, NY 10010 Tel: 212.481.8140 • Fax: 212.696.1783 www.sportsvideo.org EXECUTIVE DIRECTORS PAUL GALLO, Executive Director

paul@sportsvideo.org | 212.696.1799

MARTIN PORTER, Executive Director

marty@sportsvideo.org | 516.446.2029 EDITORIAL KEN KERSCHBAUMER,

Executive Director, Editorial kenkersch@sportsvideo.org | 646.205.1810 JASON DACHMAN, Chief Editor jason@sportsvideo.org | 646.861.2373 BRANDON COSTA, Director of Digital brandon@sportsvideo.org | 646.861.2370 KRISTIAN HERNÁNDEZ,

Associate Editor and Social Media Manager kristian@sportsvideo.org | 646.880.4902 SUSAN QUALTROUGH, Copy Editor susan@sportsvideo.org RIVA DANZIG, Art Director riva@sportsvideo.org SVG SERVICES KAREN HOGAN KETCHUM,

Director of Production karen@sportsvideo.org | 646.559.0434 KATIE CHAMPION,

Production and Operations Associate katie@sportsvideo.org | 646.524.7497 ALICIA MONTANARO,

Meetings and Events Manager alicia@sportsvideo.org | 646.880.4901 ANDREW LIPPE,

Membership & Client Services Manager andrew@sportsvideo.org | 212.481.8133 CRISTINA ERNST, Event Operations Director cris@sportsvideo.org | 917.309.5174 SPONSORSHIP ROB PAYNE, Managing Director,

Worldwide Sponsor Development rob@sportsvideo.org | 212.481.8131 ANDREW GABEL,

Director, Sponsor Development agabel@sportsvideo.org | 646.998.4554 DYLAN DAVIDSON, Sponsorship Coordinator dylan@sportsvideo.org | 646.559.0435 SVG EUROPE JOE HOSKEN, General Manager

joe@sportsvideo.org Tel: +44 74290 90134 ABOUT SVG

The Sports Video Group was formed in 2006 to support the professional community that relies on video, audio, and broadband technologies to produce and distribute sports content. Leagues, owners, teams, players, broadcasters, Webcasters, and consumer-technology providers have joined SVG to learn from each other, turn vision into reality, and implement innovations, while sharing experiences that will lead to advances in sports production/ distribution and the overall consumer sports experience.

SportsTech Journal is produced and published by The Sports Video Group.

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