36 TVBEurope
www.tvbeurope.com August 2014
Serving the tennis fans Summer of Sport
The Wimbledon tennis championship continues to be one of the major outside broadcast events of the year, as Philip Stevens reports
AS ONE of its ‘crown jewel’ events, the BBC once again provided comprehensive coverage — about 150 hours in all — of the Wimbledon tennis championship. Alongside the traditional broadcast output, the BBC took an additional transponder on the Astra satellite position at 28.2° East for the duration of the event — capacity that was also used for coverage of the Glastonbury Festival and the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
The additional facility was used to broadcast multiple high defi nition and standard defi nition video streams to satellite and cable viewers in the UK. This extra capacity enabled viewers to select tennis matches of their choice, alternative sound stages at the Glastonbury Festival and various events at the different locations hosting the Commonwealth Games. The Corporation reports that feedback from viewers after the 2012 Olympic Games showed overwhelmingly that the provision of more choice of live events made the event even more popular and enjoyable.
Feeding the world A long-standing production partner for the Wimbledon fortnight is IMG Productions. “We provide a fully produced International World Feed with English and Russian commentary covering the best tennis from an editorial point of view,” states David Shield, senior vice president, global director of engineering and technology at IMG Productions. “That operation includes distributing international highlights worldwide via satellite and on Sport 24, our own live in-fl ight sports service for airlines, plus multilateral and unilateral satellite distribution of TV-enabled courts to broadcasters across the globe. In all, we had about 60 personnel onsite.”
and Japanese sports broadcaster WOWWOW. “For Channel 7 we turned around material to be sent to Australia,” says Atkinson.
“We brought feeds into the EVS editing facility, topped and tailed the footage and delivered them to the client’s facilities in Australia.”
The operation for WOWWOW was similar to that demanded by the World Feed, with the addition of a studio and stand-up positions for the broadcaster. “We employed a Lawo audio mixer and Riedel talkback system for this particular set-up.”
Remote cameras ACS Henman Hill: Aerial Camera Systems provided an additional tracking camera on Henman Hill
“We provide a fully produced International World Feed, with English and Russian commentary covering the best tennis from an editorial point of view”
Shield says that other services provided by IMG Productions include Live@Wimbledon, the new video and audio channel and Twitter channel broadcasting from the All England Lawn Tennis Club. “There are three radio channels for listeners to choose from. Around the Grounds brought the whole event to life, Centre Court featured ball- by-ball commentary from that court, while No.1 Court offered the same service from that venue. The service also provides interviews, vox pops and local traffi c news. Alongside visitors to the Championships, the service is available online for a worldwide audience.” In addition, the company provided recording of the Wimbledon Archive and provision of the Central Content Store (CCS) that allows rights holding broadcasters to access any footage, including ISO feeds, from the current Championships, and compilations of matches from the ‘digital’ era — post 2007. Editing is carried out using Avid and Final Cut Pro. “All TV courts, ISO cameras and colour
Aerial Camera Systems (ACS) once again provided a number of specialised units. New this year was an additional tracking camera on Henman Hill (or Murray Mound, as it is increasingly being called). This delivered slow tracking shots of the crowd enjoying the day’s coverage from outside the actual playing areas.
David Shield, IMG Productions
footage are logged using a team provided by the BBC. The logs are shared between the BBC and IMG. They are available to other broadcasters through the CCS I mentioned earlier.”
Shield continues, “Besides working with the BBC, we provide technical facilities onsite for Fox Australia and full production for Fox Sports Singapore.” To service that complex operation, IMG Productions ran two production galleries, one for the World Feed and one for Live@Wimbledon. On the World Feed, the producer cuts the pictures, while Live@ Wimbledon requires a vision mixer and director. In addition, both galleries have sound supervisors, EVS operators and graphics operators.
This year saw Visions take
over responsibility for OB provision from previous incumbent SIS live. “The changeover was pretty seamless and the new Technical Operations Centre is an improvement over the On Site Central Apparatus Room (OSCAR)” declares Shield.
David Shield, senior vice president, Global Director of Engineering and Technology at IMG Productions
Gearing up for technical ops
Technical equipment and engineering support for the IMG Productions World Feed operation was supplied by Gearhouse Broadcast. “Gearhouse supplied equipment including EVS XT3 servers, Sony MVS-7000X and MVS- 6530 vision mixers, MC7 audio desks, Harris glue, an RTS Telex talkback system as well as cabling and fi bre connectivity,” explains Simon Atkinson, technical project manager at Gearhouse Broadcast.
Also used was a Snell Cygnus 576 x 576 26U 1080p 3Gbitps Router, plus several smaller Snell routers throughout the Wimbledon operation. Gearhouse Broadcast also serviced Australia’s Channel 7
Beyond that, ACS continued to rig an HD Cinefl ex V14 stabilised camera mount on the underside of a hoist that towers 22m (72 feet) above the broadcast compound to provide directors with spectacular aerial views of the courts and surrounding countryside. Another robotic unit (similar to the one on Henman Hill) offered tracking shots from just behind the base line of the Centre Court. Finally, the company’s SMARThead compact remote heads were again mounted on the umpire’s chair in Centre and No. 1 Courts to give close up pictures of the players between games, as well as any net shots. And talking of remote, Shield feels that with space becoming more cramped around the Wimbledon courts, there may be opportunities for some of the production work to be carried out away from the location. “IMG Productions has been responsible for ESPN’s interactive, red button coverage for six years, and much of that work is handled remotely. For the future, we are thinking that some parts of our production could come from our main facility at Stockley Park. Although it is preferable to be at the location, it is worth looking into what elements could be handled just as effi ciently from a remote site.”
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