The LiveU global team spent well over a year planning this project across all continents, emphasising its scale. “We’ve come a long way from first covering the marathon transmission at the Beijing Summer Games in 2008 to dynamic live productions – capturing everything from boat rides on the Seine during the opening ceremony to inside scoops from the athletes’ camps, providing backup for the main competitions and broadcasting live from the venues,” adds Feingold. LiveU’s IP 5G bonding technology, with optimised data plans, was also in play, and the company’s LU800 multicamera encoders enabled broadcasters to bring all the action to viewers back home, without the restriction of traditional broadcast equipment. “The encoders were deployed all around Paris, including the venues (both inside media zones for press conferences and also on the floor, as close as possible to the action). Some of the content was put live on air and others were recorded for future use.” BEYOND THE SEA The Summer Games this year stretched far beyond the French capital. Football was hosted across several cities in addition to Paris, including Bordeaux, Lyon, Nantes, Nice and Saint-Étienne. Basketball and handball also put on events in Lille, while Marseille played host to
the sailing. The surfing competition was held on the other side of the globe in Teahupo’o, Tahiti. France Télévisions leveraged the latest 5G broadcast transmission innovations from Haivision and Obvios for the event. The coverage included interviews with the athletes in the Olympic Village, as well as live shots from a boat-based camera. Fully produced content was then transported to France Télévisions’ broadcast production centre in Paris for broadcast across its networks using Haivision Streamhub’s IP gateway capabilities. “Utilising the latest technology – including a private 5G cellular network from Obvios and the cellular contribution solutions from Haivision – enabled us to provide
viewers with unprecedented UHD coverage of the athletes before and after the surfing competition during the Olympic Games,” states Thierry Jacob, director of overseas resources and development, France Télévisions. “The technology powering the work in Tahiti revolutionised the way France Télévisions’ overseas production team worked – and brought viewers closer to both the competitions and athletes than ever before.” VISIONARY VISUALS We’ve covered transmission and delivery, but what were viewers around the world actually seeing at the other end? For NBC viewers, Chyron’s Prime platform was used to elevate storytelling capabilities. The figures indicated that more than 30 million people tuned in to NBC’s TV and streaming platforms to watch the Games. “There were 32 sports this year, which is a wealth of information and data,” begins Nikole McStanley, Chyron product portfolio director for the live production platform. How do you ensure that translation engages viewers in the most compelling way? There’s also the challenge of making that translation work across continents, she elaborates. “You’re dealing with two different frame rates. In Prime’s application, we have the flexibility to design in one frame rate and set the output to another, converting it to play at the correct speed, which significantly reduces the need for re-rendering. This flexibility allows the Olympics to be held anywhere in the world,
IT’S A SLAM DUNK With every dribble and pass, the excitement of live basketball was brought to screens, making fans feel like they were courtside
KEEPING IT REAL TIME LiveU’s portable units allowed on-the-go live broadcasting, without the need for expensive, bulky equipment
@feedzinesocial
Powered by FlippingBook