by Douglas Price

The summer of 2024 was the ‘summer of sport’. Men’s football Euro 2024 and the Olympic Games in Paris stood out at the pinnacle of a season of world-class sporting events.

The action reached billions of sports fans worldwide through traditional TV broadcast and streaming platforms, from field to screen, driven by a new layer of innovation added to traditional content consumption experiences.

Fact: live sports remain unparalleled in terms of audience reach and engagement. Yet, the continuous evolution of consumption patterns and the varying habits across newer generations have made reliable tech innovation something more than a commodity for broadcasters. All of this is within an increasingly complex media ecosystem that requires a deeper understanding and fresher strategic approaches.

In this blog post, we examine live sports broadcasts from the perspective of technology innovation and identify four key aspects of seamless production workflows.

#1. A remote-first ecosystem with top-quality equipment

By definition, remote broadcast is the production of television content from locations outside the traditional ‘in-studio’ or OB trucks. This generally involves broadcast equipment (servers) centrally located onsite or at a broadcast facility, as well as operators working from remote locations.

A remote-first workflow – built in the cloud or with hybrid setups – overcomes the non-practicality of building a dedicated production suite on site. It also offers other advantages, namely reduced costs, increased productivity when handling multiple events at once, and sharing of resources.

Choosing the right equipment (cameras, microphones, other audiovisual hardware) is also key to ensuring a smooth delivery and unmatched experiences for the end users.

#2. 2110 standards

Scalable capture, processing, and playout remain top priorities for broadcasters who aim to deliver world-class live sporting events. The workflows in live sports production have been progressively transformed by the introduction of SMPTE ST 2110, which enhanced the overall operation by separating video, audio, and ancillary data streams over IP networks.

While it’s important to allow for any capture option, flexibility in choosing the format support will enable broadcasters to adjust workflows for events of varying scales, avoiding limitations traditional infrastructures can present.

Seamless coverage of a sporting event is ultimately the key performance indicator for successful content distribution, and ST 2110 helps elevate remote production workflows. Operators can leverage studios miles from the venue, simplifying the process without compromising quality.

#3. Instant replays: keep your fans glued to their screens

Since the technology was first developed, the ability to show a key segment of a play during live sports events has been a key indicator of successful productions for broadcasters. 

Most recently, advanced technologies for instant replays have made the headlines for supporting officiating workflows, providing officials with tools to analyze every pixel accurately and make crucial decisions faster and more efficiently.

At Hawk-Eye, we developed HawkREPLAY, the remote production and instant replay solution built off the back of the Synchronised Multi-Angle Replay Technology (SMART) systems. HawkREPLAY enhances the broadcast production workflow when it comes to instant replay, and it does so by providing operators with tools that reduce the friction between clip highlight and selection, tagging, and generation of the final output. All within seconds of the live broadcast. 

#4. A data-driven broadcast environment

Now more than ever, real-time data is integral to any live sports workflow. Think of data that is tracked, ingested, and consolidated for distribution and the advantages automated processes can provide operators with, freeing their time to focus on engaging storytelling.

Technological advancement is bringing to life automated processes that are inevitably going to change the outlook of broadcast workflows. Think of automated clipping, or the creation of graphics and overlays to display deeper insights for AR and VR analysis: smart data increases the value of sports content.

Conclusions

In today’s ever-evolving ecosystem, fans expect flawless delivery of live events, with no errors, low-latency content, and the highest quality of broadcast to be met as standard. 

While the key points mentioned in this blog post are just the tip of the iceberg that broadcast production workflows represent, it’s clear how the complexity of technology that sits at the foundation of any successful delivery must rely on best-in-class solutions and be adaptable to operations that run around the clock. 

Interested in learning more about broadcast production workflows for live sporting events? Get in touch, and book a demo with our experts.