The tech revolution powering modern sport production

The cloud has been the biggest tech shift in sport production in recent years, according to senior figures at Sunset+Vine, SailGP and Two Circles. 

Speaking at the MPTS trade show earlier this year, in a session that is now available through the Broadcast Sport Podcast, Sunset+Vine technical producer Tom Velvin-Bucknall, SailGP director of broadcast media and technology Shane Warden, and Two Circles commercial director Moe Hamdhaidari agreed on the biggest change to the sector with chair Louise Wells of Bubble Agency. 

You can listen to the full episode below, where the trio discuss the latest tech that is bringing viewers at home closer to sport than ever before, including drones, miniaturised cameras, the cloud, and plenty more. They also looked at what broadcasters, production companies and rights holders need to be focusing on next in the world of tech.

On the cloud, Hamdhaidari said: “I think the biggest shift that we’ve seen is possibly the one that’s been most talked about, and that is the use of the cloud in enabling remote production.

“We’ve seen some real, not only operational, but also commercial, benefits for our clients. We are the host broadcast service provider for the UEFA Women’s Champions League on Disney+, and the complexity around it, in terms of having multiple outputs, having 11 different commentaries, three different pitch side studios, that’s been all enabled through centralised production and remote production.

“Equally, our work with the International Canoe Federation has enabled us to not only maintain the quality of the output, but also show them real savings that we’ve then pumped back into audience development on social and digital.”

Warden agreed: “The transition into using cloud services. We’re a hugely data centric sport, plus with the inherently busy world that it exists in, in terms of the video coverage that’s required for it, working with [cloud] partner Oracle is a big partnership of ours. It brings data and the video media together.

“Previously, in my world of tennis, the data did one thing and the media did something else and they never really shared the same space, but we’ve seen those worlds coming together and the real power that that data can bring into play with the media. I’m not just talking about fancy graphics, it’s actually using that data to help you understand and define what that story is that you’re telling through the video medium.” 

For Velvin-Bucknall it was the same: ”Absolutely using the cloud. Obviously remote production is a part of our workflow as well, and we’re certainly using the cloud a lot to allow editors all over the world to access our local material, send them material and make the editing workflow a lot more efficient and not have to bring people into an office to get a job done that can easily be achieved from home or from wherever. And then obviously the on site things, cinematic cameras.” 

You can listen to the full episode, and all other episodes, of the Broadcast Sport Podcast below. You can also subscribe to the Broadcast Sport Podcast on all major podcast platforms.