2. Contexto histórico
2.1. La Ruta de la Seda
2.1.3. Geografía y rutas
Digital technology facilitated a dramatic increase in sports production output - it was the extension of ways the same original content could be
simultaneously re-packaged in alternative formats by different users that
was pivotal in meeting the rising demand for sports content. In addition to the technological dimension, a political economy approach requires an interest in who does what and why. To help answer these questions, and to
61 Although EVS is the predominant technology, the traditional VT (videotape) name was
gauge the full scale of this remarkable transformation, previous analogue workflows can be compared with a contemporary case study.
Football on the frontline
In 1992 the BBC’s Match of The Day format provided a sample workflow (see 4.2 above). By the 2013-14 season a battle for the UK’s live football viewers was being fought between challenger, BT Sport, and market leader BSkyB. But, away from the headlines, there is another Premier League football provider. Without attracting much media attention the Premier League operates its own production service.
Why does the Premier League offer this service? Whilst domestic rights for 2013-16 are valued at around £3 billion, the international rights are worth a further £2 billion (Harris, 2012), this is an important new market. Seeking to collect this revenue the Premier League controls its intellectual property according to a senior executive in charge of output speaking in 2013, “via a guaranteed standardised and high quality output aimed at a global rather than a local (UK) audience”. How the Premier League provides this service is now discussed.
Premier League Productions (PLP)
Set up in 2004, Premier League Productions (PLP) is funded by the Premier League and operated by IMG Sports Media. PLP offers content production, distribution and archive management for the Premier League. The following
account is based on testimony from participants plus fieldwork as participant-observer62 during summer 2013.
At the start of the 2013-14 season, Premier League Productions delivered content to Premier League Licensees in 212 different territories. Using digital technologies and integrated production workflows this is a modern football content factory; the scale is unmatched by any other sports league.
What does PLP do?
Primarily, PLP takes the original match coverage provided by the Premier League’s host broadcast partners, Sky Sports and BT Sport, and, with some modifications, re-broadcasts all 10 matchday fixtures across a weekend making these available to the Premier League’s international Licensees. Figure 4.2, Host to Licensee pathway
On behalf of licensees, PLP also provides small local enhancements to this coverage, including in-vision customisation from Premier League venues. Specially enhanced feeds and multiple-match packages are also offered.
PLP produces a very high volume of content in a variety of live and pre- recorded formats, from news to classic matches. Together, the live
62 I wrote a consultancy document for the German Bundesliga whilst executive producer at
IMG in 2012. This involved extensive benchmarking and content comparison with a range of football-based content including the Premier League.
PL Host Broadcast
matches, special feeds and formatted programming comprise a core production offer.
By adding further studio-based programming, both live and pre-recorded, PLP has, since 2010, also offered a full content service (in other words, a stand alone fully scheduled channel that runs 24 hours a day 7 days a week for 42 weeks each year). Via a dedicated digital department PLP also
provides short-form material for www.premierleague.com.
As the domestic broadcasting rights to live Premier League football in the UK (154 games per season, 2013-16) are held by Sky Sports and BT Sport, PLP content is focussed towards the Premier League’s overseas partners. If you see a Premier League match outside the UK then you will be watching PLP output.
Digital technology applied
This section explains (a) the technology used in a contemporary digital production environment like PLP and (b) how this technology has been configured to enable a remarkable increase in the volume and scope of output including the speed with which this output can be produced. This example also underlines Mosco’s claim (1996) about how commodification and different outputs:
… intensify the commodification process by linking increasingly specific kinds of programming to increasingly well-‐defined audiences. (Mosco, 1996: 152).
The technology used is EVS and AVID. EVS is at the hub of contemporary sport production operations, managing media at outside broadcasts or a studio base. The combination of EVS technologies and software systems – IP Logger and IP Director software– is the foundation for content logging (descriptions of content and other relevant metadata), clipping together content (a faster option than AVID editing) and the storage and movement of large amounts of media instantaneously between galleries, edit suites and MCR (MCR is the technical control area where all routing is managed).
AVID non-linear edit suites are the factory floor, the edit rooms where content is assembled before output. AVID edit bays are linked together via nearside archive systems – these can be EVS, Viz Ardome63 or AVID Unity –
shared media can be accessed quickly and by multiple producers. Far side storage is a longer-term archiving solution where content is held offline and is, therefore, not available for immediate use.
The key points are: (1) these systems feature a high degree of connectivity which allows large amounts of media to be moved around rapidly, (2) multiple producers can work on the same source material simultaneously, therefore (3) the volume and scope of output is dramatically increased as is (4) the speed of production. This is a quantum leap from earlier linear tape- based analogue systems. An example of how content flows from the initial match to international licensees follows.
63 Viz Ardome is media management system that allows multiple users to check the
availability of media directly from a desktop link. Available information includes when material was last used and if there are any special rights restrictions.
Premier League, from stadium to international licensee
Host Broadcast Partners
The Premier League’s host broadcast partners are Sky Sports and BT Sport. They are responsible for covering 154 matches a season (2013-16) for UK broadcast, with all 380 matches covered for international output. An illustrative camera plan64 for a match in the 2013-24 season is set out
below, followed by the onward production pathway, via PLP, to the Licensee.
Compared to a 6 camera plan from 1992, there are now, typically, 26 cameras deployed. 6 cameras provide Super Slow Motion. 2 Ultra Motion cameras provide additional high levels of detail. All camera output is strictly assigned to EVS; this is done to ensure superfast replay reactions whenever called for by the director.
64 This is an indicative plan as all camera positioning is subject to case-by-case restrictions
Milne | June 2014 154
Figure 4.3, Illustrative HBP PL Camera Plan
Blue = 20:1 lens
Orange = 86:1 lens (Cams 9-14 Superslo) Red = 100:1 lens with Ultra Motion
15 11 18 7 8 16 12 13 6 5 1 2 25 9 21 19 23 24 20 4 3 22 26 14 10
In a typical analogue outside broadcast truck the vision mixer console was limited to a maximum of 48 inputs, an international sports director explains the differences:
Digital switchers [vision mixer desks] now have up to 168 inputs, 8 channels of EVS is pretty standard, plus 3 different graphics sources are a fairly normal specification. The
technological changes within a fully digital operation mean that, in the same space as older outside broadcasts, there is just so much more capability. (International sports director, 2012)
Being able to generate many more replays via EVS also means more production and/or EVS operators are required to select and manage this media. Similarly, the increased demand for statistics and graphics means either 1 or 2 assistant producers are assigned to this task. Whilst the host broadcast partner match coverage is for local UK viewers, Premier League Productions re-orients all match presentation towards a global audience. How this is done is now reviewed.
The digital production environment
Premier League Productions receives a clean feed (match coverage minus Sky Sports and BT Sport commentators, graphics and other embellishments such as station identification) from all Premier League matches covered by the host broadcast partners.
To provide a standardised high quality output of all matches, the PLP production team consists of about 8 people - a director/vision mixer, 2 producers, 2 assistant producers, 2 EVS operators and a graphics operator.
Standardised high quality output is a crucial idea that recurs in the context of UEFA, FIFA and Olympic host broadcast operations. In essence, this means adding a new commentary and bespoke Premier League graphics (information on the teams, their line ups and scores/duration during the match). Highlights are also provided at half time and at full time, statistics are added plus any reports, flash interviews and press conference material when available.
As the match is fed into the production gallery, an assistant producer uses IP Logger software to produce a detailed description for editorial and
Archive use. This metadata remains attached to the media as it moves from EVS nearside storage, to the AVID, back to EVS or Ardome and then to archive. Compared to the hand-written notes made in the early 1990s (which could be of variable quality and were prone to being misplaced) IP Logger provides comprehensive data for multiple users.
The new output from the gallery is returned to MCR before onward routing to European, Asian and American satellite distribution and then to its final destination, with each of the 212 Premier League Licensees (figures 4.4 and 4.5).
Premier League Stadia
Figure 4.4 – PLP signal path, from PL Stadia to Licensee
Host Broadcast Partner OB
SNG
Uplink European Satellite
Digital MCR
Production Gallery
& EVS
Digital Archive EVS Delays
Encryption & Encoding Euro Sats Asia Sat s Americas Sat PL Licensees
Digital production workflows
The power of digital workflows, as expressed by Doyle (2002:30), is the ability “to reduce all sorts of images, sounds and text to a common format and to transport these via a common distribution infrastructure”. What should to be added to this understanding is the ability of numerous outputs to be created simultaneously, hence output is accelerated and volume increased. This is the fulcrum around which sports production processes now revolve – in a sense it is a powerful digital hub that allows content to be ingested, produced, modified and re-packaged, broadcast and then archived.
Looking at the Premier League, the objective is to take 154 matches produced locally in the UK and reversion output as an international standardised high-quality presentation for use by up to 212 global licensees. In doing so Premier League Productions delivers the Premier League brand to the world.
Turning now to the full service content service, this is simply a more structured format for content delivery, one that allows licensees to lift out and broadcast individual programmes or, if preferred, to use the schedule as a standalone channel. This option is appealing for telecommunications companies that do not have the same infrastructure as broadcasters, including production staff. The full content service includes material from the core service, but adds a range of live and pre-recorded studio
programmes, plus more match re-runs and archive-based content. The full service content is a live stream; this feed is routed to a series of regional satellites, where it is available for Premier League Licensees to access. The
step up to providing a full channel schedule requires a much larger volume of content (168 hours per week) plus a wider scope of programme formats. Figure 4.5– Indicative digital workflow
Satellite Lines Fibre
Digital MCR Nearside Archive Gallery & Studio AVID Edit & Storage Digital Production Transcoding EVS Ardome Archive Far side Archiving Digital Distribution
Analysis and additional studio-based production
To provide enough content to fill an entire channel PLP use a two-tiered approach: (1) sophisticated analysis tools are used as a focus for additional discussions with (2) studio-based programmes providing the primary format for this expansion.
In contrast to EVS, AVID and Ardome these analysis devices do not share a single operating system, meaning their incorporation is technically more challenging. However, they are important tools when adding scope to output. Of these the most notable are tOG-SPORTS Pro, the Viz-RT Touchscreen and Venatrack Real View65.
For the 2013-14 season the Premier League introduced Goal Decision
System from Hawkeye. Used during the match the referee is informed (via
a receiver worn on his wrist) if a goal has been scored, subsequent animations can be shown on the venue screens and used in match coverage. In 2014 there is no indication the appetite for performance related information is diminishing with more and more data being made available for dissection66.
What is crucial here is not the technological embellishment per se, but the ability to recycle original media in an increasingly wide range of new
65 Red Bee Piero is used in the BBC’s sports coverage and available to independent
producers for an annual license fee.
66 Also worth mentioning is the adoption of the ‘1st and 10’ graphics system developed by
Sportvision for ESPN in 1998. Further versions were developed by Princeton Video Image (PVI) for CBS and SportsMEDIA for NBC. These systems create virtual 10 yard lines for NFL coverage, showing how far the offensive team has to move the ball from the line of
scrimmage to secure a first down. These graphics systems have become embedded in NFL coverage.
programme formats. With more and more versions being generated from a limited quantity of original material the commodification process, as
described by Mosco (1996) and Schimmel (2005), enters an unprecedented new level of activity. Whilst Sky Sports was the first media provider to provide significantly extended scope, this is an important development that is now being driven by the leagues and federations as they seek more control of their own output and additional revenues, particularly in international media markets. The output provided by Premier League productions provides a useful example.