
WNBA Finals 2022: ESPN Brings the League Into the Surround-Sound Era More microphones for more sources overwhelm sneaker squeaks By Dan Daley, Audio Editor
Thursday, September 15, 2022 - 7:00 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
The best-of-2022 WNBA Finals that began Monday (ESPN, ESPN2, ABC, ESPN.com) at Las Vegas's Michelob ULTRA Arena will cap the first full season in which all WNBA games were broadcast in 5.1 surround.
It's also one in which the WNBA achieved technological and strategic parity with the NBA and other major leagues for its sound in other ways, too. The WNBA Finals pits the Las Vegas Aces versus the Connecticut Sun, who will host Games 3 and 4 at their Mohegan Sun Arena, Like their male counterpart, the finals will feature at least one player from each team fitted with a wireless Q5X PlayerMic RF transmitter, along with head coaches and game referees, wearing Q5X CoachMics and RefMics, respectively, a process it began earlier this season. (The WNBA's marketing term for this array of wireless audio is, ironically, WNBA Wired. )
That kind of parity had been a goal for us, says Michael Sullivan, remote operations specialist, ESPN. To have the production reach a level of other major championships throughout was important for us. We've worked this entire year so that we can showcase the league at the highest level, bulking up the technical resources of the WNBA Finals this year, from both a video and an audio perspective. It's especially important for us to achieve that at a time when our [viewership] is up 50%-60% in some rounds. The fans are coming, and audio is an important part of that.
It's Loud Inside Another aspect that the WNBA Finals seem to have in common with the NBA is sheer volume. Sunday night's game had an ambient noise level in excess of 90 dB and reached as high as 105 dB at certain points. In fact, the combination of crowd noise and music in the arena completely overwhelmed televised basketball's most fundamental sonic element: sneaker squeaks.
ESPN A1, NHL productions, Dan Buddha Bernstein was brought on as lead A1 for the WNBA Finals, abetted by Mark Skipper managing Riedel comms and Steve Simone on RF management. According to Bernstein, the WNBA Finals also have a slew of SFX capture, including eight Sennheiser 416 shotguns around the court and Sony ECM-77's on the nets and the far table. Sennheiser 418 short stereo mics (configured as M/S) are mounted on all handheld cams (three wired, two wireless). Crowd sound is picked up by a pair each of Shure SM81's and Audio-Technica AT-5100 condenser microphones, providing most of the 5.1 rear-channel content.
Dan brings that NHL and NBA mentality about the sound to the show, says Sullivan. Also, from an announcer perspective, we have an additional reporter, Holly Rowe, and Andrea Carter will act as a sideline analyst. So we've got additional talking heads and reporters around the court in addition to an enhanced mix on the overall court.
He adds that the expanded Wired infrastructure for player, coach, and officials audio was built in cooperation with the NBA - the league for which Q5X originally developed the PlayerMic - and leads out to the broadcast compounds, with Game Creek Video's Riverhawk serving as the hub for the Las Vegas matches and Justice for the Connecticut games.
To enhance the audio this year, we've added more microphones to [ Wired'], he says. In past years, we weren't miking as many sources. Now it's a much larger kind of wired setup just to make sure that we are bringing the emotion to the viewers at home throughout the game.
Seamless Production Integration In terms of production, ESPN is integrating the onsite audio seamlessly between the trucks and ESPN's Bristol, CT, facility. Cameras and microphones are encoded in Las Vegas for the first two games through the same Game Creek truck and sent to Bristol, where the studio show is produced.
All the studio microphones, all the studio IFBs will have complete integration, Sullivan explains, so that we can throw from studio talent to game talent and have conversations throughout the show to engage the analysts' and announcers' expertise throughout the game. Even though there'll be two completely different shows - a game broadcast and a studio broadcast - it's one centralized compound and one kind of centralized audio infrastructure.
He cites other enhancements for the WNBA Finals production: deployment of many as 25 cameras, including two roaming RF cams and what he calls a significant Fletcher component with remote POV cameras near the basket rims and the scorers table. In addition, ESPN is testing a handheld M VI camera that can mimic a RailCam-type look, using a camera/lens combination that occupies a smaller footprint than a typical RailCam and is installed along the court's edge. These visual elements, he says, will combine with audio to create the overall experience.
I think it's about how we enhance the audio that we have and how we present that audio in a creative way so that video and audio come together to create a unified experience, Sullivan says. We're trying to build out an entire infrastructure where it gives us production creativity, where we put announcers, how they're contributing to the broadcast, and then how that game and how that broadcast sounds at home. It's all one presentation.
More from Sports Video Group
02/07/2025
Progressive realism: Aurora on taking up the broadcast reins for World RX alongs...
02/07/2025
Great speed: New host broadcaster Aurora on getting the World RX 2025 season pro...
02/07/2025
Seat of its pants: Aurora boxes clever and looks ahead for the FIA as new host b...
02/07/2025
UEFA Women's Euro 2025: EBU, BBC Sport and Sunset Vine talk coverage plans, ...
02/07/2025
UEFA Women's Euro 2025: Women's Super League launches new content series...
02/07/2025
UEFA Women's Euro 2025: Ignite puts fans and players front and centre with t...
02/07/2025
Storytelling in the Live Game Broadcast: ESPN Director Jimmy Platt Breaks Down t...
02/07/2025
CONCACAF's Miguel Angel Garcia on the Gold Cup's Enhanced 2025 Productio...
01/07/2025
SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: Spyrosoft's Jonathan Witty on Futher Business Exp...
01/07/2025
The NIL Effect: How the Shifting Business of College Athletics Impacts On-Campus...
01/07/2025
Cherry on the cake: Inside the technical production of the Tour de France 2025 w...
01/07/2025
NESN's Josh Jun on Keeping Alternative Broadcasts Fresh for Boston Red Sox, ...
01/07/2025
TNT Sports Races Back Into NASCAR With Fresh Look, Familiar Edge Production approach emphasizes creative freedom, bold storytelling, casual-fan-friendly tone B...
27/06/2025
How smarter compression is creating a sustainable future By Michael Burns
Monday, June 23, 2025 - 14:13
Print This Story
Live sport is especially vulnerab...
27/06/2025
Behind the Mic: FOX Sports Ratchets Up UEFA Women's EURO 2025 With Top-Class...
27/06/2025
RTL Group To Acquire Sky Deutschland By George Bevir, Editorial Director, SVG Europe
Friday, June 27, 2025 - 8:00 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story ...
27/06/2025
Frictionless, At Scale: The Current State of Live Video Streaming Techology Leaders from Bitmovin, Comcast Technology Solutions, Harmonic, IMAX, and Phenix brea...
27/06/2025
Marquee Sports Network's Nick Steger on Meeting the Moment of the Contending...
27/06/2025
NHL Draft 2025: The League Is Primed for First Decentralized Draft in Non-Pandem...
26/06/2025
10th-Annual SVG Regional Sports Production Summit Presents Useful Roadmap for th...
26/06/2025
The Big Cloud Debate: Public vs. Private vs. Hybrid Tech leaders from CineSys, Diversified, and Net Insight breaks down all flavors of cloud By Jason Dachman, ...
26/06/2025
Program Productions' Jess Kowatch on Training the Next and Current Gener...
25/06/2025
SVG College Summit 2025: Select Sessions Now Available to Watch on SVG PLAY Tackling the latest in college sports video: NIL, live production, virtual productio...
25/06/2025
ESPN Is Set To Bring AR Graphics to Wimbledon, Revamps Bunker and Studio 18 VO B...
24/06/2025
2025 NBA Draft: ABC/ESPN Prepares for Two-Day Draft at Barclays Center Partners Game Creek Video, CP Communications, NEP Specialty Capture will be on hand By M...
24/06/2025
Cloud Broadcast Tech Update: Google Cloud's Jane Day on the Impact of AI on ...
24/06/2025
Cloud Broadcast Tech Update: AWS's Dana LaGattuta on Data-Driven Innovation ...
24/06/2025
Lions live: Dublin opener sees Sky Sports take remote route By Fergal Ringrose ...
24/06/2025
Pumas maul Lions as S4C and TG4 deliver first-ever joint host in Dublin By Ferg...
24/06/2025
ABC/ESPN Prepares for 2025 NBA Draft, the First at Barclays Center Partners Game Creek Video, CP Communications, NEP Specialty Capture will be on hand By Mark ...
23/06/2025
Adventures in Live Cloud Production: Stories From the Trenches with MLB, NHL, NB...
23/06/2025
Finding the edge: How Badger & Combes produces live-streamed coverage of county ...
23/06/2025
Masters of Madness: New football format shakes up the rules of sportainment By Adrian Pennington
Monday, June 16, 2025 - 11:38
Print This Story
The ball i...
23/06/2025
New State-of-the-Art Mountain Media Center Launches in Former Starz Encore Build...
23/06/2025
ESPN Says Goodbye to Seaport Studios, Hello to New State-of-the-Art Production F...
20/06/2025
Feeling Unlimited, Part 1: Athletes Unlimited Softball League Deploys Remote Pro...
20/06/2025
A True Test? Cricket's Growth on the Global Stage and the Role Broadcast Can...
20/06/2025
Sky Sports goes large for the British & Irish Lions Tour with AR graphics, UHD a...
20/06/2025
ESPN's Men's College World Series Finals Coverage Combines Innovation, L...
19/06/2025
SVG Rewind: PGA Tour Introduces Drone AR Smart Tracing, Reflects on Winning Geor...
18/06/2025
Technology focus: Fan expectations drive advances in the in-stadium experience By Jo Ruddock
Tuesday, June 3, 2025 - 08:36
Print This Story
For years, att...
18/06/2025
Making connections: How stadiums are meeting the ever-growing demand for data an...
18/06/2025
SVG Venues & Teams Summit Keynote: RWS Global Powers the Stadium Environment at ...
18/06/2025
SVG Rewind: Behind the Scenes of Producing Tottenham Hotspur's Europa League...
17/06/2025
SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: Mercury Intermedia's Tom Richardson, Mike Ligon o...
17/06/2025
Total Sports Performance from Relo Metrics, VideoAmp, Offers Next-Level Media, B...
17/06/2025
From Stage to Stream: Producing Live Esports Events in 2025 Leaders from ESL FACEIT Group, Riot Games, and more break down the latest trends By Jason Dachman, ...
17/06/2025
Inside FIFA 2025 Club World Cup Operations With FIFA's Oscar Sanchez, HBS...
17/06/2025
Production ambitions: Over Exposed on making the National League Promotion Final...