UFC 306: Noche at Sphere - Immersive Sound System Promises New World of Audio Massive system has an aural granularity in which even spoken syllables are processed individually By Dan Daley, Audio Editor
Monday, October 7, 2024 - 1:04 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
The synergy of sports and entertainment is well on its way to becoming a singularity. With lavaliere microphones regularly worn by MLB outfielders, it might not be a stretch to see a left fielder strap on a Fender Stratocaster.
Less absurd, though, is how Sphere, the year-old futuristic event venue in Las Vegas, seems poised to become a sports stadium. Noche UFC (UFC 306 PPV) at Sphere - Suga Sean O'Malley vs. Merab The Machine Dvalishvili - held there on Sept. 14 and broadcast on ESPN sets the stage for that. The first sports event from the Madison Square Garden-owned, 18,600-seat spherical building off the Las Vegas Strip went out over multiple distribution channels: ESPN+ PPV (English and Spanish), with prelims available on ESPN+, ESPNEWS, ESPN Deportes, and SiriusXM Fight Nation 156.
How the UFC event came to be there reflects the ongoing integration of sports and entertainment. After attending a show during U2's 2023-24 residency at the venue, UFC President/CEO Dana White decided that he wanted to host an event there. That resulted in the mixed-martial-arts company's biggest production to date.
UFC 306: Noche was the first sports event at Las Vegas's Sphere.
The event's production credits also suggest that burgeoning synergy. Silent House Group, brought in to produce the in-venue show, was fresh off Taylor Swift's The Eras Tour. Audio Supervisor Michael Abbott, who has a four-decades-long association with the sound for the Grammy Awards telecast, was hired by Silent House to manage the 64-channel-audio playback of a series of purpose-produced 90-second video segments created to define the narrative around the marquee bout.
Complex Signal Path This audio was fed via MADI into Sphere's Holoplot sound system and to a pair of Lawo Powercores and into the Lawo router. The Lawo console used for front-of-house sound bused the audio tracks into the arrays of Sphere's Holoplot sound system, itself a technical beast. The world's largest concert-grade audio system, it consists of approximately 1,600 permanently installed and 300 movable Holoplot X1 matrix-array loudspeaker modules and comprises a total of 167,000 individually amplified speaker drivers. The system's 3D audio-beamforming and wavefield-synthesis technology delivers immersive sound and effects that can be highly localized throughout an entire audience area.
Not surprisingly for this first-of-its-type production, Abbott found that the audio strategy had to be built from the ground up. The project had multiple deliverables, he recalls. There was the broadcast that needed a stereo mix of the film content for the broadcast, a stereo downmix of that content, and an M&E [music & effects] stem without dialog for the international feed; and they added three languages - French, Spanish, and Portuguese - onto voiceovers of the [videos]. Then there was the added content for the world[-feed] transitions out of the interstitial films back into live, both for the broadcast and for the space, with a sound-design bed that would play out to transition into the fight sequence.
The Code In fact, the venue and the broadcast shared audio elements while producing completely separate shows (DJs in the house, sports announcers on-air) with shared music and effects (from both open mics and prerecords) across them, and audio mix had to follow direction from both the live and broadcast productions.
The way to manage that, says Abbott, who also supervised the audio for the NHL Draft held at Sphere in late June, was with SMPTE timecode. The emphasis on timecode-driven content, both audio and video, is growing and growing. It's the best way to manage a lot of content live.
The next element to be addressed was how the films' director, Glenn Weiss, and Fight Director Anthony Giordano managed the transitions out of the film/world-feed clips into the fighter-combo packages played out in the media plane. The videos of the fighter-combo packages had four EVS playout video channels sequenced into PiP Audio boxes on Sphere's 160,000-sq.-ft. LED media plane surrounding the audience. Both the audio and the multiple video clips had to be synchronized for these sequences.
The core audio for the fighter-combo packages from the EVS replay deck comprised eight key channels. Channels 1 and 2 would be the stereo for broadcast, 3 and 4 the international M&E tracks, 5 and 6 the M&E tracks for the live sound in the bowl, 7 the main dialog track, and 8 reserved for timecode.
Every triggered event was assigned a specific timecode address for the EVS fighter-combo package playout. Some actions shared an address; for instance, one triggered the music for two walk-ons as well as all the lighting cues and PixMob LED bracelets, like the ones Silent House deployed for Taylor Swift concerts.
The Venue as a Member of the Team Though kind of an arena on steroids, Sphere itself is its own technology proposition. What would also be the UFC's first show on ESPN broadcast in 1080p relied on UFC's typical truck, NEP NCP7 A and B units, the night before the fight as well as NEP EN3 A and B and Denali Summit A and B for production of the fight itself.
Abbott says that, over the past year, much of the time he has worked in the venue on various projects has been spent understanding just how different Sphere is as a production venue. For instance, achieving a high level of speech intelligibility - critical for noisy sports events - is no simple task when the number of transducers reaches national-debt level.
That's why we ended
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
01/06/2026
January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026
Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...
02/05/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
01/05/2026
January 5 2026, 18:30 (PST) NBCUniversal's Peacock to Be First Streamer to ...
01/04/2026
January 4 2026, 18:00 (PST) DOLBY AND DOUYIN EMPOWER THE NEXT GENERATON OF CREATORS WITH DOLBY VISION
Douyin Users Can Now Create And Share Videos With Stun...
02/03/2026
NBC Sports selected Imaginary Forces to create the main title sequence for the M...
02/03/2026
The NFL announces the launch of the NFL Draft Innovation Challenge, a new crowds...
02/03/2026
The World Teleport Association (WTA) has named Skyline Communications' DataMiner SatOps solution as a finalist for the 2026 Teleport Technology of the Year ...
02/03/2026
Ventum Tech announces a strategic partnership with Pixotope, a real-time graphic...
02/03/2026
Victory , a free, ad-supported sports streaming service, announces the launch of...
02/03/2026
Global powerhouse Delta Goodrem to represent Australia at this year's Eurovi...
02/03/2026
SBS brings together prominent voices to discuss rising social division and seek ...
02/03/2026
NITV Unveils Wednesday Night Sport Night
Media releases
A Midweek Hub for Blak Sport
Flagship NRL program Over The Black Dot moves to Wednesdays at 9:30pm
...
02/03/2026
Rohde & Schwarz demonstrates FR1-FR3 carrier aggregation, advancing 6G readiness Rohde & Schwarz and Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. have reached another pivotal ...
02/03/2026
MELBOURNE, Fla., March 2, 2026 - L3Harris Technologies (NYSE: LHX) today announc...
02/03/2026
Harvey Norman tops New Zealand's biggest ad spenders as retail leads and telcos and beverages sure Auckland March 3, 2026 - Nielsen's New Zealand'...
02/03/2026
aconnic AG (ISIN: DE000A0LBKW6), Munich, and Arqit Quantum Inc. (Nasdaq: ARQQ, A...
02/03/2026
Advanced Systems Group, LLC (ASG), a technology and services provider for media creatives and content owners, has appointed Jody Boatwright as Chief Strategy Of...
02/03/2026
Lightware, an industry leader in signal management, is reinforcing its commitment to simplifying complex AV environments with the continued evolution of its TPN...
02/03/2026
ZEISS Cinema opens its doors to an exclusive screening, filmmakers Q&A and hands-on showcase of the new ZEISS Aatma lens family on Tuesday, March 10, 6:00-9:00 ...
02/03/2026
To expand the creative potential of the compact Astera QuikBeam, DoPchoice introduces the SNAPBAG Round. The new light-shaping accessory transforms the powerfu...
02/03/2026
Douglas Dubler
On a rooftop in New York City, veteran photographer Douglas Dubler watched the sun's angle shift across the urban landscape, his internal cl...
02/03/2026
ZEISS is expanding its Otus ML lens family with the introduction of the new ZEISS Otus ML 1.4/35. This manual-focus lens is designed for photographers who live ...
02/03/2026
Matthews Studio Equipment now offers the new Dinkum Systems White FlexiMount and Phone Mount Kit, a compact, highly adaptable setup for mobile content creation...
02/03/2026
Luxembourg, February 26, 2026 - SES and Africa Mobile Network (AMN) have expande...
02/03/2026
02 03 2026 - Media release Ausfilm and Screen Australia launch joint UK market initiative
Ausfilm and Screen Australia have announced Partner with Australia (...
02/03/2026
Monday 2 March 2026
Saturday Night Live UK announces writing team
L-R: Jonno Johnson; Charlie Skelton; Celya AB; Omar Badawy; Gr inne Maguire; Laura Claxton; ...
02/03/2026
Back to All News
Netflix Unveils the Trailer for 53 Sundays, the New Film by Cesc Gay
Entertainment
02 March 2026
GlobalSpain
Link copied to clipboard
Dis...
28/02/2026
With two features seen in Formula 1 coverage, the broadcaster aims to bring view...
28/02/2026
Secretary of War Pete Hegseth addresses a crowd of approximately 1,500 L3Harris employees in Camden, Arkansas, as part of his Arsenal of Freedom tour....
28/02/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
28/02/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
28/02/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
28/02/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
28/02/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
28/02/2026
Berklee Presents Mambo Mania: Eguie Castrillo and the Berklee All-Stars Big Band...
28/02/2026
Berklee Announces Two New Summer Programs in Los Angeles The Berklee Music Business Program and Electronic Music Production and Sound Design Workshop bring imme...
28/02/2026
AI-RAN is moving from lab to field, showing that a software-defined approach is ...
28/02/2026
Autonomous networks - intelligent, self-managing telecommunications operations -...
28/02/2026
Back to All News
Final Trailer for BEASTARS Final Season Part 2' Roars Tow...
28/02/2026
New way to intentionally discover molecular glues could expand drug discovery Scripps Research scientists and colleagues show how drugs that eliminate certain d...
27/02/2026
The E.W. Scripps Company names Oliver Gray as Vice President, Network Sports and...
27/02/2026
The Gotham Sports App, the exclusive direct-to-consumer streaming home of MSG Networks and the YES Network, is now available for purchase through Prime Video fo...
27/02/2026
ESPN and the Horizon League announce a new multi-year, multi-platform media rights agreement, continuing a 38-year collaboration that began with the 1988 Midwes...
27/02/2026
At the 2026 NAB Show in Las Vegas, NETGEAR will highlight its new switch models and major updates to its Engage Controller software. The company's network d...
27/02/2026
Riedel Communications announces that Fondazione Teatro alla Scala has deployed a...
27/02/2026
Lyuno specializes in media localization, including translation, dubbing, subtitling, and voice-over services for a wide array of entertainment content. The comp...
27/02/2026
Chyron Weather 2.3, the latest edition of Chyron's weather visualization suite for broadcasters and meteorologists, recently launched.
The release includes...
27/02/2026
Telestream, which concentrates in media workflow technologies, announces expanded practical AI enhancements across its Vantage, Vantage Cloud, EDC, Stanza, and ...
UFC 306: Noche at Sphere - Immersive Sound System Promises New World of Audio Massive system has an aural granularity in which even spoken syllables are processed individually By Dan Daley, Audio Editor 
