Springtime in London: EMG on Bringing the London Marathon 2023 Home for the BBC

Springtime in London: EMG on bringing the London Marathon 2023 home for the BBC By Heather McLean

Wednesday, April 12, 2023 - 13:14

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One of the EMG-supplied electric motorbikes filming Elite women runners on Tower Bridge at the London Marathon 2022

Finally back to its springtime slot after three years of being raced in the autumn, the 2023 London Marathon is to be the 43rd running of the annual event.

Taking place on 23 April, fans at home are ready to watch the full array of humanity sweating across the 26.219 miles of the course, from the Elites that will include British distance running stars Sir Mo Farah and Eilish McColgan, to the heavily costumed runners making thousands of pounds for charities.

EMG is all set to bring those pictures to people at home who will be glued to BBC One for full live coverage on the day. The technical services provider's OB fleet for the race are based at Blackheath, Cutty Sark, Limehouse, Blackfriars, and Canada Gate at the end of the race. Most of the OBs include presentation and RF except at Blackheath, where there is no RF other than from the bikes that come in from Blackheath.

Long range plans

On the long range cameras being used for the London Marathon, Chris Brandrick , UK and group commercial director for EMG Connectivity says there will be two live camera helicopters covering the entire course for the Elite races. The aerial coordination and equipment supply is courtesy of Aerial Camera Systems (ACS).

He notes: The helicopters will be AS355 twin engine helicopters, fitted with a gyro stabilised aerial camera system. RF equipment is fitted to the aircraft to either transmit up to the plane or down to the OB (once the relay aircraft has completed its mission). The helicopters will be relocated to deploy on the morning of the race to avoid heavy weather, which is common to early starts on the South Downs.

There will also be six live electric camera bikes that are covering the entire course for the Elite races. Each bike is installed with EMG's Livetools RF equipment. In the past two London Marathon events EMG Connectivity has seen significant improvements in its connectivity for coverage by deploying Livetools equipment for the long range RF camera sources.

Livetools is a manufacturer of RF technology exclusive to EMG. The technology was designed for long range RF applications where robustness is very demanding, and has been used on events such as the Tour de France, Giro d'Italia, and many other international sports events.

The Livetools Fusion transmitters and receivers are equipped with the XPRO modulation which is the most robust COFDM modulation of them all, according to Brandrick. All the Livetools products are fully monitorable via IP networks and/or RF links through its control software. The equipment comes with built in GPS transceivers and camera control for Sony, Grass Valley GVG and Panasonic cameras.

Brandrick comments: The Livetools switchers can seamlessly switch between out-of-time sources from aerial and ground terrestrial relays. This is something else completely unique to the Livetools equipment that EMG uses.

An interesting feature on the equipment is the LAN bridge; we can establish a full IP broadband link from any of our sources, which means we can bring broadband comms to the bike pilots and camera operators, deploy RF monitors under the aircrafts footprint, or even a simple Teams or WhatsApp meeting with your colleagues anywhere on the course, he adds.

BBC Sport worked with EMG to capture the 2022 London Marathon, and is looking forward to doing the same this year

Getting the signal home

Brandrick adds on the electric motorbikes being used to capture the excitement of the Elite races: Our bikes are customised and have the ability to sit the camera operator forwards or backwards with special modifications for camera and RF operations. We have the ability to mount the transmit antenna behind the rear facing camera operators, providing them with a 180 degree unobstructed field of view.

Power is taken from batteries mounted in the bike's pannier. These independent batteries have the capability of powering the RF transmission system and camera for the duration of the event, without the need to draw any power from the bikes.

Cameras are supplied with image stabilisers and the stabilised lenses we supply have a built-in optical image stabilization system that employs Canon's patented Vari-Angle Prism Image Stabiliser (VAP-IS).

All bikes have a GPS system for tracking and mapping, he goes on. This allows us to monitor the location of the bikes and facilitates the tracking antennas in the relay aircraft to follow the bikes ensuring the most effective RF camera coverage. Full duplex comms is supplied for bike pilots and camera operators with independent talkback between the two.

We're ready for this year's London Marathon; it's going to be another great day come rain, hail or sun and we will deliver those pictures to the people at home, from the air and on the ground

Additionally for the long range camera plan, there will be one B200 pressurised RF relay aircraft that will be relaying all video, data and comms signals, plus one RF reception site located at Canada Gate which will be feeding all mobile sources to the OB.

Broadcast RFs premium fixed wing aircraft partner is Aerosotravia, an operator that specialises in broadcast aerial work. The advantage of Aerosotravia is its fleet capacity and stand by service during operational aerial work.

All aircraft deployed are pressurised Beechcraft King Air types (E90 or B200). Currently we can deploy six aircraft, all identical and equipped with tracking systems, meaning full backup is available if required, notes Brandrick. The endurance of these E90's or B200's airplanes is up to eight hours 30

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