Live from Tokyo Olympics: CBC Efforts Brings Production Teams Closer Together By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Friday, July 30, 2021 - 8:20 am
Print This Story
Events like the Olympics always given the CBC a chance to bring together its Montreal team, which serves the French-speaking Canadians, with the Toronto team which serves English-speaking Canadians. And while the pandemic may have lessened the number of personnel in Tokyo to 140 it isn't dampening the spirit.
(l-to-r) Sanjay Rana, Francois Messier, Sylvain Archambault, and Sylvain Taillefer of CBC.
We have crews coming from Montreal, Toronto, and all across Canada when an Olympics come, and we become one family and that is what we're seeing, says Francois Messier, CBC/Radio-Canada Team Leader. There is a feeling of collaboration between the teams and it's amazing. It's really a feeling of family.
Messier says the team in Tokyo consists primarily of reporters who are in the mixed zones as well as personnel to support commentary from the aquatics and athletics venues. CBC News is also being supported.
Sanjay Rana, CBC, systems technologist, says that two 10Gbps circuits are used to send a multi-viewer of all the available OBS feeds to Montreal and Toronto. The team there then selects the 20 feeds they want sent over the Zayo network in JPEG-2000 at 120 Mbps.
Two main broadcast control rooms in Montreal and Toronto are involved and the broadcast alternates from one control to the other between the different programs as part of a COVID protocol.
Then we have one or two pre-control rooms, and two main broadcast control rooms and one for the morning show, he adds. There is also a sub mix for aquatics and athletics which are both mixed remotely.
Viewers back home are getting 23 hours a day of Olympic content on the main networks and then there are sub channels as well featuring long-form events like tennis, soccer, and golf. Bell and Rogers are also getting content out to viewers via TSN 1 and 2 and Sportsnet and a distribution deal with Amazon hits the OTT market.
We were supposed to have two studios here, but it was decided to keep those back in Canada, says Messier. Our main hosts are back home but we have a green screen studio here for athlete interviews that is a cheaper way than Discovery but it's our version of the Cube.
Also, in Tokyo are 16 LiveU units, 12 for the ENG crews, three for news, and one that is installed with Team Canada in the athlete's village. CBC Technical Producer Sylvain Archambault says a camera, LiveU, and a robocam with a mic stand gives athletes a chance to step up and take part in interviews.
One interesting aspect of CBC's operations is that the French-language team in Montreal moved into a new building in early 2020 that uses ST-2110 IP for signal transport. But the English-language broadcast center in Toronto is still HD-SDI. Sylvain Taillefer, CBC, technical engineer, says ST-2110 is used for audio in the voice over booths but the rest of the facility is in SDI.
As long as we stay 1080i HD SDI is fine, he says.
With the Beijing Olympics only six months away much of the CBC's future advancements will be seen at the 2024 Games in Paris. For now, the focus is on getting through the Tokyo Games safely while also serving sports fans in Canada.
This is my fourth Olympics and we've had some changes in the team, but we are always working towards same goal and it's fun to do that every two years, says Rana.
Or as is the case this year, every six months.
More from Sports Video Group
09/01/2026
Rock-It Sports' Deron Brown & Laura Rowlands on Launching a New Brand, Suppl...
09/01/2026
Warner Bros. Discovery's Chris Brown on the Broadcaster's First French O...
09/01/2026
NFL Playoffs 2026: CBS Sports Travels to Jacksonville With Packed Arsenal of Pro...
09/01/2026
NFL Playoffs 2026: NBC Sports Is Set To Roll Out New Scorebar, Insert Graphics T...
09/01/2026
NFL Playoffs 2026: Prime Video Production Team Caps Historic Season With Iconic ...
09/01/2026
NFL Playoffs 2026: FOX Sports Kicks Off Postseason Slate With Two-Game Wild Card...
09/01/2026
NFL Playoffs 2026: ESPN's Run Brings Monday Night Football' Flagship Op...
08/01/2026
At CFP Semifinals, ESPN Again Flexes Its Operational Muscle With 20+ MegaCast Vi...
08/01/2026
SVG Students To Watch: Sophie Fowler, University of OregonThe Portland product has honed her skills as a producer, director, and TD at Quack VideoBy Brandon Cos...
08/01/2026
Follow the Money, Episode 3: Inside the Sports-Media Biz With Sam McCleery and K...
08/01/2026
SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: Qualstar's Jeff Sengpiehl on the Enduring Power a...
08/01/2026
Legendary February: Production Leaders at NBC Sports Pull Back the Curtain on Ol...
07/01/2026
SVG Summit 2025: All General Sessions Now Available To Watch on SVG PLAYThe SVG Summit celebrated its 20th edition with a loaded agendaBy Brandon Costa, Directo...
07/01/2026
NBCU's Brings Rinkside Live' and Courtside Live' Features to Peaco...
06/01/2026
Peacock Bringing Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos to Live Sports ContentPeacock is the first streamer to embrace Dolbys full suite of advanced picture/sound innovat...
06/01/2026
SVG Europe Audio: Listening to the sounds of powder and ice at Milano Cortina wi...
06/01/2026
Quintar Meta Spatial SDK Integration Promises Next-Level XR ExperiencesBy Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, January 6, 2026 - 9:41 am
Print This...
06/01/2026
Milano Cortina 2026: BBC Sport Previews Broadcast Ops, Studio Setup, Social Medi...
06/01/2026
Dolby's Jason Power on Elevating Live Sports Through Immersive Audio and HDR...
06/01/2026
DAZN's Global CRO Walker Jacobs on the Streamer's Breakout Year in the U...
06/01/2026
California Dreamin': LA28's SVP of Media Jim Bell Previews the Olympic a...
06/01/2026
One Month Out From Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony, NBC Sports in Final Prep fo...
06/01/2026
Advanced HDR by Technicolor and Zinwell Integrated onto ATSC 3.0 Conversion Boxe...
06/01/2026
FOX Sports President and COO Mark Silverman Shifts to Consulting RoleHis successor will be announced soonBy Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, Janu...
05/01/2026
NFL's Blake Jones on How the League's Latest Video Additions Change How ...
05/01/2026
Spiideo's Scott Bushman on How AI Is Already Powering Live Sports ProductionFrom a line of camera systems to its automated production platform, the tech ven...
02/01/2026
Freezing Florida: NHL's EVP, Entertainment Bob Chesterman on Taking the Wint...
02/01/2026
NHL Winter Classic 2026: TNT Sports Prepares for First NHL Outdoor Game in Sunsh...
30/12/2025
As the College Football Playoff Enters the Quarterfinals, ESPN Blows Out Its Meg...
30/12/2025
SVG's Best of 2025: Original ArticlesTake a look back at all our coverage of big-time productions, game-changing technologies, and state-of-the-art new faci...
29/12/2025
San Francisco 49ers Strike Gold With Halftime Laser SpectacularStunning display caps $200 million renovation of Levi's Stadium techBy Dan Daley, Audio Edito...
29/12/2025
The Cup's Around the Corner: An Inside Look at Broadcast Preparations for th...
29/12/2025
SVG's Best of 2025: Longform VideoWatch the standout keynote conversations, deep dives, and panel discussions from the year for free on SVG PLAY!By Brandon ...
23/12/2025
How guilas Cibae as Dominican Winter League Games Are Locally Produced for Glob...
23/12/2025
BitFire's Jim Akimchuk on Supplying Scalability and Customization in the Clo...
23/12/2025
CAMB.AI Enables European Athletics to Offer Multi-Language SupportPlan is to eventually offer translation into all languages spoken in EuropeBy Ken Kerschbaumer...
23/12/2025
Analysis: As sports media values trend negative, scarcity and quality are king By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Monday, December 22, 2025 - 14:08
Print ...
23/12/2025
ESPN, Disney, and NBA Return to the Animated Altcast Fray With Second Edition of...
23/12/2025
End the Year on a High Note and Donate to the Sports Broadcasting Fund Today!By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, December 23, 2025 - 12:25 pm
P...
22/12/2025
SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: Presidio's Neerav Shah on the Role of Its Captiva...
22/12/2025
Hitting the bullseye: Sky Sports readies itself for the biggest PDC World Darts ...
22/12/2025
Unique skillset: Bringing new directors to the world of darts at The Worlds with...
22/12/2025
Gravity Media prepares for a flight of fancy with the PDC World Darts Championsh...
22/12/2025
One hundred and eighty: Gravity Media on hitting the production bullseye at the ...
22/12/2025
The Famous Group's Jon Slusser on Fascinating Fans Through Immersive Content...
22/12/2025
ESPN's Meg Aronowitz on Continuing High-Quality Broadcasts of Collegiate Spo...
22/12/2025
ESPN Takes Data-Driven Storytelling to New Heights with MNF Playbook with Next ...
19/12/2025
SVG Sit-Down: Diversified's Jared Timmins on AI for Broadcast Sports and Cre...
19/12/2025
2025 SVG Summit Audio Recap: Say What?The Audio Production and Distribution Workshop at the SVG Summit 20 took on issues including speech intelligibility, Next-...
Live from Tokyo Olympics: CBC Efforts Brings Production Teams Closer Together By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director 
