SVG Europe France Summit: In-Depth on Remote Production of the French Open and Preparing for the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics

SVG Europe France Summit: Remote production of Roland-Garros and preparing for Paris 2024 By Marie-Agn s Bruneau

Tuesday, November 29, 2022 - 09:40

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Amandine Tyl from FFT (centre) and AMP VISUAL TV's Fran ois Valadoux (right) discuss the production of French Open tennis with Nicolas D al, Orange Events and SVG Europe France

Remote production and the coverage of major international sporting events were among the main topics of discussion at last week's SVG Europe France Summit (24 November), with the focus on this year's Roland-Garros as well as planning for the Rugby World Cup 2023 and the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics.

It is the second time that SVG Europe has hosted its France Summit, with the event taking place at the Studio Gabriel, operated by AMP VISUAL TV and situated off the Champs Elys es which was illuminated by the newly set Christmas lights and decorations.

It's not often there is a broadcast and sport event in the French language, said Nicolas D al, chief technical architect at Orange Events and SVG Europe France ambassador in his opening remarks, adding that Orange is very much involved in preparing for Paris 2024 and the Rugby World Cup 2023.

Roland-Garros in remote mode

The focus of the first panel discussion was Roland-Garros, and how remote production was used to cover some of the courts. Federation Fran aise de Tennis (FFT), working with Host Broadcast Services (HBS) took over the production of the tennis event from France T l visions in 2021.

Many changes took place in two years on our way to produce the event and one of the most important ones was to de-localise production on the 11 annex (outer) tennis courts, said Amandine Tyl, production manager of FFT.

We thought we could do remote production as long as our customers didn't see the difference and we did not much communicate about it, in order that the move remains neutral.

Asked by D al if people were disappointed not to be on-site altogether, she said: Actually, to have people work in good conditions was part of the reason why we decided to do remote production.

HBS was helped by outside broadcast and production services companies EMG and AMP Visual TV, with the latter supporting the remote production of 11 courts.

The move to remote production was primarily dictated by the small size of Roland Garros as a venue, said Tyl. The event is developing, there are more and more people, and we have some serious space issues it lasts 12 hours a day, so what is best? Work in a tiny room in Roland-Garros or be comfortable in an AMP Visual room? We rather benefited from the change!

AMP Visual TV chief technology officer Fran ois Valadoux added: Some key elements are to be taken into account; there is not one single model. We did Ironman World Championship in Hawaii, that was another kind and a totally different set-up.

The female delegates at the France Summit pose for a group photograph

You need to be able to identify what you want, he continued. In the case of Roland-Garros for instance, it was very much defined. You also need expertise across the full chain, with some experts live on the ground, for network management and at the media centre. At both ends, you need people who know what they are talking about.

D al then asked if the move proved successful and if remote production could still qualify as an innovation. We thought we could do remote production as long as our customers didn't see the difference and we did not much communicate about it, in order that the move remains neutral, said Tyl. And I can say it was a success.

Even though the development of remote production was helped by Covid, we are the proof that it exists in real life, said Valadoux. We know how to deploy it, but there's still room for improvement in workflow and a lot to discover, so in that sense, it is still innovation, he added.

Also asked about 4K, Amandine Tyl said that Roland-Garros pioneered introducing UHD HDR on four courts. However, although there is interest from broadcasters, the demand has not been very high yet, she said. Valadoux added that although 4K is fabulous when you have a big screen, it can still prove a bit tricky, for instance in choosing which standard to favour.

Green matters

Guilhem Krier, head of new business and market development at Panasonic Connect Europe, the title sponsor of the France Summit, said remote production can also be chosen for environmental reasons. He have the example of Finnish production services company Suora, which is looking to achieve carbon-neutral production in live sports and estimates that fewer movement of people and equipment can reduce emission by 95%.

We are going to need powerful tools. We will have to turn out some 4K HDR. We will also be staffing up with more crew members. It's very exciting for everyone. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity!

Suora is now able to handle up to eight remote productions in parallel with a minimum of footprint, Krier said. The company has been using Panasonic's PTZ cameras, and the manufacturer will be launching in February next year its new AW-UE160 4K PTZ, that will offer further improvements for live sports. Answering another kind of demand for higher quality images, Panasonic will also be releasing early next year a new S35 studio camera offering cinematic picture, IP technology and the operability of a studio camera.

Moving FASTer

Meanwhile, Christophe Laborde, director sales engineering of cloud-based technology company Amagi, spoke about some new demands in the broadcast and monetisation of live sports linked to the development of OTT and FAST sports channels.

Amagi provided its solution to an unnamed sports network which had to deliver a sports competition across a multitude of diversified outlets in Europe and the Middle East. The soluti

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