
Live from the 2023 Ryder Cup: Sky Sports Virtual Studio in UK Plays Big Role in Remote Production By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Saturday, September 30, 2023 - 3:08 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
It's been a busy run of top golf events for the team at Sky Sports and this week's Ryder Cup at Marco Simone Golf and Country Club outside of Rome, following quickly on the heels of last week's Solheim Cup in Spain, the women's equivalent of the men's Ryder Cup.
The components of our Solheim and Ryder Cup coverage are fairly similar, with a World Feed plus commentary plus a studio on site, says Jason Wessely, Sky Sports Golf, executive producer. And then there is a gallery and master control operation back at Sky that brings it all together.
Jason Wessely, Sky Sports Golf, Executive Producer (left) and Katie Harrison, Sky Sports, Production Manager in the 2023 Ryder Cup compound.
This Ryder Cup marks the first time at any tournament where Sky Sports and The Golf Channel are sharing a studio location. Located on the first tee, it gives both production teams a chance to leverage the same facility during dayparts that are optimal for their audience back home. Sky is on air in the morning and during the day while The Golf Channel takes over at the end of the day.
Timing wise in the U.S. it's much better to use it after the match is finished while in the morning, we can build up on the first tee with a lovely studio set looking into the crowd and the energy of that crowd, adds Wessely.
While The Golf Channel is wrapping up the day's action on the studio Sky Sports switches over to a standup position with an RF camera on the side of the 18th green. Sky also rebroadcasts The Golf Channel Live From show, giving viewers in the UK a bonus two-hour recap.
We'll manage that two hours from a smaller gallery at Sky, so we can deal with any non-compliant stuff that we want to edit out on the fly, explains Wessely. We could also run in our content to replace their content if we feel it's not quite right for our audience, but it is quite light touch.
The studio operations back home is also busy during the Ryder Cup as a virtual green-screen studio in Osterley Park is handling a variety of coverage elements. A camera at the Ryder Cup course shoots backdrops at different times of the day and those images are then dropped in the back screen projection as the goal is to make the viewer at home feel that that the virtual set is an extension of the real studio set on site.
Our player avatars, virtual course, and touchscreen are all presented from there and it's designed to look as though it is here at the course, says Wessely. As soon as the player pairings are known the team there gets to work on building the players and building the editorial. Then they record the head piece in the virtual set and when the time comes, they run that into the program with a throw from the real studio here to the 3D virtual studio.
Building out the player avatars is a process that began with player recordings last Tuesday and Wednesday. The recording process requires the players to stand on a rotating plank so that cameras can capture them from all angles.
We'll get some still photography, a few questions, and have some fun with them so that process is really important to us, adds Wessely. We then map their 3D images, which is crucial to our virtual presentation.
The storytelling rhythm of a Ryder Cup or Solheim Cup is very different from a major golf tournament as matches can end prior to 18 holes (and often do). The Ryder Cup, ideally, has very little time between sessions but if needed on-course RF kits and on-course reporters can do reports or interviews.
Plus, we have the virtual studio back in Sky recording the pairing for the afternoon and we play that into the break section to reveal to the viewer who was going to play in the afternoon, says Wessely. The time goes by pretty fast.
Next week the Sky golf team head to Scotland for another unique event: the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship which is played across three courses: Old Course at St. Andrews; Carnoustie; and Kingsbarns.
We choose one course to focus on each time, but we have remote OBs at every location for each day and then we try and lean into the celebrity aspect and do interviews with the celebrities while playing and have some fun with it because it is a different event.
Key to keeping spirits high for the team is having good golf and that is what they have had for the past couple of months, from the Open in Liverpool to the BMW Championship in Wentworth, the Solheim Cup in Spain, and now the Ryder Cup.
As long as the golf is good, it keeps the spirits going, and weather is the other thing that can dampen the spirit, says Wessely. The trick is keeping the remote team back at Sky motivated and we find clever ways to get them out to the golf course during the year. Yes, they can sleep in their own beds but it's also hard to gauge the event when you're working at home. So, a mixture of OBs, remote, and clever ways of getting them to venues is the secret to remote broadcasting because it's here to stay.
North America Stories
15/04/2026
Image courtesy of MD Helicopters...
15/04/2026
Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger, L3Harris VP Mark Farley, and state and local l...
15/04/2026
U.S. Space Forces Ground-Based Optical Sensor System upgrade at the Maui Space S...
15/04/2026
NBCU-Versant notches 13.1% of TV viewing in February, its best since August 2024...
15/04/2026
New data reveals older Kiwis are financially resilient, loyal to local products,...
15/04/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/04/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/04/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/04/2026
Evergent introduces its Agentic Revenue Orchestration Platform, transforming how subscription businesses across direct-to-consumer streaming, pay-TV, telecommun...
15/04/2026
Harmonic's XOS Media Processor Delivers Exceptional Video Quality to More than Half of U.S. Public Media Viewership
Harmonic (NASDAQ: HLIT) today announce...
15/04/2026
LONGMONT, COLORADO, APRIL 15, 2026 DPA Microphones N Series Digital Wireless System users in North America can now take full advantage of the system's exc...
15/04/2026
Cobalt Iron, a leading provider of SaaS-based enterprise data protection, today announced the launch of Compass Tape Gateway (CTG), a transformative enhancemen...
15/04/2026
Disguise to Showcase Cutting-Edge Experience Tech for Sports, Broadcast and More...
15/04/2026
Arooj Aftab Makes the Music She Wants to Hear The singular artist explores the juxtaposition of grief and joy, dark and light, in her distinctive sound.
Apri...
15/04/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/04/2026
Interra Systems, a provider of end-to-end quality assurance solutions for the digital media industry, is proud to announce its central role in the digital trans...
15/04/2026
VO Integrates Client-Side and Server-Side Ad Technologies with its Secure Video Player and Segmentation Tools, Leveraging Broadpeak's SSAI and BPK SmartLib ...
15/04/2026
TMT Insights, a leader in professional services and software development for the media and entertainment (M&E) industry, today announced the launch of TMT AI at...
15/04/2026
Encompass Digital Media, a global leader in managed broadcast and cloud-based media services, today announced an expanded partnership with Oracle Cloud Infrastr...
15/04/2026
Middleman Software, a leading provider of signaling and synchronization solutions for broadcast and streaming workflows, today announced it will unveil PhaseLoc...
15/04/2026
Deity Microphones today announced the PR-4, a compact six-track field recorder featuring four inputs, 32-bit float recording, advanced routing, and a workflow-f...
15/04/2026
Blackmagic Design Announces Fairlight Live
Brie Clayton April 15, 2026
0 Comments
Powerful software-based live audio mixer with support for SMPTE-2110...
15/04/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/04/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/04/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/04/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/04/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/04/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/04/2026
Strategic Alignment With the Riedel Group for Innovation and Growth
Thomas Riedel, founder and owner of Riedel Communications and the Riedel Group, has acqui...
15/04/2026
SDVI, the leading platform provider for cloud-native media supply chains, today announced that the company's Rally platform has been deployed by Iyuno Media...
15/04/2026
Frequency, the engine behind many of the worlds leading streaming television channels, has become the platform of choice for leading U.S. broadcasters bringing ...
15/04/2026
New Service Simplifies Integration of AI Applications with Exceptional Reliability and Security
SAN JOSE, Calif. April 14, 2026 Harmonic (NASDAQ: HLIT) t...
15/04/2026
During the 2025 off-season, VIDI completed a major upgrade of the broadcast infrastructure across all 36 stadiums in Germany's 1st and 2nd Bundesliga. The p...
15/04/2026
Clear-Com announced significant updates to its award-winning Arcadia Central Station as well as enhancements to the Eclipse HX Digital Matrix System now runn...
15/04/2026
Shotoku Introduces the World to Aura P2 PTZ Prompter Panner at NAB SHOW 2026
Brie Clayton April 15, 2026
0 Comments
New system removes PTZ pan restric...
15/04/2026
LiveU Announces Expanded Collaboration with Sony at NAB Show, Adding Direct File...
15/04/2026
This 24-Hour Performance Art Piece Needs Your Participation Keefer Glenshaws latest project is about collaborating with the Berklee community and beyond.
Apr...
15/04/2026
LinkedIn's 2026 Grad's Guide shows where opportunity is growing Published on Apr 15, 2026 Categories: Company News, Data and insights
LinkedIn Corp...
15/04/2026
Traditional data centers only stored, retrieved and processed data. In the generative and agentic AI era, these facilities have evolved into AI token factories....
15/04/2026
The NAB Show 2026 trade show, running April 18-22 in Las Vegas, is set to showcase a wave of new features and optimizations for top video editing applications. ...
14/04/2026
Haivision has announced the Falkon X4, a 5G mobile video transmitter for live broadcast and remote production. The device will be showcased at NAB Show 2026.
...
14/04/2026
Founded by veterans of the production-truck world, Stripe TV was born out of a d...
14/04/2026
Grass Valley has expanded its partnership with Studio Berlin, supplying 12 LDX 135 UHD/HDR camera systems and 12 LDX 180 Super 35mm cinematic cameras, including...
14/04/2026
LTN has announced two senior appointments ahead of NAB Show 2026: Mark Romano as Vice President, Multichannel Platforms, and Edward Cox as Vice President, Sales...
14/04/2026
Sennheiser and Italian rental company Agor have begun preparations for their Eu...
14/04/2026
DAZN and ADI Predictstreet have announced a partnership to integrate ADI Predict...
14/04/2026
Deltatre has announced the completion of a direct-to-fan website and app for Leg...
14/04/2026
Daktronics, will exhibit at NAB Show 2026 in partnership with Grass Valley at Booth C2408, Las Vegas Convention Center, April 19-22.
Daktronics will showcase a...
14/04/2026
Backblaze will host a series of partner presentations at NAB Show 2026 (Booth N1259, North Hall), open to all exhibition hall badge holders. Showcase partners i...
14/04/2026
BRAHMA AI will exhibit at NAB Show 2026 (Booth W2415, West Hall), demonstrating its Enterprise AI Content Platform for media, entertainment, sports, and technol...