
NBA Tipoff 2021: Turner Sports Brings Back Onsite Productions, Debuts Vibrant NBA on TNT Graphics Package NBA coverage joins NHL, MLB Postseason productions during Turner's busiest time ever By Jason Dachman, Chief Editor
Tuesday, October 19, 2021 - 3:19 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
Turner Sports is in the midst of the busiest stretch in its history. Its first-ever NHL season and the return of the MLB Postseason are in full swing. And tonight, the broadcaster welcomes back its longest-running property: NBA on TNT.
There have definitely been growing pains because we have had to stretch our team in ways that they haven't been stretched before, says Chris Brown, director, technical operations, Turner Sports. While we have been able to increase our headcount and hire more people, we haven't filled all those positions yet, so we do have a number of people doing double or even triple duty. Everybody - myself included - has to step up and pitch in to make sure we're giving all three properties their just attention. It has definitely been a team effort across the board to get to this point.
Turner Sports will tip off the league's 75th-anniversary season tonight with an opening-night double header featuring the Nets-Bucks in Milwaukee and Warriors-Lakers in L.A. And with it, the iconic NBA on TNT brand will have a brand-new look - a wrap-around graphics package - and plenty of new production technologies to bring the hardcourt action to fans.
Productions Are Onsite After REMI-Heavy 2020-21 Season After centralizing the bulk of its productions at its Techwood Campus in Atlanta and remoting from a truck to the facility for nearly 60 NBA games last season, Turner Sports is hitting the road again for NBA broadcasts. Deploying NEP TS2 and Supershooter 8 mobile units, Turner plans to deploy nearly all announcers and crew onsite at the arena.
Last year, COVID accelerated a lot of concepts that we were already thinking about, says Brown. However, because of COVID, we had the unique opportunity to have a lot of space that I don't anticipate will be available as we push into the new year and start returning to the office. While we're excited about the technology and I think there's going to be a time and a place for us to eventually move to that as one of many different production options, we're just not quite there yet in terms of core infrastructure and space [in Atlanta].
Diamond motif in Turner Sports' new graphics package for NBA on TNT celebrates the league's 75-anniversary season.
What we were able to do last year was prove a concept, he continues. I think that was significant because, if and when we have the available infrastructure at the facility in Atlanta to manage things like this on a full-time basis, we now know we can do that. I think there are definitely ways that we can look at being more efficient, particularly with basketball. But, for now, the plan is to get back to a pre-COVID type of operation.
Turner Sports' current use of REMI production workflow will be limited to the virtual-shot-clock operator, who will be located in Atlanta. All other crew, however, will be onsite in the truck.
The production team has made very clear to us that they are much more collaborative when they're in the same room and that makes the product better, says Brown. That's the approach that we're taking for now. From an operations standpoint, the execution of the physical remote is going to look a lot more familiar, and everybody is going to be a lot more comfortable in terms of how they execute. I think that is going to continue to improve the broadcasts and bring the audience experience back to what they're used to seeing and hearing, which is a big win.
New Graphics Package Celebrates NBA's 75th-Anniversary Season Turner will roll out a brand-new graphics package for wraparounds tonight, debuting its revised NBA on TNT look. The package is built on a diamond motif, matching the league's special diamond-shaped logo for its 75th season. In addition, viewers will see refracted light on many graphics elements as if they were looking through a diamond.
We're coming from a package that was very monochromatic and dark with everything desaturated to a very vibrant, colorful, juicy package, says Jordan Shorthouse, VP, creative director, Turner Sports. I think it's phenomenal, and it's going to play perfectly into this year's telecasts. We loved the [previous package], but we've been living with that dark package for four or five years and were definitely ready for a change. We just wanted something with more vibrancy, more color, more fun, and that's what you're going to see when this package hits air.
Although the insert, scorebug, and virtual-shot-clock graphics will not change, the new wraparound package will give NBA on TNT broadcasts a wholly revamped look. The LED monitors in the Inside the NBA studio have also been updated with the new graphics look.
After opening with Tuesday and Thursday games this week, TNT will primarily carry games on Tuesday nights before transitioning to both Tuesdays and Thursdays in mid January. At that point, the Tuesday-night telecasts will also be updated to reflect the diamond-motif package but with a twist: all elements will be black and gold.
Tuesday night is more about the culture, fashion, and style of the NBA, says Shorthouse. We're trying to be a bit sleeker and play into that whole culture concept so that is why everything is black and gold. We did that last year, and now we're updating the package to reflect that same color scheme but with the new design style.
As soon as Opening Night is over, he continues, we're going to start working on the Tuesday-night package to get everything turned blac
More from Sports Video Group
02/07/2025
Progressive realism: Aurora on taking up the broadcast reins for World RX alongs...
02/07/2025
Great speed: New host broadcaster Aurora on getting the World RX 2025 season pro...
02/07/2025
Seat of its pants: Aurora boxes clever and looks ahead for the FIA as new host b...
02/07/2025
UEFA Women's Euro 2025: EBU, BBC Sport and Sunset Vine talk coverage plans, ...
02/07/2025
UEFA Women's Euro 2025: Women's Super League launches new content series...
02/07/2025
UEFA Women's Euro 2025: Ignite puts fans and players front and centre with t...
02/07/2025
Storytelling in the Live Game Broadcast: ESPN Director Jimmy Platt Breaks Down t...
02/07/2025
CONCACAF's Miguel Angel Garcia on the Gold Cup's Enhanced 2025 Productio...
01/07/2025
SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: Spyrosoft's Jonathan Witty on Futher Business Exp...
01/07/2025
The NIL Effect: How the Shifting Business of College Athletics Impacts On-Campus...
01/07/2025
Cherry on the cake: Inside the technical production of the Tour de France 2025 w...
01/07/2025
NESN's Josh Jun on Keeping Alternative Broadcasts Fresh for Boston Red Sox, ...
01/07/2025
TNT Sports Races Back Into NASCAR With Fresh Look, Familiar Edge Production approach emphasizes creative freedom, bold storytelling, casual-fan-friendly tone B...
27/06/2025
How smarter compression is creating a sustainable future By Michael Burns
Monday, June 23, 2025 - 14:13
Print This Story
Live sport is especially vulnerab...
27/06/2025
Behind the Mic: FOX Sports Ratchets Up UEFA Women's EURO 2025 With Top-Class...
27/06/2025
RTL Group To Acquire Sky Deutschland By George Bevir, Editorial Director, SVG Europe
Friday, June 27, 2025 - 8:00 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story ...
27/06/2025
Frictionless, At Scale: The Current State of Live Video Streaming Techology Leaders from Bitmovin, Comcast Technology Solutions, Harmonic, IMAX, and Phenix brea...
27/06/2025
Marquee Sports Network's Nick Steger on Meeting the Moment of the Contending...
27/06/2025
NHL Draft 2025: The League Is Primed for First Decentralized Draft in Non-Pandem...
26/06/2025
10th-Annual SVG Regional Sports Production Summit Presents Useful Roadmap for th...
26/06/2025
The Big Cloud Debate: Public vs. Private vs. Hybrid Tech leaders from CineSys, Diversified, and Net Insight breaks down all flavors of cloud By Jason Dachman, ...
26/06/2025
Program Productions' Jess Kowatch on Training the Next and Current Gener...
25/06/2025
SVG College Summit 2025: Select Sessions Now Available to Watch on SVG PLAY Tackling the latest in college sports video: NIL, live production, virtual productio...
25/06/2025
ESPN Is Set To Bring AR Graphics to Wimbledon, Revamps Bunker and Studio 18 VO B...
24/06/2025
2025 NBA Draft: ABC/ESPN Prepares for Two-Day Draft at Barclays Center Partners Game Creek Video, CP Communications, NEP Specialty Capture will be on hand By M...
24/06/2025
Cloud Broadcast Tech Update: Google Cloud's Jane Day on the Impact of AI on ...
24/06/2025
Cloud Broadcast Tech Update: AWS's Dana LaGattuta on Data-Driven Innovation ...
24/06/2025
Lions live: Dublin opener sees Sky Sports take remote route By Fergal Ringrose ...
24/06/2025
Pumas maul Lions as S4C and TG4 deliver first-ever joint host in Dublin By Ferg...
24/06/2025
ABC/ESPN Prepares for 2025 NBA Draft, the First at Barclays Center Partners Game Creek Video, CP Communications, NEP Specialty Capture will be on hand By Mark ...
23/06/2025
Adventures in Live Cloud Production: Stories From the Trenches with MLB, NHL, NB...
23/06/2025
Finding the edge: How Badger & Combes produces live-streamed coverage of county ...
23/06/2025
Masters of Madness: New football format shakes up the rules of sportainment By Adrian Pennington
Monday, June 16, 2025 - 11:38
Print This Story
The ball i...
23/06/2025
New State-of-the-Art Mountain Media Center Launches in Former Starz Encore Build...
23/06/2025
ESPN Says Goodbye to Seaport Studios, Hello to New State-of-the-Art Production F...
20/06/2025
Feeling Unlimited, Part 1: Athletes Unlimited Softball League Deploys Remote Pro...
20/06/2025
A True Test? Cricket's Growth on the Global Stage and the Role Broadcast Can...
20/06/2025
Sky Sports goes large for the British & Irish Lions Tour with AR graphics, UHD a...
20/06/2025
ESPN's Men's College World Series Finals Coverage Combines Innovation, L...
19/06/2025
SVG Rewind: PGA Tour Introduces Drone AR Smart Tracing, Reflects on Winning Geor...
18/06/2025
Technology focus: Fan expectations drive advances in the in-stadium experience By Jo Ruddock
Tuesday, June 3, 2025 - 08:36
Print This Story
For years, att...
18/06/2025
Making connections: How stadiums are meeting the ever-growing demand for data an...
18/06/2025
SVG Venues & Teams Summit Keynote: RWS Global Powers the Stadium Environment at ...
18/06/2025
SVG Rewind: Behind the Scenes of Producing Tottenham Hotspur's Europa League...
17/06/2025
SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: Mercury Intermedia's Tom Richardson, Mike Ligon o...
17/06/2025
Total Sports Performance from Relo Metrics, VideoAmp, Offers Next-Level Media, B...
17/06/2025
From Stage to Stream: Producing Live Esports Events in 2025 Leaders from ESL FACEIT Group, Riot Games, and more break down the latest trends By Jason Dachman, ...
17/06/2025
Inside FIFA 2025 Club World Cup Operations With FIFA's Oscar Sanchez, HBS...
17/06/2025
Production ambitions: Over Exposed on making the National League Promotion Final...