
CBS Sports Continues To Innovate With PGA TOUR West Coast Swing Full RF coverage this week, FlyCam for next week are latest enhancements By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Friday, February 3, 2023 - 1:21 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
The West Coast swing of CBS Sports PGA TOUR coverage is under way, and with it come some innovations. Notable among them are a live interview with a miked Max Homa playing the 13th hole at Farmers Insurance Open last week, a FlyCam at the famed WM Phoenix Open 16th par 3, and RF coverage at Monterey Peninsula Country Club for the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am this weekend.
The upper compound for the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, which will be broadcast on CBS this weekend
We worked in collaboration with the PGA TOUR on adding RF coverage to Monterey Peninsula last year, says Adam Stouter, senior director, remote technical operations, CBS Sports. Because of that success, we've added Spyglass so we're essentially covering three courses with RF, which is pretty cool. It has a feeling of a major with three courses, an upper and lower compound, and a BSI presence at the two outer courses.
Super Bowl LVII will be in town the same time as the WM Phoenix Open, bringing added energy to an event that can draw 200,000 fans.
The 16th has the huge bowl, and the coverage around Sam Ryder's hole-in-one last year was a lot of fun, says Stouter. We're going to add a FlyCam there this year.
During the Farmers Insurance Open, Max Homa chatted live with the CBS broadcast crew via an AirPod from Torrey Pines Golf Course.
The miked-up feature last week had golf fans on social media buzzing as Max Homa, who eventually won the tournament, was able to talk with the CBS broadcast team while playing the par-5 13th hole. (To watch the clip, click here)
I think you're definitely going to see more of that throughout the season, says Stouter. It's about giving golf fans what they want: the access and insights to the players during competition. It was huge and something we've been wanting to do for a while. And with Max winning, we couldn't have scripted it better.
The Riedel Bolero system and an Apple AirPod were at the center of the effort. We deployed Bolero antennas to give us full coverage of the hole, Stouter explains. The thought was to make this as easy as possible for the players. The only thing Homa had to do was put in one AirPod so he could focus on the competition and not on wearing gear. We've been impressed with the Bolero systems out there on the course.
(After the tournament, Homa said, Hopefully, we can keep pushing that or tweak it - just anything to help golf gain some attraction to all the viewers, hopefully a little bit younger than our typical audience. I think that's what the goal is. )
According to Stouter, the operations team is going down two parallel paths when it comes to PGA coverage: First, we want to ensure that we have robust core coverage of all the golf shots on the course. Second was just to identify enhancements we can strategically use throughout the season on designated tournaments to make them feel bigger and unique. We're also excited to have the Fed Ex playoffs for the first time.
That means up to 16 hard cameras and up to 11 RF handheld cameras, an RF jib, and an Inertia Unlimited xMo high-speed system every week. More shallow depth of field via Sony F5500, FX3, and FX6 cameras is planned, along with drone coverage supplied by Beverly Hills Aerials and Kaze Aerials. And Trackman will provide more ball tracing from tee boxes and fairways.
And we have Virtual Eye back with us, adds Stouter. Their animations, tracing, and AR are an integral part of our broadcast graphics.
As for production trucks, NEP Supershooter 4 will be used for the West Coast swing and for the Mexico Open; NEP Supershooter CBS will be deployed for the rest of the season.
We've got an amazing technical crew out here and an amazing production team led by producer Sellers Shy and director Steve Milton, adds Stouter. It's just great being back out here, and everybody's excited. We're in year two of our new deal with the PGA TOUR, and they have an amazing team as well. We just stay close with them on everything from laying out the compound or sharing resources. We're starting to see more and more potential for efficiencies on the tech side.
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...