Mixing up the sound: INA TV A1 Yannis Petrakoyannis on the 2022 FIFA World Cup qualifiers By Heather McLean, Editor
Thursday, April 14, 2022 - 12:11
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INA TV A1, Yannis Petrakoyannis, with the Calrec Summa console he used during the FIFA World Cup qualifiers
SVG Europe caught up with Yannis Petrakoyannis, an A1 for Greek independent full-service company, INA TV, to find out about his experience of working on the World Cup football qualifiers, as well as the ins and outs of the audio technology he used on site.
You're a sound engineer with 25 years of experience in the industry. Can you describe your background for us? What roles have you had and what high-profile projects have you worked on?
I started many years ago as a F.O.H. sound engineer for a PA rental and installation business (for live bands, dances, clubs, theatres, shows, galas, presentations) and I was also running my own recording and production studio suite.
As a host van we have up to 16 condenser mics around the football field and one cam-mic on each steady or portable cam over the pitch area. There can also be mics on some specifically positioned cameras covering the crowd, the action on the field, the teams and the pitch entrance. This is the so-called international sound' group of the game and it's routed on specific audio channels for transmission to clients
Over the last seven years I've been working on TV and broadcast productions. I'm located in the north of Greece and I've been involved with many live shows and projects. I'm working in TV as an A1 sound engineer and assistant, mainly using OB vans to cover major social, political, cultural, and sports events all over Greece and sometimes other European countries.
When did you start working for INA TV and what does your current role with them entail?
I started with INA almost seven years ago, first as a sound engineer assistant but I soon developed into an A1. I'm qualified to operate on five OB vans out of INA's big fleet.
With 30 years of experience, and by covering some of the most prestigious events around the world for major international broadcasters, INA TV is one of the leading independent full-service companies in the broadcast business in Greece and across the Balkan and South West Europe region.
INA specialises in satellite and streaming services, production and broadcast solutions for all kinds of events, including news, sports, business and entertainment, special events and corporate TV conferences. INA TV also produce film and documentary, as well as provide independent and reliable services for event organisers, rights and non-rights holders and has been present for event coverage in over 30 countries worldwide.
You've been covering the World Cup football qualifiers with INA TV's OB units. Did they build a special truck for this or are they using one that was already in their fleet?
The truck that is being used right now for UEFA is a three year-old OB van, which was chosen and customised for the demands of those high-level production services. It can manage more than 16 cameras, has at least two video and replay servers running, HD, 4K and Dolby sound, optical, wireless, ethernet and IP connections and comms, and of course a Calrec Summa!
The Calrec Summa console used by INA TV's Yannis Petrakoyannis
How many football matches have you covered so far and how many more do you have coming up?
Each year and each season has different broadcast and production programmes and schedules. It depends on company contracts and assignments and on media platforms and networks and clients.
In 2021 we exclusively covered the entire Super League 2 (SL2) Greek football championship, lots of Greek basketball and volleyball games, other major sport championships and games and many political and cultural events.
For UEFA we are covering the home games of the Kosovan national football team for Group B of the European qualifiers for the upcoming World Cup. We've been visiting Kosovo throughout 2021 but over the years, INA TV has travelled all over Europe to service many European and international broadcasters and media clients.
Specifically, what Calrec technology and consoles are you using and how does it interface with other audio equipment that you're using for the football matches?
This OB van has a Calrec Summa with a 24+8 fader board and two x Br.IO expansion racks on a Calrec Hydra2 network. The DSP core has double modules for total redundancy. The audio connections are either analogue or digital over AES.
The OB van has three I/O sound board panels inside and outside, three patch bays and three audio multicores on motorised reels. Then there's Ethernet and LANs for IP and network connections, intercom and IFBs.
Of course, we've also all the internal van sources and destinations like the de-embedded camera audio channels (two channels on each), video, recording, playback channels, 5.1 and stereo monitoring, programme cue feeds and splits, talkbacks, codecs and telephone hybrids, Dolby encoders, transmission channels on embedder outputs and more.
As you can see, it's quite complex but the Summa can handle all the traffic and the audio production like a charm and still has more to give and more capabilities if needed.
Can you describe the audio technology workflow in the van? What feeds are you mixing? Crowd noise? How many microphones are you using?
Each production has a different approach, design, and workflow. For UEFA's football games the broadcast procedure has a quite tight protocol provided by UEFA which includes the audio requirements, the transmission channels and the feeds.
A single football match can be covered and broadcast by multiple OB production vans. One is always the host, and if no other production van is present the host must also
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Mixing up the sound: INA TV A1 Yannis Petrakoyannis on the 2022 FIFA World Cup qualifiers By Heather McLean, Editor 
