ESPN Deploys Globe-Spanning REMI Production To Serve Australian Open to Viewers Worldwide Operation comprises staff in Melbourne, cloud editing in London, REMI team in Bristol By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Monday, January 13, 2025 - 2:13 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
ESPN's Australian Open production shifted into high gear on Saturday, and the effort truly spans the globe, with staff onsite in Melbourne, a cloud-based edit in London, and a large REMI team in Bristol, CT, working on both the domestic and ESPN International effort (which also includes personnel operating in Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico).
It has been nice to work our way back from the pandemic and have a presence in Melbourne, says Larry Wilson, senior manager, remote operations, ESPN, but there are efficiencies in doing it this way as we have found a balance. The REMI team has been incredibly supportive and creative in being able to produce such high-quality content for us over the years.
For the ESPN REMI team, the event stands alone on the yearly calendar. It's the biggest yearly production that requires a new sleep schedule: on-air days can run from 9 p.m. ET to 9 a.m. or even 10 a.m.
ESPN's Australian Open domestic control room in Bristol, CT.
The odd hours also make the event unique for the REMI teams not working in Melbourne. Notes Scott Chamberland, supervisor, REMI operations, ESPN, The individuals crewed in Bristol flip their life schedule for a month to make this project happen.
Mike McQuade, EVP, sports production, ESPN, says the folks on the team are thrilled to be in Melbourne to showcase world-class tennis to fans around the globe and the vibrant culture Down Under. Our incredibly talented team is uniquely qualified to navigate the challenges that come with creating and distributing content across a multitude of platforms and countries - some 10,000 miles apart - over nearly three weeks.
During those three weeks, the ESPN team in Bristol works out of Production Control Room D70, where all the domestic coverage is produced before the signals head to master control. Additional Bristol facilities include a production-support space, voiceover booth for International, and two tape rooms equipped with Evertz DreamCatchers. The tape rooms record all feeds coming in from Melbourne and are networked for content sharing.
Right now, McQuade adds, we're staffing 24 techs just from the REMI group alone daily, and they support our ESPN domestic and international footprint. As the tournament plays on, we will start getting clean camera feeds, which are integrated into the production. As the tournament play moves into the second week, our crews will shrink.
According to Wilson, 41 outbound transmission paths from Melbourne include 16 court feeds, press conferences, and other behind-the-scenes content. Each path runs through frame converters to change the frame rate from 50p to 59.94. Three of those 41 feeds, he explains, are solely for the ESPN International side, which can take whatever content they want for their purposes and audiences.
New this year is the use of the cloud for editing. Postproduction company CMSI provides infrastructure supporting a remote edit that is based in the UK and cloud-connected to feature producers in Chicago and North Carolina. The producers have their own interface to view the cloud-based work, Wilson explains. All the editing is happening in the cloud, allowing the producers to log in and watch the progress and check things out before it is sent to Bristol for integration.
An International Effort London isn't the only international location for Australian Open operations. ESPN International staffers in Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, and Canada work to serve their viewers. According to Chris Calcagno, coordinating producer II, ESPN International/ESPN Deportes, two ESPN International control rooms in Buenos Aires are connected to Bristol. In a smaller control room in Bristol, all the feeds are coordinated before being output to the various platforms in Argentina, Brazil, and Canada.
In ESPN's Australian Open international control room: (from left) ESPN International/ESPN Deportes Producer Amy McTigue, Coordinating Producer II Christian Calcagno, Operator Austin Smith
We have a big facility in Buenos Aires, he says, where we put together the Spanish feeds for two simultaneous networks for the first eight days of the tournament. Many of the talent are based in Buenos Aires, but we also have talent in Bristol and Mexico as well as a reporter at the Open, who gets interviews. But everything gets incorporated in Buenos Aires for the Spanish-language side of things.
ESPN Brazil, meanwhile, has two control rooms in operation during the first eight days and has a reporter in Melbourne for its Portuguese broadcast. A TSN control room creates a channel for Canadian viewers.
ESPN International has a studio at the Australian Open so we can do interviews, says Calcagno, adding, It is also connected to Buenos Aires, Sao Paulo, Mexico City, and Toronto.
Tennis Australia will be pushing innovation for the next two weeks, and the ESPN team around the globe is eager not only to deliver it to viewers but to be part of the official start of the 2025 tennis-major season.
The people who participate on this love tennis and love being part of this team, says Chamberland. This is my fifth year. Now I'm in a management role, so it's cool to see it from a different perspective. But we have the buy-in from everybody who participates, and that makes the end product that much better.
Most recent headlines
11/12/2025
Dalet, a leading provider of cloud-native, end-to-end media workflow solutions, ...
27/11/2025
LONDON Vizrt has added several AI-driven advanced features offering improved speed, intelligence and accuracy in the newest version of its media asset managemen...
27/11/2025
Prime Video has launched AI-powered video season recaps in a beta version for select English-language Prime Original series in the U.S., a move Amazon is callin...
27/11/2025
27 Nov 2025
GSMA brings M360 Eurasia 2026 to Samarkand in partnership with VEON...
27/11/2025
Tahar Rahim and Izuka Hoyle star in the gripping six-part Sky Original from Acad...
27/11/2025
Thursday 27 November 2025
Sky Arts Reveals the Nation's Greatest Basslines - and Queen Reign Supreme
The UK's most iconic basslines have been revealed...
27/11/2025
Back to All News
Stranger Things 5': Prepare for One Last Adventure With O...
27/11/2025
The media industry has a paradox at its core. It's an industry built on light, color and imagination, yet behind the scenes, it's powered by one of the ...
27/11/2025
Rating reflects rating progress across areas including policies, diversity & inclusion, health & safety and Net Zero leadership
Winchester, UK, 27 November 202...
27/11/2025
What are the industry standards for Retail Media? Kathryn explains that certification is based on the IAB Europe Retail Media Measurement Standards and the IAB ...
27/11/2025
World champion boxer and Irish sporting icon Katie Taylor will be in studio this...
27/11/2025
Roblox, one of the world's most popular online gaming platforms for primary ...
27/11/2025
Black Friday is leveling up. Get ready to score one of the biggest deals of the season - 50% off the first three months of a new GeForce NOW Ultimate membership...
26/11/2025
SVG Sit-Down: Prime Video EP Mike Muriano Previews Massive Black Friday Slate Fe...
26/11/2025
A cinematic snow sculpture at the 1995 Sundance Film Festival. Photo by Randall Michelson...
26/11/2025
Book podcasts are booming. On Spotify, you'll find everything from celebrity book clubs to deep dives with bestselling authors. And in markets where audiobo...
26/11/2025
Mumbai, November 24, 2025: In a first-of-its-kind initiative, JioStar, in collab...
26/11/2025
LONDON Factual content producer ITN Productions has launched a new low-latency IP gallery for news bulletins....
26/11/2025
MIAMI TelevisaUnivision said it struck a new multiyear distribution agreement with YouTube TV that includes distribution of TelevisaUnivision's U.S. network...
26/11/2025
OpenDrives, Inc., a leader in software-defined data storage and data services, today announced the launch of the Atlas Corporate Creative Solution. This new Atl...
26/11/2025
Disguise, the industry-leading company powering the world's biggest live performances, is partnering with pioneering LED wall manufacturer DVS to give atten...
26/11/2025
HighField AI, the pioneer in agentic and multimodal automation for broadcast and media production, today announced the expansion of its global channel partner n...
26/11/2025
As high-stakes Premier League fixtures approach and additional premium content launches, with MONO positioning themselves to dominate Thailand's sports stre...
26/11/2025
Hosting a wide variety of events from high-intensity NHL games to complex live music concerts and major entertainment productions, Montreal's 21,000 capacit...
26/11/2025
Vizrt, the leader in live production technology revolutionizing viewer engagement and experience, releases AI-driven advances focusing on speed, intelligence, a...
26/11/2025
ITN Productions, an award-winning factual content producer, today launched a new low-latency IP gallery for news bulletins. Responsible for delivering a leading...
26/11/2025
Ikegami reports ongoing advances throughout 2025 in developing and delivering coordinated television production solutions that maximize quality, versatility and...
26/11/2025
Following the Nov. 21 blackout of NBCUniversal channels on Fubo, the two sides have traded barbs about their inability to reach a new carriage deal....
26/11/2025
LONDON As TV sports rights become increasingly important for both broadcasters and streamers, Ampere Analysis predicts global investment in the genre will surpa...
26/11/2025
LOS ANGELES Vubiquity said it has achieved the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Media & Entertainment Competency as part of the AWS Partner Network (APN). This designa...
26/11/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission's Enforcement Bureau said it has entered into a consent decree with Comcast calling for the cable company t...
26/11/2025
Berklee Named to the Hollywood Reporters Top Music Schools List The publication highlights the college's screen scoring program, industry partnerships, and ...
26/11/2025
Back to All News
Animated Series Love Through a Prism' Casts New Light on ...
26/11/2025
Back to All News
NALIP Unveils Fifth Cohort of Director Incubator
Social Impact
26 November 2025
United States
Link copied to clipboard
The National Assoc...
26/11/2025
YouView Achieves Greenly Gold Certification for SustainabilityNov 26, 2025
YouView is proud to announce a Gold Certification award from Greenly for our perform...
26/11/2025
Back to All News
Netflix Deepens Partnership with Taiwan's 62nd Golden Hors...
25/11/2025
Tracy Bonareri Onchoke, an investigative journalist from Kenya is the winner of the Thomson Foundation's Young Journalist Award 2025.
The 26-year-old-sele...
25/11/2025
SVG All-Stars: Blayke Scheer, Senior Director, Creative Content, YES NetworkThe Indiana alum has turned storytelling into an artform for more than two decadesBy...
25/11/2025
Op-Ed: With FCC's C-Band Auction on the Horizon, Broadcasters Need Proven, C...
25/11/2025
Analysis: Is Baller League really the future of sport? By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Tuesday, November 25, 2025 - 10:10
Print This Story
With KSI on...
25/11/2025
Platinum Whitepaper: The Growth of Broadcast in the World of Major Large Scale E...
25/11/2025
SVG Summit 2025 Preview: SVG Women's Sports WorkshopBy Samantha Gabay
Tuesday, November 25, 2025 - 10:27 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlig...
25/11/2025
SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: CacheFly's Matt Levine on the Evolving Role of th...
25/11/2025
Peacock's EA SPORTS Madden NFL Cast Levels Up on Thanksgiving With SkyCam as...
25/11/2025
Mathias Broe attends the 2025 Sundance Film Festival premiere of Sauna at Library Center Theatre. (Photo by Michael Hurcomb/Shutterstock for Sundance Film Fes...
25/11/2025
The best playlists, podcasts, and audiobooks bring a little extra magic to your daily routine. With new features and offerings, Spotify Premium delivers even mo...
25/11/2025
Comprehensive new research confirms what we already knew: Australian music fans love the quality, quantity, and access they have to new and local music on strea...
25/11/2025
Applicable Products
Objectives The purpose of this application note is to give a brief background on 5G (NR) wireless communication an explain the reason a SN...
25/11/2025
Nielsen will now measure both Lionsgate's FAST channel MovieSphere and Movie...
ESPN Deploys Globe-Spanning REMI Production To Serve Australian Open to Viewers Worldwide Operation comprises staff in Melbourne, cloud editing in London, REMI team in Bristol By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director 
