A New Highlight in the Sports Calendar: Beach Volleyball by SKY Germany

(28/10/2013) Once in a year Timmendorfer Strand is becoming the Wimbledon for beach volleyball. This was also true this year when for the 21th time the German SMART beach volleyball championships were played. For the finale of the SMART beach volleyball tour Timmendorfer Strand was transformed into a meeting place for the beach volleyball fans from all across Germany. Only here AMBION was setting up the Ahmann-Hager arena with more than 5,000 seats. Only here the Olympic champions have their own parking space right next to the arena. Only here the spirit is better than at the Copacabana.

Already in the early 2000s AMBION GmbH (then Ultrasound OHG) was active in a similar constellation for 6 years for the German beach volleyball championships at Timmendorfer Strand. At that time the team tailored a sound setup for the event area and established the Court Party on Saturday night in the middle of the Ahmann-Hager arena, setting the standard for the party crowd.

In 2013 AMBION again got the contract for the setup of technical equipment for the entire SMART beach volleyball tour as well as the German Championships at Timmendorfer Strand. The aim was to develop a high-performance setup with the experience of the learnings during the recent years and with the advanced possibilities offered by today's technology. The focus was on the following aspects: maximum speech intelligibility in the spectator area, fast set-up times, and to comply with all legal requirements (e.g. wind load near the coast) and weather resistance.

The same was the guideline for the setup of the TV equipment to enable SKY Germany to produce beach volleyball as never seen before, neither at World or European Championships, nor at the Olympics. The event picked up spectators in front of the TV with new perspectives, other points of view and never seen before camera movements. SKY took the chance to present beach volleyball completely detached from our learned viewing habits and opened a new window to the presentation of event sports on TV.

SKY decided to work for the live production of the event with TV Skyline. TV Skyline's offering consists of an inhouse department for the development of special cameras in addition to a flexible HD OBVan fleet.

Together with SKY the company was thinking outside the box and developed new camera positions and workflows creating a new playground for the presentation of the sports. All special cameras were controlled by remote operators to offer always the highest level of camera settings.

Another focus was on sound: a lot of additional microphones enabled the TV spectators to participate on everything that happened on the playground: the communication between the players during the match, tactical discussions of the players during time outs, the conversation with the referee in the case of controversial decisions and also the enthusiasm of the spectators in the stands.

SKY Germany produced a total of five events of the SMART beach volleyball series for Sky LIVE

The set-up consisted of up to twelve cameras per event including SuperSloMotion cameras

Eight different special camera systems

CommCam for the commentator and his expert (SPORTS:CAM 5 HD remote)

ScoreCam for the scoreboard and additional impressions of the match ground, spectators, cheerleaders, and warm-up of the players (SPORTS:CAM 5 HD remote)

SandCam camera next to the field, showed the power and dynamics of the players from an unprecedented perspective (SPORTS:CAM 4 HD remote)

BeautyCam at an exposed location with a unique view of the venue (SPORTS:CAM 5 HD remote)

RefCam mounted at the head of the referee, allowing viewers a unique look from the perspective of the referee. The spectators could follow the discussions between players and referee in the case of disputed decisions or different rule interpretation.

Birdy, a lightweight camera crane with an LMP HD -1200 camera, extremely flexible, for match coverage and for moderation, no sight obstruction for spectators.

NetCam attached directly to the net, this remote camera offered great dynamic images of blocks and blares of the actors (Goal:Cam 2 HD); at the final at Timmendorfer Strand, an UltraMotion Pico camera from LMC was used

an Antelope UltraMotion high speed camera from LMC was in action at the finals at Timmendorfer Strand

Interview with Alessandro Reitano, Director Sports SKY Germany

How satisfied have you been with the workflow based on the SportsCam 5 HD camera series from skyline?

AR: Very satisfied. The workflow was fitting perfectly to our requirements. In addition, we were able to generate numerous new camera angles.

Was it worth the production costs?

AR: Yes! We have set new standards in the TV coverage of beach volleyball. With up to 12 cameras, we have presented the sports quite well. In particular we were very pleased with the feedback from athletes: It was very positive across all participating athletes.

Will you present beach volleyball events in the future with similar efforts?

AR: The aim is to maintain the standard we have developed this season also in the next season. In addition, we again want to place new and innovative approaches for next year's TV production.

Which special features do you need to consider for the production of beach volleyball?

AR: The difficulty is to respond to the particular circumstances of each location. Beach volleyball is not produced in locations with existing TV structure therefore we have to adjust the setup accordingly.

copyrighted by liveProduction.tv Which camera positions have proved particularly successful, and are there positions which you will change or no longer use?

AR: Basically, all have camera positions have proven their relevance, however we have slight adjustments in the choice of the lenses. A special highlight was the use of the REF:CAM at the S

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