IBC Accelerator: Pitlochry Highland Games to showcase how 5G plus Starlink LEO and 4G LTE bonding can bring remote live sports to all By Heather McLean, Editor Monday, September 5, 2022 - 14:19
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Aiming to help broadcasters when live sport is remote and hard to connect, a a live showcase of the Pitlochry Highland Games will be broadcast at IBC as part of a project that aims to demonstrate the portability and flexibility of a private 5G network in a box'
IBC's 2022 Accelerator Media Innovation Programme is back in Amsterdam, and this year, a Highland Games in the heart of Scotland is at the forefront of a pioneering project trialling future television production in remote locations using 5G and involving world-leading broadcasters.
The Pitlochry Highland Games, which takes place on 10 September, will showcase a project live at IBC that aims to demonstrate the portability and flexibility of a private 5G network in a box' for live television production use cases where the location is remote and connectivity is sparse.
The technology has and is being trialled in Kenya, New Zealand, Southern Ireland, as well as Scotland, and will be showcased under the title of 5G Remote Production in the middle of nowhere' at IBC.
Private 5G can be configured to meet the uplink data demands. Through advanced encoding, decoding and compression signal processing, low latency can also be achieved, which is critical for many live broadcast sport applications
The private 5G standalone network being used in all four of these middle of nowhere' IBC Accelerators has been designed, engineered and integrated by Neutral Wireless, working alongside the University of Strathclyde's Software Defined Radio engineering team (StrathSDR), which it was spun out from in 2021, and the Scotland 5G Centre rural testbed project.
The aim of the project is to trial production over 5G for broadcasters, including BBC Research & Development, BT Sport, BT Media & Broadcast, TV2, Paramount, Olympic Broadcasting Services and RT .
Logistical challenges
Speaking to SVG Europe, Professor Bob Stewart, Professor of Signal Processing, University of Strathclyde, says: Sports broadcasting has many key logistical challenges, especially when it takes place outside in the case of most sporting stadiums, and when it takes place over wide areas such as for golf, cycling, motorsport, marathons, water sports, etc.
Affordable, rapidly deployable private 5G networks easily fit into sports broadcasting production workflows. Compared to traditional wired communications between cameras and recording and production facilities (especially for live broadcasting when the video content cannot simply be stored locally on the camera and retrieved later), private 5G offers a solution that minimises power and fibre runs. Without private 5G these cables runs often amount to kilometres of cabling for outside sporting event.
Stewart goes on: 5G has the potential to complement or replace existing wireless camera and microphone solutions that require the application for and management of many spectrum licenses. Many cameras can be connected over the same 5G network under the single spectrum license, as well as audio equipment, monitoring equipment, communications and UEs, and data transmission and two comms for control.
Like existing RF solutions, video can break out to SDI to land on existing broadcast equipment and follow the same production workflow as cabled cameras. The encoders and UE can be made very small and lightweight, allowing them to be mounted with small cameras on racing cars, motorbikes, or flown overhead. The true two-way data communication could be used for crew communications, as well as providing low latency telemetry data for team use or for broadcast overlays or immersive reality graphics.
Stewart notes that audience participation in sport broadcasting is also a driver for these new technologies. He explains: Audiences looking for more immersive experiences when watching sport, being so-called part of the action [is a driver]. This demand places heavy requirements on data throughput, volume and latency in particular. Private 5G can be configured to meet the uplink data demands. Through advanced encoding, decoding and compression signal processing, low latency can also be achieved, which is critical for many live broadcast sport applications.
The Neutral Wireless Lomond Network-In-a-Box (NIB) being taken easily through central London in its travel case
Unassuming box
The technology from Neutral Wireless will be housed in an unassuming box with antenna at the Highland Games, situated in a corner of the balcony at the main event pavilion.
As dancers perform to bagpipes and cabers fly through the air, the Games will be provided with a dedicated bandwidth using shared spectrum, which will deliver no interference or capacity issues affecting the quality of transmission, even with the large crowds present where many visitors will be using their mobile phones and the local WiFi.
Says Dr. Cameron Speirs, chief commercial officer at Neutral Wireless: Bob and I are co-founders of Neutral Wireless. It is a commercial spin out from Strathclyde University (where Bob is a professor). Bob and I spun-out Neutral Wireless last year. The rationale was that the university does not really have the appropriate mechanisms in place to support the increasing commercial interest in our 5G technology (or better defined as our software defined radio technology). Our private 5G solution - known as the Lomond Network-In-a-Box (NIB) - offers an innovative, affordable, and portable solution for rapidly popping up a private 5G network.
Bob's team at Strathclyde and our engineering team at Neutral Wireless are, for the time being, blended. We work seamlessly together, with the university team focusing o
