Sony's Beyond Sports Technology Powers Upcoming ESPN Monday Night Football Alternate Presentation-The Simpsons Funday Football
Brie Clayton November 12, 2024
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Real-time visualization with NFL's Next Gen Stats will drive animated viewing experience to reach new audiences during Dec. 9 Bengals vs. Cowboys game
Sony's Beyond Sports is collaborating with ESPN , the NFL , Disney , and The Simpsons to produce The Simpsons Funday Football, a real-time animated alternate presentation of a Monday Night Football game between the Cincinnati Bengals and Dallas Cowboys on Monday, Dec. 9, 2024. The Simpsons Funday Football alternate viewing presentation will stream on Disney and ESPN and on mobile with NFL .
A combination of data processing and real-time visualization technology from Beyond Sports will insert well-known characters from The Simpsons into the game action while the Bengals and Cowboys play in real time. This will be the second ever NFL alternate presentation Beyond Sports has collaborated with the NFL and ESPN on, the first being the successful three-time Sports Emmy Award winning NFL Toy Story Funday Football, featuring the 2023 Atlanta Falcons vs. Jacksonville Jaguars game in London, set in Andy's Room in the Toy Story Universe. That altcast was ESPN's first fully animated NFL telecast, delivering the biggest live event to-date on Disney (based on peak concurrency).
The Simpsons Funday Football altcast will demonstrate the potential of Beyond Sports' real-time visualization engine to build a broadcast that engages new and existing viewers, including multi-generational audiences, in an exciting and entertaining way. Fans can expect to see Homer and Bart on the sidelines, Marge and Lisa interviewing players during the game, Maggie operating the SkyCam, plus additional interactive elements including animated virtual commentators. Beyond Sports' virtual commentator technology further enhances audience engagement by inserting the actual announcers calling the game into the animated production. The technology uses a virtual reality headset to capture the real commentators' upper body movements and facial expressions and create 3D animations.
Sports leagues, broadcasters, and content producers must continually develop innovative options for reaching and retaining newer audiences that are accustomed to enjoying content experiences customized to their tastes, said Sander J. Schouten, Managing Director and Co-Founder at Beyond Sports. We are focused on meeting the expectations of each demographic by being visible on the platforms they are using and speaking in the way they want to be spoken to when it comes to their viewing habits.
The December telecast will use tracking data supplied by Sony's Hawk-Eye Innovations and the NFL's Next Gen Stats, enabling Beyond Sports to create a viewing experience that complements the live game through an innovative blend of traditional sports broadcasting and fully animated storytelling.
Beyond Sports' technology processes and converts NFL's Next Gen Stats and Hawk-Eye tracking data into 3D recreations. The platform has had a transformative impact on the sports production world for several years, supporting high-profile projects for 25 of the major sports leagues worldwide.
Beyond Sports' technology makes it possible to combine two data sources, analyze, validate, enhance, translate to a 3D environment, and stream to a desired platform in real-time, with a delay of less than a second. Using visualization allows for the addition of more storytelling aspects to the broadcast. This can be done through the addition of a new 3D environment or characters, educational or entertaining clips, replays from all angles, and live virtual commentators. Special visuals, events, and animations can be triggered either manually or through the data adding additional storytelling layers and making the live stream more fun to watch.
The Dec. 9 altcast also marks the latest example of Sony's far-reaching efforts to help engage the next generation of NFL fans. As an official technology partner of the NFL, Sony's deep integration throughout the league's games extends to Beyond Sports' real-time visualization platform and Hawk-Eye Innovations' officiating and tracking technology, sideline photography, broadcast cameras and production, and the development of on-field and sideline technologies, including a new coach's sideline headset that will debut in the 2025 season powered by Verizon Business' Managed Private Wireless Solution running on Verizon's reliable 5G network.
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