Live From the Ryder Cup: 2021 Production Is a Family Affair for Sky Sports and NBC Sports Collaboration will be key at Whistling Straits in Wisconsin By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Thursday, September 23, 2021 - 2:08 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
After a year's delay, the 2021 Ryder Cup is set to begin Friday, with Team USA and Team Europe squaring off at Whistling Straits in Kohler, WI. It's the first Ryder Cup for which Sky Sports and NBC Sports are part of the same corporate family, and collaboration will play a big part.
Both units are very excited to be broadcasting it for the first time in three years and to be working together and talking together, says Jason Wessely, executive producer, Sky Sports Golf. Not only to make sensible efficiencies, sensible savings, and environmentally responsible savings but to pull resources so that the customer gets an enhanced experience, not a lesser experience. Collectively, we're stronger, and it's very exciting [to be] looking at the future of golf broadcasting as we work together with each other and with partners like the European Tour Productions and PGA of America.
The biggest area of collaboration will be around Golf Channel's Live From show, which has become a staple for golf fans, especially at the majors and events like the Ryder Cup.
We worked pretty hard to get Live From throughout the season onto the Sky platform because it's a nice product that has a continual news flow for the Sky customer, says Wessely. So we're going to join forces and throw to a Sky set and then go back and forth to the Live From Golf Channel set and give a complete, comprehensive show that throws back and forth between the two groups.
There has been a lot of work with Live From Coordinating Producer Matt Hegarty and his team, he adds, but we'll be able to have the American take and the European take on things, and, hopefully, over the next couple of days, we'll find a real good rhythm with a dovetailing effect between the two units. There is also a different stylistic difference that will be interesting to watch.
Sky Sports will have a studio presence at the first tee and a crew of 40 onsite at Whistling Straits.
The core of Sky's coverage for the competition will be the world feed, which will be produced by IMG and European Tour Productions. Telegenic's TWiz production trailer will serve as the broadcast hub onsite, housing commentary booths and technical facilities that include audio mixing and Simply Live operations.
It's a very clever truck that has been designed purposefully for Sky, Wessely points out. It's got office space, it's got a green room, it's got a commentary booth, it's got the sound mixing, and it's got the operation for the touchscreen.
TWiz historically has been used week in and week out for Sky's PGA TOUR coverage, but the pandemic put a pause on operations, which didn't restart until August for the Fed Ex Championship. Having it back in the operation will allow around 50 signals to be sent to Sky's production facility in Osterley Park outside London.
The workflow is split between the Telegenic truck onsite and two galleries at Sky that are essentially working throughout the week, explains Wessely. The main gallery will look after the main coverage Friday to Sunday, and a second gallery will look after Live From. That gallery is PCR 35, which will curate the Live From program and deliver it to transmission while Gallery 5 ends up being the content generator.
The two are working in tandem, he continues. One challenge is fitting into the various corporate workflows back home: we have just over 40 people working here at Whistling Straits, but, back home, we have as many as 150 people working at Sky Studios.
Sky Sports typically has a massive studio presence at the first tee, but, this year, that presence will be smaller, and studio operations will be located near the 18th green (Golf Channel will have its studio presence at the first tee).
Twenty minutes before the [competition starts] , says Wessely, we will go our separate ways from the Golf Channel, and our presenting team will be down at the first tee, alfresco-like standing on the grass. [Golfers] Nick Dougherty and Paul McGinley will be there, talking about the atmosphere as the crowds get loud. The viewer will feel as though they're in the heart of the action.
Once the action starts, the world feed will be at the center of the Sky offering, and the PGA TOUR Entertainment Group is filling in gaps created by the need to deploy as few people as possible. Four or five RF cameras will be key to the coverage, cut into the world feed, which will rely more than ever on NBC's coverage.
We are truly doing a joint world feed, says Wessely, so we'll need to know where NBC is going, when commercial pieces are coming in, etc. It will rely on very good communication between [Golf producer] Tommy Roy at NBC, ETP, and Sky.
In recent years, Sky has also embraced NCAM to deliver augmented-reality video captures of Team Europe golfers into the studio environments, and this year is no different. Players stand on a pedestal in a greenscreen environment, and a Trackman camera system rotates around them, capturing them from all angles.
Unless the camera moves, you don't get the 3D aspect to it, says Wessely. We will also use a Steadicam in our studios and a pan rail. The players get sort of beamed up into our studio, and we can put our presenter in there and make it look like the players are being transported into our studios.
Something new onsite this year are touchscreens that give the presenters more control over video highlights and other elements.
When you have the touch functionality, says Wessely, it's crucial that the
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
Live From the Ryder Cup: 2021 Production Is a Family Affair for Sky Sports and NBC Sports Collaboration will be key at Whistling Straits in Wisconsin By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director 
