NASHVILLE, Tenn.-The COVID-19 pandemic was a big blow to television production; Los Angeles, the center of the production world, suffered its lowest filming levels on record between April and June. Between keeping socially distant on set and needing to travel to different locations, when-or if-production can return to what it was before is currently unknown.
Some relief to these new production headaches has popped up in the music capital of the U.S. of all places, Nashville. There, NEP Live and Skyway Studios have partnered for the construction and housing of an LED Smart Stage.
ALL THE WORLD'S A STAGE
William Shakespeare believed that the entire world was a stage, but the collaboration between NEP Live and Skyway Studios has turned that idea around to make this new stage a way to bring nearly any place in the world into a single location.
Officially opened to clients on June 8, the Smart Stage is housed in Skyway Studio's Nashville location, a 150,000-square-foot facility that in addition to its sound stages includes amenities like hair and makeup, green rooms and around the clock security. But the centerpiece is the new virtual, high-resolution LED stage.
The stage measures in at 38x20x13-feet with the walls having a resolution of 8272x1408 pixels, while the floor has a resolution of 1932x1008 pixels. There are a total of 13,594,432 pixels active on the set at a single time.
Playing back an image to effectively create the virtual 3D environment is done with a combination of 8K Unreal servers, a Disguise GX2C media server and VX4 media server and Stype Red Spy camera tracking system. Additional components include an NEP Plater Performer server for plate playback and frame accurate capture and logging, while screen mapping and control is done through Barco E2 running native resolution. The studio also features 10 GB of connectivity and multiple fiber optic links to common broadcast partners, including other NEP studios around the world.
We've heard from many of our clients that a stage of this size and this design doesn't exist anywhere else in the U.S., said Jason Newman, business executive, Creative Technologies, at NEP. Even in L.A., outside the volume for The Mandalorian' or something along those lines built for a tentpole project, there's not another stage that has the full surround with the capability that we've got here.
Even when compared to the virtual production set that The Mandalorian has made famous, Newman said that the only real difference is the layout and the size; the hardware driving the technology and the LED displays are essentially the same, just adapted into a somewhat smaller package.
In addition to the technical and physical collaboration between NEP and Skyway, a third-party has helped bring the actual environments to the stage. Lightborne Communications was tasked with creating the video content and 3D graphics.
Working alongside NEP and Skyway Studios has been an incredible opportunity to pair cutting-edge technology and a top-of-the-line studio facility with Lightborne's renowned content creation abilities, said Scott Durban, president of Lightborne. Using Unreal Engine to create content for this space draws on all of our capabilities and combines them into a new kind of alchemy that has seemingly endless conceptual, narrative and visual potential.
LIVE ON STAGESince the Smart Stage launched in June, it has been used for a number of different kinds of productions. With it being located in Nashville, one type has been for music performances serving as a potential replacement for delayed or cancelled tours that impact not only artists and their fans, but the production crews that help produce the shows. The stage can also be used to produce content or entire presentations for corporations, as well as high-end TV or film production.
The opportunities are endless, said Bill Lafontaine, chief marketing officer at Skyway Studios, who emphasized their excitement over what the partnership with NEP has brought to the table.
However, you don't need to be putting on a concert to utilize this virtual stage technology at Skyway. The studio and NEP also crafted a smaller stage that Skyway expects to be an option for local sports broadcasters (Nashville is home to the NHL's Predators, the MLS' Nashville FC and the NFL's Tennessee Titans). Regional broadcasters covering these teams could do studio shoots for pre-game, halftime and post-game coverage, Lafontaine believes.
While still in its early days, Skyway is excited about the prospects of what the Smart Stage has to offer. According to the studio's owner and CEO, Julie Stadler, they might install more Smart Stages if the current installation proves successful.
THE EVOLUTION OF PRODUCTIONAs mentioned earlier, nearly everything surrounding production is impacted by COVID-19 right now. Smart Stage contributes to the potential solution by eliminating the need for traveling to different locations or having an unsafe number of people in a single environment. This was particularly helpful as Tennessee's COVID-19 restrictions allowed for production to return sooner than in places like New York, or Los Angeles, where NEP has a similar virtual stage setup.
Still, timing played a key factor in all of this coming together.
One of the key things that people mostly don't realize is that, say COVID had hit us five or six years ago, the infrastructure and the bandwidth within the world did not exist at that time to be able to support what the technology can do today, said Andy Gerber, account and project manager for NEP Live. Even so, the pandemic did not cause a shift in the ways production operates, but rather an acceleration.
We were heading down this road with this technology, Gerber continued.
Part of the challenge in doing this now, he s
Most recent headlines
01/01/2026
Latin Grammy Cultural Foundation Announces 2026 Noel Schajris Scholarship The scholarship will cover tuition and housing for one Berklee College of Music stud...
01/01/2026
New year, new games, all with RTX 5080-powered cloud energy. GeForce NOW is kicking off 2026 by looking back at an unforgettable year of wins and wildly high fr...
30/12/2025
As the College Football Playoff Enters the Quarterfinals, ESPN Blows Out Its Meg...
30/12/2025
SVG's Best of 2025: Original ArticlesTake a look back at all our coverage of big-time productions, game-changing technologies, and state-of-the-art new faci...
30/12/2025
MELBOURNE, Fla., Dec. 30, 2025 - L3Harris Technologies (NYSE: LHX) will release its fourth quarter 2025 financial results before the market opens on Thursday, J...
30/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
30/12/2025
It marked the first civilian operational authorization for a HAPS flight in Europe, led by Space42's subsidiary, Mira Aerospace
The flight demonstrated HAP...
29/12/2025
San Francisco 49ers Strike Gold With Halftime Laser SpectacularStunning display caps $200 million renovation of Levi's Stadium techBy Dan Daley, Audio Edito...
29/12/2025
The Cup's Around the Corner: An Inside Look at Broadcast Preparations for th...
29/12/2025
SVG's Best of 2025: Longform VideoWatch the standout keynote conversations, deep dives, and panel discussions from the year for free on SVG PLAY!By Brandon ...
29/12/2025
From crisper Lossless audio and immersive music videos in beta to new Audiobooks+ plans, custom transitions between tracks, and in-app Messages, we keep levelin...
29/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
27/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
26/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
26/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
25/12/2025
Holiday lights are twinkling, hot cocoa's on the stove and gamers are settling in for a well-earned break.
Whether staying in or heading on a winter getawa...
24/12/2025
What is AI good for? Posted by MTI Film on December 24, 2025
What is AI good for?
What is AI good for?
It's been three years since ChatGPT first cap...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
24/12/2025
Back to All News
The Boyfriend' Season 2 Unveils Heartwarming Trailer, Key...
24/12/2025
Back to All News
Love, Fights, and Everything in Between: Badly in Love' Returns for Season 2
Entertainment
24 December 2025
GlobalJapan
Link copied t...
24/12/2025
Scripps Research study links sleep variability with sleep apnea and hypertension How consumers' digital activity trackers could enable personalized health s...
23/12/2025
How guilas Cibae as Dominican Winter League Games Are Locally Produced for Glob...
23/12/2025
BitFire's Jim Akimchuk on Supplying Scalability and Customization in the Clo...
23/12/2025
CAMB.AI Enables European Athletics to Offer Multi-Language SupportPlan is to eventually offer translation into all languages spoken in EuropeBy Ken Kerschbaumer...
23/12/2025
Analysis: As sports media values trend negative, scarcity and quality are king By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Monday, December 22, 2025 - 14:08
Print ...
23/12/2025
ESPN, Disney, and NBA Return to the Animated Altcast Fray With Second Edition of...
23/12/2025
End the Year on a High Note and Donate to the Sports Broadcasting Fund Today!By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, December 23, 2025 - 12:25 pm
P...
23/12/2025
The year is winding down, the weather outside is frightful, and it's the perfect time to escape into a story that warms the heart. For listeners looking for...
23/12/2025
A Zeus motor is hot fire tested at L3Harris' Camden, Arkansas, solid rocket ...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Lightware will exhibit several major product innovations at ISE 2026, including the new USB-C BOOSTER-V1, Google Meet. integration for various Taurus UCX models...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Taking the Stage at Carnegie Hall-On a Global Scale Boston Conservatory Orchestra students reflect on their epic concert marking the 80th session of the UN Gene...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
Netflix's The Great Flood and Culinary Class Wars 2 Top Gl...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
Stranger Things By the Numbers: How the Global Phenomenon Shap...
23/12/2025
Experience the power of WO Automation for Radio's newest service, the System Effectiveness Review. Designed to help you achieve more, a System Effectiveness...
23/12/2025
23 Dec 2025
VEON's Beeline Kazakhstan and Rakuten Symphony Collaborate to A...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
How Steamy Can It Get? Single's Inferno' Season 5 Pre...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
33 Million Global Viewers on Netflix Watched Jake Paul vs. Ant...
23/12/2025
New technique lights up where drugs go in the body, cell by cell Scripps Research scientists developed a technique that maps drug binding in individual cells th...
NASHVILLE, Tenn.-The COVID-19 pandemic was a big blow to television production; Los Angeles, the center of the production world, suffered its lowest filming levels on record between April and June. Between keeping socially distant on set and needing to travel to different locations, when-or if-production can return to what it was before is currently unknown.
