NBC Sports Tees Up 70 Cameras, Drone Tracing for Presidents Cup From Royal Montreal

NBC Sports Tees Up 70 Cameras, Drone Tracing for Presidents Cup From Royal Montreal Nimble production has 300-person team onsite for a unique competition By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director

Friday, September 27, 2024 - 9:51 am

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Day one of the President's Cup, the biannual golf competition between a team of U.S. golfers and a team of non-European international golfers, saw the U.S. take a commanding 5-0 lead at Royal Montreal Golf Club in Canada. For the production team at NBC Sports and Golf Channel, it's a week-long production effort following months of preparation.

NBC Sports is using two drones for this weekend's coverage of the President's Cup from Royal Montreal Golf Club.

With any event, especially a Presidents Cup, it is a full team effort across the board, with everyone partnering together to make it a success, says Allison McAllister, VP, golf operations, NBC Sports. It takes months of planning between NBC Sports, PGA TOUR Entertainment, and Tournament Operations to make this amazing event come to life.

McAllister credits the NBC Sports golf-operations team of Bridget Cugle, Tavi Wright, and Melissa Beasley and the technical team of Marc Caputo, Jason Abrams, Sam Ruby, and Bryson Smith for working tirelessly to get the 300-person production team onsite and 70 cameras (including two drones) up and running this week.

We are still using NEP trucks, she notes, with most of the crew traveling from the States, although Broadcast Services International is providing all the local Canadian labor. We are using ND1 A, B, C, and D and BSI RF 4 for main tournament coverage and NEWBERT for Live From coverage. Filmwerks is providing power in the compound.

Captain's Cart Cams, introduced at the previous Presidents Cup, in 2022, are back. New this year is a partnership with the PGA TOUR to deploy drone tracing via Trackman to the coverage, ARL virtual graphics, and a Strut shallow-depth-of-field camera. NBC has also added Hawkeye, operated from Tulsa, OK, to complement the EVS replay devices aboard ND1, and The Switch is handling transmission for NBC, Live From, and the PGA TOUR world feed.

Live From has been covering the event from Montreal all week, with its set located off the ninth green and near the fan zone (part of that coverage has included golfer Johnson Wagner providing some live breakdowns from the course). The Live From set has the clubhouse and first-tee exterior as a background; the NBC Sports tournament set is located by the 14th hole.

Golf events like the Presidents Cup, the Ryder Cup, and the Solheim Cup are unique in that they feature a lot of team play (two players from one team playing two from the other) and holes are won or lost instead of aggregating a score. That means matches can end before the 18th hole, which requires nimble deployment of camera, audio, and talent.

To keep up with coverage, says McAllister, we have seven RF handhelds and three RF hard cameras on InProduction [mobile cameras]. There are also three RF handhelds that the PGA TOUR controls that can supplement our coverage and cover commercial breaks.

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