The Simpsons Funday Football: Inside the Tech That ESPN and the NFL Use To Bring Springfield to Life The alternative broadcast relies on Sony's Beyond Sports tech and Hawk-Eye data By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Monday, December 9, 2024 - 3:24 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
The world of alternative broadcasts is expanding once again. Tonight, ESPN will roll out The Simpsons Funday Football on ESPN2, Disney+, ESPN+, and NFL+ (mobile). SVG goes behind the scenes in Springfield (and Bristol) with in-depth coverage of every aspect of the production:
TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW: Inside the Tech That ESPN and the NFL Use To Bring Springfield to Life (FULL STORY BELOW)
PRODUCTION OPERATIONS: The Game May Be Set in Springfield, but the Production Team Is in Bristol
CREATIVE PHILOSOPHY: ESPN Creative Studio's Michael Spike' Szykowny Pulls Back the Curtain on Creative Process
TRACKING TECHNOLOGY: Sony's Beyond Sports CEO Sander Shouten Analyzes How Tracking Tech Enables Real-Time Animated Altcasts
MUSIC & THEME SONG: ESPN Records Unique Twist on Monday Night Football Theme for Animated Alternative Broadcast
Altcast Sophistication Illustrates Evolution of Animated Broadcasts The Simpsons Funday Football not only promises to be filled with more humor and schtick than previous alternative broadcasts but also demonstrates how quickly the technology is evolving to power such broadcasts.
I think this is the most alternate of the alternate broadcasts, says Phil Orlins, VP, production, ESPN. To me, this is the true alternative because we're not just treating the game or wrapping it with an alteration. We're actually re-creating the game in a truly alternative universe. By design, we're explicitly pursuing the interest of fans who may not want to watch the game in the conventional manner, and I think that is really important.
Tonight's broadcast involves creative elements representing everything from the Simpsons writing staff to the ESPN graphics team, which continues to get more and more reps with such broadcasts. Those creative elements make use of some key technology pieces that make it all possible and, increasingly, allow the. shows to become even more sophisticated.
Explains Josh Helmrich, senior director, media strategy, business development and Next Gen Stats, NFL, We always had this vision when we started player-involved tracking, which is what we call the Next Gen Stats platform, to create benefits for the entire ecosystem of the NFL. One of those is bringing new experiences to our fans and creating more engaging content. With the Beyond Sports team and Hawk-Eye data, we've been able to take it to the next level. The more creative and engaging content we can create, the better. We continue to grow, thanks to great partners like ESPN and Beyond Sports.
According to Orlins, the constant and rapid progress with the technology that started with single-point tracking just a couple of years ago and relatively basic movements has evolved to blended tracking, which is single-point NGS tracking combined with the Hawk-Eye tracking. He credits Sony's Beyond Sports co-founder/Chief Technology Officer Nicolaas Westerhof and his team with taking the alternative broadcast to new heights.
Our 3-D simulation is based, first, on positional tracking data, explains Westerhof. We have two sources coming together. The single-point tracking data provided by Next Gen Stats relies on trackers in the shoulder pads of the player and gives us a very stable feed of the position of the player.
The secondary source, he notes, is optical tracking that provides skeletal data from 29 points on each player's body and limbs. The secret sauce provided by Beyond Sports is to combine the two sets of data in an accurate way.
It allows us to get a lot closer to the actual players' movement and give the [animated characters] detailed movement, Westerhof explains. It's a little less stable than the single-point tracking, but, when it works, you want to use it as much as possible because it provides the detail.
Tonight's effort takes things to yet another height. Characters like Lisa Simpson, for example, will not be as tall as Dallas Cowboys wide receiver CeeDee Lamb. So, when the Beyond Sports system tracks a ball thrown to a real-world 6-foot-2 receiver but the shorter Lisa Simpson animated character is what the viewer sees, the Beyond Sports system needs to adjust the flight of the ball so that it lands in the hands of Lisa Simpson.
With data processing, says Westerhof, we can take the ball and make it go exactly into her hands. That is difficult to do, especially in real time, and a whole bunch of different processes are going on in the background on our side, mostly machine-learning processes, to make that happen. It needs to be adjusted on the fly as we don't know beforehand what character is going to be in what play. We spent a lot of time on making the system as flexible as possible, because we don't know what's going to happen.
The advances in Hawk-Eye have been driven by a broad technical partnership between Sony and the NFL that began in the summer and is being expanded to other aspects of the NFL's business. This alternate broadcast is a good example of [that expansion], from a Hawk-Eye perspective, says Sony Chief Commercial Officer Michael Markovich. The more data we capture, the better it gets, and we can deliver more use cases from it. As this data gets better and the systems get better and we have more reps and trials, obviously, we get to do things like the Simpsons game and the Toy Story game and, hopefully, even more serialized or episodic media content.
He also sees a role for this sort of data in officiating: Our number-one focus on the Hawk-Eye side is to use the optical trac
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
04/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
04/07/2026
April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...
01/06/2026
January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026
Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...
19/05/2026
Actus Digital, a LiveU company, and a leading provider of intelligent media monitoring and broadcast compliance platforms, announced today that METEO CONSULT ha...
19/05/2026
Globecast, a leading provider of managed services for the broadcast and media industry, today announced the completion of a major renovation of its Singapore fa...
19/05/2026
Following a major upgrade to its Connecticut remote production centre with the installation of three 60-fader Argo S consoles in 2023, RPS has switched one of t...
19/05/2026
PlayBox Technology today announced the launch of Celebro Play, a browser-based media orchestration platform designed specifically for broadcast facilities and p...
19/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
19/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
19/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
19/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
19/05/2026
LYNX Technik, provider of modular signal processing solutions for broadcast, post, and professional AV will showcase its latest signal processing solutions at B...
19/05/2026
Media Links, a leading developer and manufacturer of IP media transport solutions, has announced the integration of its Xscend platform with Skyline Communicat...
19/05/2026
Collaboration expands regional partner ecosystem as Media Links showcases IP media transport solutions on stand 4M4-4 and alongside Clearcast Asia on stand
Me...
19/05/2026
Company Highlights Labor-Saving Control and Custom Branding Opportunities Designed to Increase Integrator Profitability
LynTec, a leading manufacturer of ele...
19/05/2026
Mago Studio Moves AI Video Beyond Prompts with New Production-Focused Tools
Brie Clayton May 18, 2026
0 Comments
New Capabilities Bring Controllable, ...
19/05/2026
It May be Time to Stop and Take an AI Breather
Brie Clayton May 19, 2026
0 Comments
If the rock you stay on starts to roll, jump clean. Or you'll...
18/05/2026
Despite a bumpy start to the year, the provider of event-production support and ...
18/05/2026
Daktronics has partnered with the University of North Carolina to manufacture and install 11 LED displays totaling more than 10,000 square feet and more than 14...
18/05/2026
CBS LA has announced a multi-year partnership with the Los Angeles Rams, covering exclusive local broadcasts of Rams preseason games, weekly year-round programm...
18/05/2026
Skyline Communications has announced an integration between its DataMiner xOps p...
18/05/2026
eCLUTCH, the hybrid esports platform powered by iKOMG, has announced an expansion of its distribution across Europe, MENA, Africa, and Asia, along with new cont...
18/05/2026
Behind The Mic provides a roundup of recent news regarding on-air talent, includ...
18/05/2026
With 22 games this season, the production team looks forward to tweaking and enhancing the coverage
After 8,660 days off the air, the WNBA returned to NBC yest...
18/05/2026
(L-R) Midori Francis and Natalie Erika James attend the Saccharine premiere during the 2026 Sundance Film Festival at The Ray Theatre on January 22, 2026, in ...
18/05/2026
Last night, the Spotify Podcast Awards in Mexico returned to the country's capital. Now in its second year, the evening honors creators whose voices are hel...
18/05/2026
ZEN-Core synth goes mobile
Roland's powerful ZEN-Core software synthesizer has just been introduced to the iPad, offering a convenient entry point into ...
18/05/2026
Versatile new limiter plug-in announced
Based in Sheffield, UK, fedDSP offer a range of plug-ins that span the music production, live sound and high-end med...
18/05/2026
A new use for convolution?
Viiri Audio's debut plug-in aims to do something a little different with convolution processing, allowing users to adjust all...
18/05/2026
Delta Goodrem shines for SBS as more than 3.27 million Australians tune in for E...
18/05/2026
The Australian Defence Force uses L3Harris T4 and T7 robots for explosive ordnan...
18/05/2026
Continued investment across Europe and Germany is expanding local teams and improving access to stock, regional expertise, and specialist broadcast support.
CV...
18/05/2026
Agentic AI inference at one-tenth the cost per token with NVIDIA Vera Rubin NVL7...
18/05/2026
18 May 2026
Dubai and New York, May 18, 2026 - VEON Ltd. (NASDAQ: VEON), a glob...
18/05/2026
Monday 18 May 2026
Sky News offers ad-free podcasts and bonus episodes for just...
18/05/2026
Comscore March 2026 Consumer AI Chatbot Usage Rankings Show Claude Gaining Share OpenAI's ChatGPT maintains lead while Anthropic's Claude continues to c...
17/05/2026
Delta Goodrem's Eurovision Eclipse marks end of a stellar run
17 May, 2026
Media releases
Bulgaria wins Eurovision 2026
Relive every spellbinding mome...
17/05/2026
Back to All News
Oasis Premieres on Netflix June 19
Entertainment
17 May 2026
GlobalSpain
Link copied to clipboard
Summer, sunshine, the beach, parties. T...
16/05/2026
Helps to deliver a clean, balanced midrange
Developed alongside Newfangled Audio, the latest plug-in in Eventide's software collection has been designed...
16/05/2026
Brings onboard stem rendering to RANE System One
Engine DJ have just released Engine DJ 5.0, a free update for their Engine DJ OS embedded hardware and Engi...
16/05/2026
Boris FX Continuum Pairs AI Precision and Advanced Creative Controls
Jessie Electa Petrov May 16, 2026
0 Comments
The 2026.5 release adds automatic de...
16/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
16/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
16/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
16/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
15/05/2026
Seattle Sounders FC and Seattle Reign FC, in partnership with RAVE Foundation an...
15/05/2026
Dan Brumm has served as sound designer on Bluey, the Australian children's t...
15/05/2026
The Professional Audio Manufacturers Alliance (PAMA) and Shure Incorporated are accepting applications for the 6th annual Mark Brunner Professional Audio Schola...
The Simpsons Funday Football: Inside the Tech That ESPN and the NFL Use To Bring Springfield to Life The alternative broadcast relies on Sony's Beyond Sports tech and Hawk-Eye data By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director 
