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 ...
09/10/2026
September 10 2026, 06:00 (PDT) Dolby Expands Dolby OptiView Platform with New Capabilities at IBC 2026
New Sports Intelligence helps providers better unders...
07/10/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, today announced the latest Long-Term Supported (LTS) release of Dalet Flex. Build...
29/09/2026
Oak View Group (OVG) has announced Cisco as an Official Technology Partner, with plans to standardize infrastructure across its venue network on Cisco solutions...
29/09/2026
SportsNet Pittsburgh (SNP) won three honors at the 2026 Mid-Atlantic Emmy Awards.
Program awards went to Bucs BP in the Sports Program Live category (produced ...
29/09/2026
The Professional Women's Hockey League has announced home openers for all 12 teams for the 2026-27 season, along with a broadcast partnership with CBC under...
29/09/2026
Manifold technologies has been recognized as a contributor to the Media eXchange...
29/09/2026
FuboTV has announced My Local Sports, allowing subscribers in select markets to add their local regional sports network (RSN) as an add-on to a Fubo Sports subs...
29/09/2026
Asian News International (ANI), a wire agency and video news provider based in India, has deployed Grass Valley's AMPP Media Operating System and Framelight...
29/09/2026
South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) has deployed Ikegami UHK-X600 cameras as part of an upgrade to IP-based production infrastructure. The deployment ...
29/09/2026
REMI, REMCO models will drive the bulk of the broadcaster's NHL productions ...
29/09/2026
Three years in, the facility is supporting more centralized race production, com...
29/09/2026
NBC, Peacock, and NBSN are carrying all four Wild Card series with a production ...
29/09/2026
19 Nonfiction Projects Across All Stages of Production to Receive More Than $1 million in Support as Documentary Film Program Approaches 25th Anniversary
LOS ...
29/09/2026
Two new plug-ins launch alongside updated bundles
Zynaptiq have just announced the launch of two new plug-ins, alongside new and improved versions of two of...
29/09/2026
All-in-one bus processor revealed
Wes Audio's ng product range has come a long way since it was first introduced, and now includes a tasty selection of ...
29/09/2026
eds3_5_jq(document).ready(function($) { $(#eds_sliderM519).chameleonSlider_2_1({ content_source:......
29/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/09/2026
Ikegami announces that the South African Broadcasting Corporation, SABC, has chosen Ikegami UHK-X600 camera systems as part of an advance to IP-based operation ...
29/09/2026
Blendkit Offers 20% Discount to Celebrate Crossing 150K Asset Milestone
Brie Clayton September 29, 2026
0 Comments
Blendkit, the largest 3D asset libr...
29/09/2026
Interactive streaming specialist Ease Live supported more than 76.5 million fan sessions across three major European media operators during this summers FIFA Wo...
29/09/2026
Ease Live has added support for VAST (Video Ad Serving Template) to its graphical overlay technology, opening up new ways for broadcasters, streamers and rights...
29/09/2026
Rise AV has announced the launch of the inaugural Rise AV Awards, a new global awards programme celebrating the women, advocates and organisations across the AV...
29/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/09/2026
Clear-Com announced that First Baptist Nashville has upgraded its production communications with a Clear-Com intercom solution as part of a comprehensive sanct...
29/09/2026
Blackmagic Cinema Camera 6K Captured Action Shots for Sketch
Brie Clayton September 28, 2026
0 Comments
Camera's portable design and dynamic range...
29/09/2026
Kean Production Services Deploys AJA ColorBox to Deliver Consistent, Accurate Co...
29/09/2026
Berklee Alumni and Faculty Nominated for the 2026 Latin Grammy Awards A total of 28 Berklee alumni and faculty earned nominations across 20 categories this ye...
29/09/2026
Berklee's K-Pop & Beyond Explores Connections Between K-Pop and Hip-Hop Now in its fifth year, the series brings together artists, industry leaders, and s...
29/09/2026
We tend to think we live in a digital world, with hopes and fears around artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing, data centres and the next big technolo...
29/09/2026
Today, in partnership with the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), Apple relea...
29/09/2026
Final Cut Camera, the professional filming app for iPhone, receives a major upda...
29/09/2026
RT lyric fm is proud to announce the annual Choirs for Christmas competition callout. Warm up those vocal chords and join us on RT lyric fm for a celebration ...
28/09/2026
The NHL has announced Adobe as an Official Creative, Marketing and AI Partner beginning with the 2026-27 season. The partnership will provide the league and its...
28/09/2026
MultiDyne will exhibit at CABSAT 2026 (October 5-7, Dubai Exhibition Centre), showcasing an expanded technology portfolio following its June 2026 acquisition of...
28/09/2026
ARRI and HONOR have announced the HONOR Magic9 Pro Max, a flagship smartphone carrying ARRI branding on the device and packaging as the first product-level expr...
28/09/2026
Net Insight has added the Nimbra 1020G to its pan-Asian live media trial network, giving customers and partners in the region a way to evaluate ST 2110 and JPEG...
28/09/2026
Vindral has been named a recipient of a 2026 Technology and Engineering Emmy Award by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences in the category of We...
28/09/2026
Interra Systems will exhibit at CABSAT 2026 (Stand B2-37, Dubai Exhibition Centre, October 5-7), demonstrating its BATON QC platform, ORION monitoring solutions...
28/09/2026
Two years into its new production facility, the TOUR is expanding centralized wo...
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 
