BBC Sport unveils innovative new VR studio for Beijing Winter Olympics By Heather McLean, Editor
Monday, January 24, 2022 - 18:35
Print This Story
BBC Sport is taking readers to the slopes with a virtual cabin on a mountainside in China for a studio
BBC Sport is unveiling a new virtual reality (VR) studio for its coverage of the Beijing Winter Olympics that will take viewers from a mountainside log cabin to a virtual ski resort, and beyond.
Rights holding broadcasters at this year's Games are restricted from being able to roam the local area with camera crews, preventing them from giving people at home a feel of the country. However, the VR studio will take viewers to the edge of a mountain range and the excitement of a Winter Olympics in all its snowy glory.
With every event you kind of learn about how you can use the technology and use your imagination to create something which is unreal
Comments Jonny Bramley, executive producer for major events at BBC Sport, talking to SVG Europe from his hotel in Beijing: We did consider whether we'd be looking at some live shots from some of the venues here in Beijing, but you actually come up with a more impressive environment if you kind of let your imagination run away and come up with something that might be your ideal log cabin in a snowy mountain environment.
We're pretty happy with the way the studio looks. And again, it's clearly virtual and we're not trying to pretend it's actually real, but it does look pretty impressive, so we can have a bit of fun with that.
Even though the footprint of BBC Sport's greenscreen studio being used for Beijing is only 84 metres square, it has managed to create a virtual ski resort an expansive studio
As the Winter Olympics is a smaller event than the Summer Games, this time BBC Sport is not utilising the large Dock 10 studio it made into its virtual Tokyo eyrie. It has scaled the VR set back to its Pres 2 studio, as it would for any other Winter Olympics.
Bramley comments: The Summer Olympic studio was in one of the large studios in Dock10. This time we are using our more compact studio, but it's bespoke. It's probably the biggest virtual footprint we've got. Being able to use it for a major event like this is actually a great use of the space. It's not a huge space but we've been very creative with our VR set design, so it's great.
Not only do we have a number of different positions inside the studio, but we've actually got various places where we can actually shoot - virtually outside. I think [the studio is] probably one of the most exciting things about the coverage, Bramley adds.
Presenters will be able to virtually report from outside' the BBC Sport studio at a ski resort
Pushing VR to the edge
John Murphy, BBC Sport's creative director for motion, tells SVG Europe: The innovative element of the studio is in the virtual design. Although the footprint of our greenscreen studio is only 84 metres square, we have managed to create a virtual ski resort and studio which has more than five different presenting positions both inside and outside. It will also reflect different times of the day and you may even spot some wildlife!
Murphy explains that the technology which drives the virtual studio is a Viz 4 and Unreal Engine integration using the Viz Fusion keyer along with the Mo-Sys camera tracking system. Unreal Engine provides the virtual landscape and rendering and Vizrt's Viz 4 and Viz Arc provide the control of the studio, including any AR.
He adds: Our studio (Pres 2) which is based at Media City, Salford is a four-camera greenscreen studio with a locked-off fifth ceiling camera which we have brought in for the Winter Olympics; it gives us a bigger viewpoint from one of the positions in the studio.
On the studio, he notes: It is a fixed studio which has been active since May [2021] and has hosted various productions. However, the Winter Olympics is our biggest event to be held in there to date and therefore we are expanding the virtual footprint of the studio.
Although the architecture of the studio is the same, we have created an extra presentation area inside, and the biggest change is that we now have three or four presentation areas outside of the studio in our own ski resort - a virtual ski resort. So our presenters will talk about going outside', but they'll actually be inside the VR studio. We'll be in the studio - the VR log cabin - then go to the downhill skiing or whatever, and when we come back our presenters can be outside' in our virtual ski resort. It's pretty cool!
Viewers will be able to see day turn into night in Beijing time, and may even see some wildlife on the slopes
Constantly evolving
As to how the Beijing studio has moved on from that used for Tokyo and how BBC Sport is constantly pushing forwards with its VR set design, Bramley says: It's definitely evolved. Tokyo was a good example of how you're not constrained with virtual reality. When you design a real set you're very much constrained by those four walls and the challenge with that is how creative you can be within those four walls. A VR set design means you've got to literally think outside of the box outside those four walls and so the scenes we had in Tokyo meant the set was the entire city of Tokyo with our little box on top of a skyscraper in the middle. This time the set is in a mountain environment and it's our own little log cabin in the middle of that.
With every event you kind of learn about how you can use the technology and use your imagination to create something which is unreal, concludes Bramley.
The BBC will broadcast more than 300 hours of live coverage across BBC One and BBC Two, with even more coverage available on a second live digital stream o
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...
30/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
30/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
30/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
30/05/2026
Zero in on one that says yes (and no)
Andy Marken May 29, 2026
0 Comments
Hero image courtesy of Deposit Photos
For content creators the most difficu...
29/05/2026
With InfoComm 2026 just weeks away, NDI is giving attendees plenty of reasons to...
29/05/2026
Reaffirming a partnership that has defined Canadian sports broadcasting since 19...
29/05/2026
Mobile/tablet is No. 2 device for watching TV, suggesting that the sports-production industry needs to take another look at the format
Ring Digital's Sprin...
29/05/2026
Berliner Ensemble, one of Berlin's five major theater companies, has expande...
29/05/2026
Solid State Logic will showcase its new compact, fly-away TCA Tour audio product...
29/05/2026
Gerald (Jerry) Pierce, a pioneering technologist who helped shape the digital transformation of the motion picture industry, passed away last month on April 12 ...
29/05/2026
Paramount+ will be the English-language U.S. home for Barclays Women's Super...
29/05/2026
Further strengthening its virtualisation strategy to fully support broadcasters ...
29/05/2026
Swiss broadcaster Canal Alpha has deployed Harmonic's award-winning, software-based XOS Advanced Media Processor to modernize playout operations across cant...
29/05/2026
PTZOptics will showcase a new generation of intelligent video workflows at InfoComm 2026, June 17-19, Las Vegas. Visitors to booth N8227 will see how PTZOptics ...
29/05/2026
Arizona's Family has launched the Arizona's Family Sports (AZFS) streaming app, a new direct-to-consumer destination for live, local sports. The app is ...
29/05/2026
Starting in 2027, DAZN will be the exclusive home of The Canadian Football Leagu...
29/05/2026
Comcast Business has detailed the advanced network infrastructure it has deploye...
29/05/2026
In two-day event, leaders from academia and industry explored solutions to chall...
29/05/2026
The Basketball Tournament (TBT), now entering their 13th year of competition, ha...
29/05/2026
Roku has launched FOX One as a Premium Subscription on The Roku Channel in the U.S. Roku customers can now subscribe to FOX One using their Roku account for liv...
29/05/2026
In its sixth year, the broadcaster's coverage has become a global brand and ...
29/05/2026
Ratings Roundup is a rundown of recent ratings news and is derived from press re...
29/05/2026
The days are getting longer, the temperatures are rising, and playlists are filling up for the season. With summer around the corner, Spotify's global edito...
29/05/2026
New retro-inspired MPC announced
There are few devices that have gained the status held by Akai Pro's MPC range, and in recent years, the company have s...
29/05/2026
Save up to 30 on acclaimed titles
Following a successful launch at Superbooth 2026, Bjooks have revealed that they will be continuing the Kickstarter campa...
29/05/2026
Binaural monitoring application improved
Genelec have just released an update that brings some powerful new features to their HRTF-based binaural headphone ...
29/05/2026
6 June 2026 at SAE Institute, London, UK
IMSTA FESTA 2026 is almost upon us, with some of the biggest names in pro-audio set to descend upon SAE Institute i...
29/05/2026
Gerald (Jerry) Pierce, a pioneering technologist who helped shape the digital transformation of the motion picture industry, died April 12, 2026, at his home in...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Comparing 5 AI Video Enhancers for Restoring Old Video Quality
Kate Luvis May 29, 2026
0 Comments
Digitizing VHS, MiniDV, and other legacy formats doe...
29/05/2026
Studio Hamburg Builds New Post Pipeline with DaVinci Resolve Studio
Brie Clayton May 29, 2026
0 Comments
Workflow replaces a patchwork of legacy tools...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
29/05/2026
At the Intersection of Music and Dance, an Epic Collaboration Boston Conservatory musicians and dancers found creative parallels in their recent performance o...
29/05/2026
May 29 2026, 09:00 (PDT) Dolby and rednote Bring More Immersive Storytelling to...
29/05/2026
Something fundamental has shifted in how people consume media. Audiences aren't abandoning television or radio content; they're just expanding how, wher...
29/05/2026
Youtube exclusive special drops today
Watch now
UKTV today announces another e...
29/05/2026
Back to All News
The Official Trailer of Physical 100 Italy, on Netflix From Se...
29/05/2026
Genelec announces V2.1 for Aural ID binaural headphone monitoring application posted: 29/05/2026
Aural ID 2.1 enhances binaural monitoring for stereo and ...
29/05/2026
At just 20 years old, Sean Melia from Summerhill Co. Meath has been revealed as the winner of Super Garden 2026. Sean is the youngest ever contestant and winner...
BBC Sport unveils innovative new VR studio for Beijing Winter Olympics By Heather McLean, Editor 
