Live From Paris 2024: Impressions of Week One and a New Era in Olympic Production Perhaps the most notable change is increased reliance on at-home operations By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director Sunday, August 4, 2024 - 4:10 pm
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Attending and working at an Olympics Games is a privilege for anyone, and, with the exception of the Beijing Games in 2022, I have been blessed to go behind the scenes of nine of the last 10 Games and 10 overall (going back to the Salt Lake City 2002 Winter Games). Over the years, I've been able to spend time with hundreds of executives, discussing the Olympics and the role they have played in technology advances: the move to HD, UHD, HDR, IP, the Cloud, 8K, SurroundSSound (and beyond), social media, OTT and digital services, internet-based transmission, fiber-based transmission, bonded cellular, and, yes, even 3D and virtual reality. If I really want to push it, my reporting days go back to 1992 and the early days of nonlinear editing, digital-video formats, and HD at the Olympics.
Wandering the halls of an IBC and discussing the evolution of production tools, the challenges of logistics in a new city, and how to make the most of the tons of content being created has been a constant learning experience. The halls of an IBC are literally a United Nations of the greatest talent in sports production. And all of that talent - both the veterans who laid the foundation of innovation and the young up-and-comers who will blaze new trails for decades to come - have one focus: to create the best viewing experience for sports fans around the globe, each of whom want to see their home-country athletes do well and also be covered equally to those from the largest nations.
Each Olympics is different, reflecting not only new technologies but also the culture of the host city and nation. Each Games is also a step forward in terms of sustainability, venue design, and logistics. For example, this year, the temporary venues created are just as dynamic as the venues that often have be built for an Olympics and then became wastelands. No wastelands will come out of Paris 2024: those venues will be taken down and leave nothing behind but memories.
As the final week of Paris 2024 begins, the energy and enthusiasm around the content-creation efforts remain across the halls of the IBC and across the city (and yes, even beyond Paris to places like Tahiti where, according to Facebook posts from a friend working on the event, things are, to quote Larry David, pretty, pretty good).
Life and Work at the IBC The International Broadcast Center (IBC) at Le Parc des Expositions in Bourget (about a 15-minute drive from Stade de France and Charles de Gaulle Airport) is the center point of the technical infrastructure driving the Games. It is where Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS) has its main transmission, signal management, distribution, archive operations, audio and commentary monitoring and signal management, logistics, and more. It is also where many rightsholders have their technical operations.
The IBC has changed greatly since Tokyo 2020. Notably, the International Broadcast Center (IBC) and the Main Press Center (MPC) are in different locations (the MPC is about 20 minutes away at Palais des Congr s de Paris at Porte Maillot). The move makes sense, putting the relevant professionals much closer to the event locations where they spend most of their time, saving time but also allowing them to rely on public transport rather than a dedicated transport system, which requires more buses and emits more carbon.
But the absence of an MPC definitely lends a different feel to the IBC, absent the hundreds of still photographers, reporters, and other media professionals who typically be swarming the facility. As a result, the IBC is quieter and calmer and is more focused on the TV professionals who help shape the story of Paris 2024, which is being played out on TV sets and digital devices all around the world.
The map for one of the IBC halls shows broadcasters' locations. Areas marked CTA house the equipment racks, allowing air-conditioning to be concentrated in rooms filled with heat-generating gear.
Historically, IBC operations have been a mix of studio operations, production-control rooms, audio-mixing areas, graphics areas, voiceover booths, and much more. As SVG reported in 2021 and 2022, workflows born out of the pandemic opened a new era of remote operations, with rightsholders (and their key technology and services partners) innovating out of necessity. At Paris 2024, such workflows have taken hold at a scale unimaginable only six years ago: many of those production capabilities are not at the IBC.
The CBC, for example, has moved them to Canada House. Australia's Channel Nine has shifted them to the broadcast tower at the Trocad ro (and also back home). France Televisions have located many of them, logically, at its headquarters here in Paris. For WBD and Eurosport, WBD House near the Arc de Triomphe is shared by multiple Eurosport-market production teams. And, of course, NBC Olympics and Telemundo are relying on facilities in Stamford, CT, and Miami, respectively.
A core technical component remains at the IBC, helping ensure that OBS-provided content is sent to home-country production hubs properly, for all the broadcasters that have operations in Paris. South Korea's KBS, however, is actually producing two channels from the IBC - one of the few broadcasters, if not the only one, doing so.
This is a win-win for all involved from both a cost and storytelling standpoint. More people back home can finalize the program, but the studio locations, freed of having to be in the IBC and near a technical backbone, can be in more interesting locations. They don't require thousands of square feet of operating space to support both the studio n
