Panasonic AW-HN40H TV Technology: Guide to Sports Production - Page 4

front (and the back) of house, which makes for easy work flow. "The front-of-house drives everything needed for events," Ohlmeyer said, "including our 50-foot horizontal LED video wall and our vertical screens." The equipment roster also features Sony (PXWX 400) and Panasonic (AW-HE130K) cameras; Ross Carbonite Black and xPression for more switching, and graphics, respectively; and a full complement of Shure mics. The studio can be configured three ways, according to Darryl Wenhardt, president of San Diego-based CBT Systems, the venue's equipment integrator. The first clears the floor for the audience with up to 12 player pods with Panasonic AW-HE2 cameras on the stage, when people are paying to see the match; or the floor can be populated with high-performance PCs during tournaments, when guests pay to play; or it can become a hybrid during elimination tournaments where those who advance are invited to play on stage. presenting the in-house arena show, the TV production frontof-house guys are using the same camera and audio resources, so we're creating multiple productions," he said, "though even then, they use the same Evertz routing system and the same audio." From a director's perspective, much of the setup is done before the event "and that generally includes a high-level view of the player board," Wenhardt said. "The director uses the main display and side [vertical] displays for player identification and stats, like he would at a basketball game. The difference is the dense intercutting and heavy pan/tilt/zoom during game competition, with a camera on each player where we show the action from a player's perspective." Esports Arena Las Vegas is also "game agnostic," as some game publishers just have one game, like Blizzard has Overwatch. "In our case, we play different games in-house and we're also streaming, so the arena has to be flexible" on the floor and behind the scenes, Ohlmeyer said. "Our player pods [on the floor] give our broadcast an almost NFL Films-type feel when players converse during action," he said, "and each player has a wired headset, so we can hear their conversations," as the crew recently did during the $100,000 eSport Superstars Paladins tournament by the game's publisher, Hi-Rez Studios. "One of the things we're proud of here is the broadcast-quality infrastructure, [which allows] game publishers and networks to broadcast an event here in high quality, in a turnkey way," said Ohlmeyer. "They simply sit down and get to work. They may need to add some cameras, but there's no need to roll up a truck." GOOD BOUNCES While the Esports Arena Las Vegas studio is new, it may soon have Tyler Ninja Blevins on stage during Ninja Vegas 18 at Esports Arena Las Vegas. a spinoff or two. "I think we'll see some franchising and similar arenas," INNER WORKINGS said Wenhardt. "It's an exploding industry. The NBA already has its own [eSports] league." As for content capture, the Panasonic AW-HE2s can pan, Indeed, early May marked the start of the NBA 2K League, tilt and zoom "without any possibility of distracting moving with the broadcast of its Tip-Off Tournament being broadcast elements," Wenhardt said, and the model has two outputs: to on Twitch, the popular online streaming service in the indus- the player's CPU and, in team games, to the team intercom try, from Long Island's Brooklyn Studios. from a player headset that includes a party line. It also includes Grant Paranjape is director of esports business and team a recordable ISO system for each player. operations with Monumental Sports Entertainment (MSE), While broadcasting eSports is relatively new, "it isn't much which owns the NBA's Washington Wizards, the NHL's different than covering other sports," he said. "The one thing Washington Capitals and Capital One Arena, among other that is different from an NBA game," he said, "is when we're entities. MSE is also involved in Axiomatic, a holding company [4] GUIDE TO SPORTS PRODUCTION | MAY 2018