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Tech Powers Super Bowl LIX
Last year I predicted I would have a Super Bowl ad but like so many goals I set for myself, it has not been completed. Although perhaps I shouldn’t feel too bad, at least I didn’t end up creating a Super Bowl ad on my iPhone that directed people to purchase T-shirts with a swastika on them!
Like last year, I thought I’d round up some of the cool technical tidbits from Super Bowl LIX, or as I refer to it: Super Bowl Licks (my dad says he won’t speak to me until I promise to stop calling it that).
The Super Bowl… on Tubi?
That’s right, since FOX aired Licks this year, they simulcast on their AVOD service Tubi, where you could follow up the game with a movie from Tubi’s surprisingly good catalogue of available titles.
This follows what I’ve been saying about AVOD and FAST channel services for a while now: expect to see them become an increasingly important part of the streaming ecosystem and for media companies to encourage their adoption. Selling TV ad space is a relentlessly scalable (and decades-old) way of making money, in ways that subscriptions can’t match!
Covering the Biggest Live Event of the Year
There are a ton of great pieces on some of the logistical heavy lifting going on behind the scenes at Licks this year.
Over at Sports Video Group, they profiled the NFL Technology Operations team and their extensive work getting the Superdome ready for the big game:
During the regular season, a packed stadium with fans and a broadcast entity present a challenge, but, when it’s the Super Bowl, that challenge is significantly magnified. The most important test was three days before kickoff on Thursday: all wireless and transmittable devices were turned on to somewhat replicate the traffic that would be seen on Sunday. The rehearsal allows the crew to detect potential problems and jot down areas for improvement, but the team will know if everything is operating properly is only when more than 73,000 fans fill the seats on game day.
“There’s really no way of simulating a Super Bowl at kickoff,” says [stadium infrastructure and football technology director Chris] Vassallo. “This is the closest we can get from a frequency-coordination [standpoint].”
With so many cable networks, broadcast outlets, and digital platforms onsite in New Orleans, it could be tough to keep track of — or contain — the frequencies emitted by any sort of device inside the building. The league combats this possibility with a system of tags that designate whether a certain camera, microphone, or other piece of equipment is allowed to transmit. Without this tag, the device needs to be wired to its own source of connectivity and not be using the NFL’s dedicated network.
This is miles above my own solution, labeling my Wifi network “Scammy Datasteal.” People use it anyway!
NewscastStudio has a huge list of all the tech specs for shooting the game:
2 SkyCams, including a Super Slowmo / 4K SkyCam debut.
4 set locations in New Orleans, including Bourbon Street and the Superdome.
16 mobile units deployed around the Superdome.
18 pylon cameras.
48 microphones capturing game and player audio.
53 miles of fiber and cable installed for coverage.
149 cameras covering the game and pregame, including super slow-motion, robotic and augmented reality cameras.
6,808 fiber connections added to the Superdome.
For some reason Forbes’s coverage of the Super Bowl tech specs lists two fewer cameras (emphasis mine):
For a typical game, Fox only has 35 to 40 cameras for the action. But for Super Bowl LIX, it will have 147 total cameras, including 85 game cameras — 27 super slow motion, 23 high resolution, 16 robotic, 10 wireless and two SkyCams.
What happened to the other 2 cameras???
Making Halftime Happen
To me, logistically even more impressive than putting on the game is everything involved in creating the halftime show, and Wired has a fantastic breakdown of how it all came together, from sourcing a Buick GNX to the video game-inspired stage design to the amount of time available to set up and break down the show:
…you have to get all of the staging, lights, dancers, and the artist themselves onto the field in 7.5 minutes and then get them off 6 minutes after the final note.
The set of my student film took a full day to break down (in part because we got spaghetti sauce everywhere).
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Kernels (3 links worth making popcorn for)
Here’s a round-up of cool and interesting links about Hollywood and technology:
Broadcast networks and streamers are coexisting peacefully… for now. (link)
10 cool indies to check out this year. (link)
How they pulled off the spectacular animation of Wallace & Gromit. (link)