When MySports commissioned La Télé to produce French-language ice hockey match coverage, the broadcaster needed to add a second control room without impacting its daily operations.
La Télé is a regional broadcaster in the Vaud and Fribourg regions, airing news and general interest programming. Based in Lausanne’s Palais de Beaulieu with a secondary facility in Villars-sur-Glâne, the broadcaster has also established a strong reputation for live sports production, covering events such as the 20km de Lausanne and Morat-Fribourg races, alongside SBL Cup basketball and its ice hockey analysis show, Les Puckalistes.
That experience paid off when the National League restructured its free-to-air broadcast rights. La Télé secured the contract alongside Léman Bleu and Télé Bilingue, replacing RTS as the French-language outlet. MySports, the league’s paid broadcast rights holder, subsequently contracted La Télé’s production arm, La Prod, to produce French language studio programming around the games for all match nights.
The project’s technical implementation was led by François Vittoz, technical director, Maxime Humbert, technical manager, Ouriel Barbezat, sound manager, and David Klaus AV technician.
“MySports visited our facility and, in an effort to standardise programming around matches across all channels, we discussed the opportunity to produce wraparound shows for paid broadcasts as well,” said David Klaus, on behalf of La Télé’s technical operations team. “That is how we became both a broadcaster on La Télé and a producer for MySports.”
The MySports deal gave La Télé three months to add a second control room and studio without disrupting its daily broadcasts. With a small technical staff and no capacity for a separate chain, the broadcaster leaned on a Blackmagic Design solution to tie the rooms together and keep operations simple.
Unified multi-match operations
La Télé made the Blackmagic Videohub 120×120 12G the routing core for both control rooms, rather than building a separate chain for match nights.
“As soon as the decision to add a second control room was made, it was obvious we needed to expand our routing capabilities,” Klaus said. “We needed to exchange signals between the facilities already in place at La Télé and the new ones for MySports.”
The router handles approximately 45 sources and 60 destinations during match nights for MySports content alone, with additional capacity supporting La Télé’s concurrent operations. “To be honest, the Videohub 120×120 solved only one, albeit a big problem problem for us,” Klaus noted. “It allowed us to avoid building two parallel systems.”
“Together with MySports, we decided to integrate all management of this new control room and studio into our existing capabilities. This allowed us to create redundancy, particularly for live production switchers and recorders.”
The primary control room runs an ATEM 4 M/E Constellation HD with an ATEM 2 M/E Advanced Panel 20 for control, while both facilities access the same robotic studio cameras, multiview monitoring and signal processing. A shared server room eliminated the need for duplicate climate-controlled spaces and centralisedall recording and playout infrastructure.
Cross-facility signal access has proven particularly valuable for La Télé’s six-person technical team. The lead operator in either control room can manage both broadcast chains simultaneously via Ethernet control, with full routing control from either position.
“The lead technician in the MySports control room can operate the entire chain from their position, and vice versa,” Klaus noted. “We are even able to share this position between La Prod and La Télé, which represents a considerable advantage in terms of flexibility, especially for a small team.”
Simultaneous TX feeds
All seven National League matches arrive simultaneously over fibre via Net Insight Nimbra IP video transport. “On match nights, La Télé takes in 10 signals from the on-site production trucks, plus two exchange feeds with the German language master control in Erlenbach, and returns four signals,” Klaus explained.
An eight-person crew operates each game day, running three nights a week. The workflow begins midafternoon when the lead technical operator configures routing, audio mixing and signal distribution, then tests intercom and video links with venue trucks and the Erlenbach facility.
Three editors working on replay stations equipped with DeckLink Quad 2 and an UltraStudio Mini Monitor capture and playback cards monitor the match feeds, tagging key moments and assembling highlight packages as games unfold.
Audio integration runs through two SDI interface units handling embedding and de-embedding between SDI infrastructure and the facility’s audio-over-IP network. Incoming signals from venues route through the IP gateways into the interface units for channel reordering before passing to the Blackmagic Videohub, with outbound signals following the reverse path for transmission.
Coverage begins at 7.25pm with a studio presentation before the broadcast switches to live commentary onthe featured game. Between periods, analysts breakdown highlights while editors tag, cut and play clips as producers call for them. If the featured match ends early, the control room can switch to any ongoing match before returning for the post-match programme.
At 10.25pm, a 40-minute highlights recap air simultaneously across La Télé, Léman Bleu, MySports and Télé Bilingue, pulling from packages prepared during the evening and fresh post-match interviews. A motion graphics system supplies on air graphics, while the ATEM Constellation handles vision mixing for the studio segments and game feeds.
“Match by match, the analysts review key plays and the editors roll clips as the producer calls them,” Klaus said. “They also cut post-match interviews and flag new material for the presenters.”
Standardising operations
While MySports operates a separate master control room in Erlenbach, La Télé proposed a Blackmagic Design solution that met the demands of live game nights while fitting a regional broadcaster’s resources. “Sunrise, the primary rights holder for ice hockey broadcasts, followed the build closely, but trusted us to implement it,” said Klaus.
Ultimately, the decision to standardise on Blackmagic Design was borne out of practicality. “As a regional broadcaster, we have to be disciplined about where we spend,” Klaus noted. “Implementing a Blackmagic solution helps us to work flexibly without compromise, with the price, availability and breadth of their offerdriving our technical decisions.
“As a broadcaster, we’ve standardised much of our group operations around Blackmagic, which includes aspects of our OB capabilities. The expanded infrastructure model we’ve deployed for the National League hockey gives us a scalable template for additional live production requirements that will make future builds simpler and less staff intensive.”
