Sports TV Awards 2021 Finalist: Standing Tall and Being Heard by Tall Audio

Tall Audio thrived on the challenge of producing sports broadcast audio during lockdown, leaning on their pre-pandemic experience

Credit: Tall Audio (2021)

During the UK’s first national lockdown, Tall Audio was one of the first companies to develop workflows to mix live television in a safe, remote environment, earning them a place on the highly competitive SVG Europe Sports TV Awards 2021 shortlist for ‘Outstanding Production Audio Innovation’.

By chance, a contract working on a digital festival was Tall Audio’s last job before the pandemic hit. Having set up a de-rig studio at the location so that people could join in via the internet rather than in the studio, this gave owners Alex Wrigglesworth and Paul Stadden an idea. Within a week they were working closely with Timeline Television to implement new remote working techniques to overcome challenging production scenarios across the UK.

“A friend of ours told us about Timeline’s Stream Anywhere app,” says Stadden. “Within a few days, I had a talkback panel and a Unity Connect to see if it worked over public internet for us. Timeline played a massive part – they are very experienced in remote production and this helped hugely when it came to remote working. Within a week we had handled a job for BT Sport and a pre-recorded a football show, and a week later mixed a live Moto GP show. After that, it exploded.”

The winners of the SVG Europe Sports TV Awards 2021, sponsored by Canon, will be announced on Thursday 28 October at Chelsea F.C. during the Sport Production & Technology Summit 2021. Registration for both events is now open to members and sponsors here.