Wimbledon 2024: All-new ESPN broadcast centre adds flexibility and focus to coverage

It’s been a year of change for ESPN at Wimbledon. Not only is it settling into a completely overhauled broadcast centre, complete with eye-catching new studios, but it’s also working with a new vendor and adopting new broadcast video formats and a new production workflow.

Following an 18-month project, the roll out of a state-of-the-art new broadcast facility spread across two floors marks a transition to IP technology for ESPN. Following an extensive RFP, this year is also the first year of a new deal with EMG / Gravity Media.

“We just went into a multi-year deal with EMG / Gravity, so this is their first time supplying our kit for the show,” explains Larry Wilson, senior manager operations, ESPN. “We were very comfortable with Gravity’s technical solutions, as well as their pricing and the relationship that we’ve had with them on other slams, they also handle Roland-Garros, Australia and the US Open.”

Going to RFP gave the team the opportunity to start from scratch and assess all the technologies and equipment that they wanted to deploy in the expansive new centre, which boasts expanded studio space, two new 1080p HDR control rooms, shared replay, graphics, and video areas, edit rooms and a whole host of technology innovations.

Sam Olsen, senior technical specialist, ESPN, adds: “That was good to be able to specify an IP solution and switches with specific options and configurations that we wanted, the same with the audio consoles. We went all VIA in the EVS world and deployed a Riedel Bolero network across the site. And we continue the spirit with Gravity and with good partners, and we’ll develop technology as it presents itself in the market.”

Scale was one of the key reasons behind the decision to go down the IP route.

Olsen continues: “The number of feeds that we take from hosts, coupled with the size of the system we have on site even as a rights holder, it made sense to go IP. We’ve got that scalability to continue to deliver whatever production asks for. The other thing is space. We’ve been able to put the engineers in a dedicated master control room and have a dedicated equipment room. But to fit everything into that, if that was done in an entirely baseband world, I don’t think we would get everything into that room. So IP solutions just make sense.”

As domestic rights holder for the US, ESPN is taking content from host broadcaster Wimbledon Broadcast Services (WBS) so a lot of production could be done simply by putting the world feed on air, however ESPN opts to significantly enhance its coverage and IP is also enabling this.

Wilson explains: “We have 25 additional unilateral cameras, we have our own graphics, we have our own edits, we have a massive 19 VIA servers that are downstairs doing ingest and replay, two control rooms, all that to customise that content from WBS for an American audience.”

Olsen adds: “On top of that, we’ve got the news operation for doing anything outside of tennis coverage on our linear networks, if we need to service SportsCenter or any other news and incident analysis that can be done as well, so we’re supporting international as well.

“We’re already thinking about next year and how we can continue to deliver efficiencies and from the point of view of looking at potentially IP CCUs and so on, which will allow us to free up some of the baseband nodes so we can handle more third parties, more graphics and more on screen enhancements.”

ESPN’s coverage is also benefiting from a new 900sqft studio space (Studio 3), which is enabling the production team to be more flexible in their broadcasts, while also showing viewers the beauty of Wimbledon thanks to a 34ftx6ft window overlooking Court 18.

Wilson says: “The studio changes the way that production thinks about how they want to handle the broadcasts. They can shoot four different sets within that one set. They’ve got their touchscreen, they’ve got their mega wall video display, they’ve got their four-person desk, and they’ve got a sit down position.”

In addition, studio 12 has been enlarged by combining two studios and moving a corridor wall back, providing a more relaxed space for interviews. “This has become our up close and personal type of operation, but it still has a lineage to what we’re doing in the major studio,” says Jamie Reynolds, executive producer, tennis. “We’re modernising and bringing the whole presentation up.”

Despite the high-spec new space, the ESPN team is partially remote, with some graphics being handled from Connecticut.

Wilson explains: “It’s what we call our remco model where we have the hardware here, but we’ve essentially set up machine control to go down to Connecticut. Libero [Vizrt’s enhanced graphic telestration system] is operated the same way. We’re also delving into cloud-based edit as well. We have edits on site here and we’re also doing edits in Connecticut, Florida, with producers in Bristol [Connecticut] and Chicago.

“We’re making calculated moves. We do have on site facilities for editing and cloud based for the graphics as well.”

Reynolds adds: “What we don’t necessarily want to have happen is to become so electronically savvy that we make it more attractive to do this from Bristol, Connecticut, rather than being on site. There are pitfalls with both. Yes, it can be economically smarter, fiscally more responsible, to do things from a remote site, but you lose the intimacy, the connective tissue, you lose the ability to say, if you believe you’re the steward of the sport, with what we do with the majors, if we’re there our presence helps establish the community and we can be reactive.”

For this reason, there’s a substantial team on site in London, including editors, producers, graphics operators and support, all helping to deliver around 240 hours of coverage, including live coverage from each court, daily highlights shows, a new studio show and on-demand replays. The focus throughout, of course, is on telling the story of the championships, and the new setup is very much enabling this.

Reynolds concludes: “It reinvigorates the crew, it reinvigorates the personalities that come into a nice fresh environment. It becomes a little fresher presentation all the way around. Studio 3, with the touchscreen, the big screen, it’s all beautiful and looks very sophisticated, very contemporary. As broadcast tools were growing into how to use them effectively for the sport. It’s easy for some of the traditional sports, whether it’s football or basketball, we know how to play with those elements. How can we apply those tools with tennis, that’s what we’re trying to explore.”