Globecast, Imagina France team for League 1 live first
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Editor
| 07 December 2016

Broadcast services firm Globecast has entered a partnership with Imagina France for what the firms say is the first demonstration of a live remote production service solution with match broadcast.

The demo — bringing multiple signals from a French League 1 football match between Bastia and Bordeaux, from which programming was then created remotely — took place on 30 November, and the two firms say that their offering turns the concept of the traditional supply of a ready-to-broadcast feed from venues on its head.

Images from five dedicated cameras and their associated signals — CCU, tally, intercom — were sent from the Bastia stadium in Corsica to the Imagina France production truck in Boulogne, near Paris. This acted as central production unit where the director and his team operated. Signal transport was provided by Globecast via a 1Gbps link, with a total latency of 100ms in JPEG2000 and 350ms in H.264.

By demonstrating the feasibility of a fully remote production of a major sporting event from a location with strong technical and logistical constraints, Globecast and Imagina France claim that they have proved that it’s possible to provide the market with packaged or customised solutions that meet content providers’ needs, and that allowing live programmes to be produced remotely from places where events occur regularly will open new possibilities for broadcasters and rights holders.

Moreover, it asserts that providing multiple raw feeds facilitates the production of diversified content with the availability of multiple sources at a central production site allows the production of a variety of programme formats of the same event at lower cost, which optimises monetisation.

“The success of this first demonstration in France confirms our desire to develop our services to help our customers face market pressures while also providing innovative content,” said Michele Gosetti, France sales director and global contribution operations at Globecast. “Remote production is an exciting approach that gives them the opportunity to offer flexible and cost-effective content.”

Added Imagina France general director Jérémie Roudaire: “With this project we wanted to show what we believe to be the future of mobile video in France and to offer our customers, with the help of Globecast, new solutions. Indeed, we have developed experience of working this way in Spain where Mediapro Group produces an average of ten matches per day of La Liga Santander in Barcelona from 40 stadiums all over the country.”