SKY Television New Zealand, the main broadcaster of the recent Rugby World Cup championship, which was hosted in the island nation, implemented EVS live production systems to provide the complete live video recording, replay and content management infrastructure for the coverage of all matches in high definition.
SKY TV New Zealand productions opted for a complete EVS architecture for all recordings and fast turnaround editing operations. The live production operations of all matches were covered by four HD mobile units and two flyaway production kits distributed to different venues around the country.
Each OB unit was equipped with six to eight XT series servers, depending on the number of games. Up to 24 cameras and five Super Motion systems were used to cover the top matches. The EVS live production systems were used by SKY TV production teams at all venues to generate a comprehensive number of replays, including Super Slow Motion and quick highlights of key actions from every match.
SKY TV New Zealand is one of the first broadcasters to deploy the new generation XT3 EVS servers to produce a globally broadcast event. In addition to a significant increase in capacity and media processing bandwidth, the XT3 system under Live Slow Motion (LSM) control allowed SKY TV productions to support two Super Motion HD camera feeds for record and instant replay in the same machine.
Complementing the onsite coverage, SKY TV built a centralized indexed media server at the International Broadcast Center (IBC) in Auckland. Composed of four networked XT2 servers, the indexed media server was used to manage the recording of all rugby matches feeds as well as unilateral feeds.
Ingested material was logged using IPlogger, part of EVS' content management suite IPDirector. Production and post-production teams also used the advanced browsing system of IPDirector to retrieve specific match action instantly for summary, highlight and magazine-style program creation in Final Cut Pro. Using EVS XF2 technology, the system also provided the official archive of all matches of the event.
