Archive notice: This article was originally published on September 28, 2009. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
The 12th World Athletics Championships in Berlin was the first major HDTV production broadcast live by ARD and ZDF. The images from Berlin’s Olympic Stadium were supplied by TV service provider TopVision. The final review of the major project showed: The smooth operation and reliability of the Sony solutions used were record-breaking. TopVision alone used 70 Sony cameras, including the HDC-3300 HD Super Motion camera, the HDC-1000, HDC-1500 and HDC 1550 HD cameras, and the FCB-H10 HD mini camera. All of TopVision’s outside broadcast trucks were equipped with Sony vision mixers. Those responsible – from technicians to directors – were convinced by the Sony technology.
The employees of the central service hotline specially set up by Sony for the World Athletics Championships and the service staff on site had no serious technical emergencies to deal with during the 55 hours of live transmission. Everyone involved in the production was able to concentrate fully on their job during the event and was completely satisfied with the quality and reliability of the Sony solutions used.
Inside Berlin’s Olympic Stadium, the TopVision team used various Sony cameras – precisely matched to the different disciplines and deployment locations. For example, the rts TrackRunner HS on the finishing straight was equipped with a Sony HDC-1500. It also delivered the images of Jamaican Usain Bolt’s world-record run in the men’s 100 meters. A further eight HDC-1500s were used on Steadicam systems with wireless transmission. Six HDC-3300s also provided super-slow-motion recordings in HD, while the FCB-H10 HD mini camera mounted at bar height brought viewers directly to the high-jump and pole-vault mats.
By networking six integrated Sony SD/HD production vision mixers from the MVS-8000 series, a total of eleven fully equipped control positions were implemented in the four outside broadcast trucks equipped by Sony: TopVision’s Ü4/Ü5, SWR’s FÜ2HD and Betamobil’s HD5. While Ü4 and Ü5 were responsible for the action in the stadium, the control rooms in FÜ2HD and HD5 coordinated the images of the marathon and race-walking competitions. The vision mixers supplied the world feed in 1080i for broadcasters from more than 165 countries and fulfilled every request from the editors.
