I’m curious as to how a ref will blow their whistle and get instant replay footage within seconds. Can someone explain this process to me?
In: Technology
I’ve only worked on small set-ups/crews but there’s usually a replay operator in sports broadcast control rooms. They’ll have a rolling recording of a handful of camera angles on a specialized piece of equipment. When the director of the production asks for a replay to show on air, usually of a big event like a goal, they’ll ask the replay op to cue up the goal. The replay op will “jog” back to the point in the recording where the goal happened (usually just a few seconds to a minute ago), while the replay machine is still recording the camera angle in real time. The director will “take” the video signal from the replay machine, while telling the replay op to “roll” their footage and put it on air for the viewer at home.
It’s a lot less editing, in the traditional sense, and a lot more of switching video signals on the fly. Kind of like putting a puzzle together as 5 different people are throwing pieces at you.
Sometimes you’ll see a heavily edited video as the broadcast is going to commercial break, kind of a highlight reel of the last period, inning, etc. I don’t have much experience with that but as far as I can tell, that is done with video editing software (Adobe Premiere, etc.) and played directly out of the computer or done with a much more advanced level of replay equipment.
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