LOS ANGELES and ATLANTA—TNT Sports  has signed a deal with Cosm, a provider of immersive technology that will see Cosm produce and present select live premium sports programming from across TNT Sports' footprint in immersive 8K+ at its forthcoming venues in Dallas and Los Angeles starting in 2024.

The multi-year agreement will include TNT Sports’ live coverage of the NBA, NHL and U.S. professional soccer through "Shared Reality" on Cosm’s 87-foot diameter LED domes. Earlier this year, during the 2023 NBA All-Star in Salt Lake City, the NBA was the first professional sports league to partner with Cosm, bringing select NBA League Pass games into "Shared Reality" at Cosm's forthcoming venues.

The agreement marks the first time a broadcast rightsholder will present live sports content in Cosm venues, which will host a number of premium events throughout the TNT Sports calendar, including select NBA on TNT regular season and playoff games (along with TNT's exclusive coverage of the NBA's Eastern or Western Conference Finals each year), TNT's coverage of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, and select U.S. Men's and Women's National Soccer Team matches. 

(Read: Immersive Sound – Front, Forward, Above and Beyond)

"This partnership is transformative, not just for Cosm but for the live sports and entertainment industry at large," said Jeb Terry, CEO and President at Cosm. "We are thrilled to team with TNT Sports to bring award-winning live coverage of the NBA, NHL, and U.S. National Soccer Teams to fans in a new way — by giving them the best seats in the house, every time. Cosm enables the best of at-home and in-venue, delivering the ultimate fan experience. It is a privilege to work with great partners like TNT Sports who also share an innovative spirit and commitment to the fan experience."

"We have always been at the leading edge of creating experiences, centered on innovation, that truly elevate how sports fans are able to engage with our premium content in exciting ways," said Raphael Poplock, SVP of Acquisitions, Business Development and Partnerships at TNT Sports. "Partnering with Cosm further advances that mission, offering a level of immersion within our thrilling NBA, NHL and U.S Soccer action like never before. We look forward to collaborating and bringing the possibilities of shared reality within sports to life next year." 

As part of this new partnership, Cosm and Warner Bros. Discovery will also explore other opportunities to feature select pieces of non-scripted entertainment content in the future. Additional details will be announced at a later date. 

Cosm's first two public venues, set to open in 2024 in Los Angeles at Hollywood Park and Dallas at Grandscape, will deliver state-of-the-art visuals and merge the energy of the crowd with elevated food and beverage service to make guests feel like they are sitting front row, courtside, or rink-side at live events taking place across the world, the company said. 

If Las Vegas’ biggest export is hyperbole (which doesn’t always live up to its name), perhaps the debut of what is arguably the world’s most advanced video entertainment complex helps put an end to such doubts. 

The opening of the “MSG Sphere” dome on the Vegas strip was the talk of the town this weekend when U2 launched its two and a half-month’s residency in the new facility which builders, led by MSG Network owner James Dolan, proclaim  “is a next-generation entertainment medium, powered by cutting-edge technologies to create extraordinary experiences that bring wonder to the world.”

Those cutting edge technologies include a giant 360-degree wraparound video display that wraps up, over, and around the audience, creating a fully-immersive visual environment for audiences seated in the 17,600 seat theater. The dome itself measures 516 feet wide and stands 366 feet tall with 580,000 square feet total. The 160,000 square foot LED display, featuring 16Kx16K resolution, with the ability to display 256 colors on skyline, is billed as the highest resolution LED screen in the world. 

MSG is touting its Sphere Immersive Sound Immersive as “the world’s largest concert-grade audio system.” Developed specifically for Sphere’s unique curved interior, the system consists of approximately 1,600 permanently installed and 300 mobile HOLOPLOT X1 Matrix Array loudspeaker modules and includes a total of 167,000 individually amplified loudspeaker drivers. 

The system utilizes HOLOPLOT’s next-generation 3D Audio-Beamforming and Wave Field Synthesis technology to transform how audio is delivered in large-scale venues, resulting in what Sphere says is "controlled, consistent, and crystal-clear concert-grade audio for audiences of up to 20,000 people, providing each audience member with a truly exceptional and personalized listening experience."

The entire sound system is completely hidden behind Sphere’s 160,000 square foot interior LED display plane.

U2’s The Edge said, “The beauty of Sphere is not only the ground-breaking technology that will make it so unique, with the world’s most advanced audio system integrated into a structure which is designed with sound quality as a priority; it’s also the possibilities around immersive experiences in real and imaginary landscapes. In short, it’s a canvas of an unparalleled scale and image resolution, and a once-in-a-generation opportunity. We all thought about it and decided we’d be mad not to accept the invitation.” 

As if the audio and video whiz bang tech is not enough, Sphere also features patented 4D technologies such as infrasound haptic seating, and various atmospheric and environmental effects, such as warm breezes, evocative scents and changing temperatures, “to create multi-sensory experiences that take storytelling to an entirely new level,” Sphere said.

Designed by global architect and design firm Populous, the project was announced by the Madison Square Garden Company in 2018, The $2.3 billion arena is owned by MSG Group and  and Las Vegas Sands Corporation.

Based on the rave reviews over the weekend, the dome apparently lives up to the hype. USA Today called “IMAX meets the Death Star – with a lot of swagger, a head trip of artsy graphics and a trove of heartfelt songs."

From The Verge:
“From videos being posted to social media, it looks like shows at The Sphere can be breathtaking, probably more than a little nauseating, and undoubtedly expensive to produce… sometimes, things looked absolutely out of control, with wild animations spanning the entirety of the screen in ways that must be completely disorienting for our lizard brains. People were just losing it."

LOS ANGELES—The Walt Disney Studios has appointed Accenture as a founding member and Innovation Partner of its StudioLAB initiative that aims to reimagine, design and prototype entertainment experiences and the production capabilities of the future, the consulting, strategy and technology company said Wednesday.

Accenture Interactive and its design unit Fjord will help to establish StudioLAB, as well as develop new entertainment technology. Guided by Accenture Labs’ R&D, they seek to employ emerging technologies in innovative ways, the company said.

“As we thought about key partners to deliver our vision for StudioLAB, the decision to collaborate with Accenture Interactive was clear,” said Jamie Voris, CTO of The Walt Disney Studios in a press release.

Initially, the focus will be on immersive entertainment, artificial intelligence, IoT, the future of movie production and next-generation cinematic platforms, the company said. Accenture will support operations at StudioLAB as part of its three-year agreement with Disney. It will work with Disney to develop StudioLAB’s charter and governance, physical lab design and business operations.

Accenture employees will work with StudioLAB personnel on incubating and prototyping new concepts to advance how stories are told, it said.

“Technology is an essential component of how we make characters, stories and worlds come alive at Disney, and we’re looking forward to the possibilities of what we can imagine and build together,” said Voris.