NEW YORK—The winners of the 41st Sports Emmy Awards were announced on Aug. 11 by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences through a virtual ceremony. The big winners of the night proved to be ESPN and Fox.

With awards presented in more than 35 categories, ESPN and Fox tied for the most awards by network with seven apiece—ABC also won an Emmy, so the entire ESPN network group came out ahead of all other network groups with eight.

Super Bowl LIV, which aired on Fox this year, was the most awarded program of the year with four (Outstanding Open/Tease, Outstanding Editing - Short Form, Outstanding Post-Produced Audio/Sound and Outstanding Studio or Production Design/Art Direction).

The Masters on CBS (the 2019 tournament) was directly behind the Super Bowl with three Emmys for Outstanding Live Sports Special, Outstanding Technical Team Remote and the George Wensel Technical Achievement Award for its “Every Shot, Every Hole” feature.

Other events that were recognized for their production and technical efforts included the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup Final and  HBO’s “24/7: Kelly Slater.”

The ceremony was live streamed, with winners accepting their Emmys virtually from a studio or their home. For the full list of winners, visit theemmys.tv. 

BURNSVILLE, Minn.—RTS Intercoms proved to be a key piece of the Game Creek Video production setup during Super Bowl LIV in Miami earlier in February. RTS gear was used to help provide key communications for broadcasters during the entire weekend of the big game.

Game Creek used RTS intercoms for its entire fleet of 10 OB trucks that were on site, each with its own integrated comms system. All trucks were connected using RTS Tribus and Trunking technologies. RTS ADAM frames were used in the primary production trucks, while Game Creek’s Edit 4, its newest support truck, utilized the RTS ODIN frame connected via Dante/OMNEO networking.

“We put an OMNEO card in each matrix frame, then Dante networked everything so they could share ports,” said Jason Taubman, senior vice president of technology with Game Creek Video. “We also use RTS trunking to bring them all together, creating a network of well over 200 user stations across the production compound.”

The user stations used a variety of RTS keypanels, including new KP-5032 and KP-4016 models and legacy models like the KP-32.

In addition to Game Creek Video’s own production, its cameras were used by a separate production supplier for the Super Bowl Halftime show. Communications in that situation were also supported by RTS technology.

NEW YORK—Super Bowl LIV between the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers drew an estimated 102 million viewers, an uptick from 2019’s Super Bowl LIII, but that rising tide did not lift all boats.

According to TVT’s sister publication Next|TV, based off the numbers that Nielsen has provided, it concluded that under 1.4 million people streamed this year’s Super Bowl, which would be the lowest number since 2016. Last year, the number of streamers was 2.6 million.

For more information, read the full story on Next|TV.

ALLENDALE, N.J.—Of the thousands of cameras on hand to capture Super Bowl LIV between the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers, a pair of cameras used the latest Telemetrics robotic camera control system technology to capture and share still images of the game with numerous news outlets.

In what Telemetrics said is the first such use of its new system for a live sporting event, the two robotic cameras were mounted high in Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium. The setup included Telemetrics’ WP-HOU-A9 Weatherproof Camera Housings and a Sony Alpha a9 full-frame mirrorless camera installed on a Telemetrics PT-CP-S5 compact pan/tilt head, all of which was controlled through a Telemetrics RCCP-MJ robotic camera control panel. The setup also featured a network interface the users to control the camera and access the images online.

The PT-CP-S5 A9 unit is fully integrated and includes a compact pan/tilt head and weatherproof camera housing. It has robotic servo controls that use motors of ultra-high position and velocity accuracy.

Telemetrics said the system was a collaboration with Sony and a major news service.

DENVER—The Super Bowl is likely to remain the biggest television event of the year when the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers play in Miami on Feb. 2, but the way that viewers watch the game is changing.

According to the 2020 “Super Bowl Viewership and Consumer Streaming Trends Survey” from digital marketing agency Adtaxi, the number of viewers planning to stream the Super Bowl is the highest ever, coming in at 24%. That continues growth from the last two years, which saw the big game streamed by 8% for Super Bowl LII and 21% last year for Super Bowl LIII.

“The horse is out of the gate. Digital platforms are capturing historic Super Bowl audiences, with TV and cable increasingly losing hefty chunks of audience with each passing year,” said Chris Loretto, executive vice president of Adtaxi. “As streaming services flood the market with competing content, prices and access, the question is not whether Americans will stream big games, but which services will nab their attention.”

Adtaxi dived deeper into some of the potential viewing habits for this year’s Super Bowl. It found that 69% of viewers plan to use more than one platform to engage with Super Bowl content, 78% of which plan to use social media during the game. As far as content, 62% said they are enthusiastic about watching the commercials, 58% for the game and 48% for the halftime show.

The survey also delved into other streaming habits. Adtaxi reports that 68% of its respondents consume the majority of their TV over streaming, while 30% consume all of their TV via streaming. When it comes to ads, 31% said streaming offers the most personally relevant ads, compared to 21% and 12% for cable and traditional TV, respectively.

On the topic of cord-cutting, 26% said they already cancelled a cable or satellite subscription in favor of streaming, while 28% plan to do so in the coming year. For those planning to, 51% said it was to save money, 36% because they want to watch on their own schedule, 35% want the option of binge watching and 27% want to avoid traditional TV commercials.

For more information, visit Adtaxi’s website.

LOS ANGELES—Fox Sports will continue its efforts to bring football fans 4K/UHD-quality broadcasts of this season’s NFL games, announcing this week that it will do so for Super Bowl LIV.

Fox Sports executives Michael Davies and Kevin Callahan confirmed the network’s plan during a Sports Video Group Summit on Dec. 17, saying that they will shoot the game in 1080p HDR at Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium and will upscale the footage to be broadcast in UHD. This is the same type of process that Fox Sports has been doing to broadcast its Thursday Night Football games in UHD this season; it also did so for the ALCS.

Callahan estimated that about 50,000 people will have the necessary setup to view the game in UHD.

The full story is available on Sporttechie.com.