BRISTOL, Conn.—“College GameDay” is ESPN’s premier college football pregame show, for which we have won the Sports Emmy for Best Weekly Studio Show for three consecutive years (2024–2026). It’s a privilege to work on the show and to continue to shape it.
For those unfamiliar with “GameDay,” it’s a 20-plus-camera, multiset, fan-immersive broadcast that moves to a new college campus every week of the season. It’s exciting, unpredictable and one of the most technically complex studio shows on television.
Live in HDR
Last season, we began exploring how to evolve the show’s visual identity. We had already moved “GameDay” into HDR, and that shift opened the door to a more cinematic presentation. I don’t just mean shallow depth of field, which tends to dominate conversations about “cinematic sports,” but the full package: Crisp edge detail, richer color and extended dynamic range. With a controlled lighting environment on our set (even outdoors), we knew we could push the look further.
At the 2025 NAB Show, RED’s booth immediately caught my attention. They were showcasing the V-RAPTOR with the SMPTE back, and the combination aligned exactly with my search for a cinema-grade sensor that could still integrate cleanly into a broadcast workflow.
After meeting RED’s specialists and digging into the camera’s capabilities, it became clear the V-RAPTOR could deliver two things we needed simultaneously: One was a true cinematic image suitable for HDR and the other was high-frame-rate performance for studio slow motion.
We weren’t just chasing a “pretty picture.” I needed a camera that could slot into our EVS replay system, take a matching look-up table to sit alongside our Sony broadcast cameras and still be painted live from the truck. V-RAPTOR ticked every box.
Every week of the season, “GameDay” rolls into a new campus. We build a full studio environment outdoors, surrounded by thousands of fans who show up before sunrise. It’s a wild place to deploy a cinema camera, but RED made the integration straightforward.
Canon supported us with optics, primarily the Canon 17–120 mm Cine Servo zoom, and later a prototype Canon 11–55 mm. We ran the camera through a Cyanview control panel, RED provided the necessary rack gear and we powered the camera directly from the truck to accommodate the different power requirements.
Operationally, the only noticeable change was weight. With cine glass and the larger body, we assigned the camera to an operator with experience carrying one through long, energetic handheld sequences. Once it was on his shoulder, he ran with it creatively.
We deployed the V-RAPTOR for two weeks of the 15-week regular season, at Vanderbilt and Utah. Vanderbilt was a perfect test case—the show featured live country music performances, and the camera produced standout images that immediately
differentiated themselves from our standard broadcast coverage.
We ran the camera at 3x slow motion, using it for fan reaction slo-mos, which are a show signature. We also used it for our on-set field-goal challenge, where a student attempts a kick for a cash prize.
Ready for 500th Show
The camera bridged the gap between cinematic presentation and high-frame-rate replay in a way we hadn’t achieved before. RED proved itself as a valuable tool in our broader innovation strategy.
As “GameDay” enters its 40th season and prepares for its 500th road show, we’re always looking for ways to evolve. V-RAPTOR gave us a new visual language to explore and helped inform how we think about balancing cinematic storytelling with live broadcast reliability.
As we continue to push forward in HDR, in camera tech and in how we bring the energy of thousands of fans into viewers’ homes, RED will remain part of the conversation.
More information is available on the RED website.
