With 49 HD cameras and a small fleet of mobile trucks, CBS's
coverage of this year's PGA Championships will be one of its largest live
sports production efforts this year.
"In terms of onsite activity it is actually even bigger than
the Super Bowl and very comparable to what we do at the Masters," explains Ken
Aagaard, executive VP of engineering, operations and production services, CBS
Sports.
The size of the crew and equipment that will be handling the
coverage reflects both the complexities of covering a major golf tournament
where the network has to deploy cameras on every hole and the fact that CBS is
producing more content this year, with multiple feeds for CBS Sports Network,
DirecTV and other outlets, Aagaard explains.
"Every year it gets bigger," Aagaard says.
As part of the expanded coverage, the CBS Sports Network will
be offering for the first time the "PGA Championship Clubhouse Report" live
from Oak Hill Country Club in Rochester, N.Y. The show will air after the end
of each round from Thursday, Aug. 8 through Sunday, Aug. 11 between 8:00 p.m.
and 9:00 p.m. ET.
CBS airs live coverage of the third and fourth rounds on
August 10 and 11 between 2 and 7 p.m. ET.
TNT offers extensive coverage on Thursday and Friday from 1
to 7 p.m., and 11 to 2 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday in addition to Turner's
extensive digital only coverage. http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/494895-Digital_Pin_Placement.php
As the host broadcaster, CBS will be using a total of 49 total
HD cameras, which is close to the 55 or 60 cameras typically used for Super
Bowl coverage.
These will include 23 Hard cameras; four Point of view
cameras on tees at Par 3's; eight radio frequency (RF) held-hand cameras; four
cabled hand-held cameras; four talent cameras; three roving jib cameras; one
Protracer Camera that will be used to show the flight of ball; and two RF
SwingVision High Frame Rate cameras that will help analyze the golfer's swings.
The crew will also use 14 RF microphones for on-course audio;
two RF receive sites comprised of 2 mobile cranes to receive the camera
signals; 30 six channel HD EVS with 57 replay output channels for replays;
seven HD VTRs; nine Chyron Duet HyperX3 graphic generators; and one telestrator.
As part of the coverage, CBS will deploy one blimp; three
large television mobile units; two small television mobile units; eight large
trailers; one mobile RF unit; two mobile edit units and four uplink trucks.
