In Broadcast - August 2016 - 54


54

www.inbroadcast.com | Vol: 6 - Issue 8 | August 2016

InStudio

Lawo Drives Remote TV
®
Production With F1

F

ormula One® ranks among the
most exciting and appealing
of international racing sports and
demands that its television coverage
keeps pace. With diverse broadcast
requirements dictated by the variety
of its courses and widely spread race
locations, it is the perfect setting for
some precision engineering from
German technology company Lawo.
As an essential part of F1®'s
international profile, television airtime
is considerably more extensive than a
series of two-hour races spread across
nine months of the year might suggest.
Prior to the Sunday race, two days are
devoted to free practice, followed by a
day of qualifying. The outcome of three
qualifying sessions determines the
starting grid positions for the race on
day three. F1® fans want to see all of
the practice action and the qualifying,
as well as gaining insights from behind
the scenes.
All aspects of a race are broadcast
live - including full coverage of night
races in Singapore and Bahrain - with
the drivers and mechanics using
practice sessions to experiment
with different setups for their cars,
while strategists study options and
alternatives. They first put everything
they have learned into a fastest
possible qualifying lap before taking
on the full duration of the race. The
devotion of F1® fans is such that they
will watch all of this play out, and hang
on every word of the commentary
teams - often former F1® drivers
themselves.
For TV broadcasting, the 2016 season
has brought something altogether new
- remote production.
Taking on TV production for Germany
for the 25th year, German station RTL
aims to simultaneously reduce costs

while advancing production quality.
Key to this is locating the production
control at the broadcast centre
operated by CBC (Cologne Broadcast
Center) in Cologne rather than setting
up a mobile facility at each track.
Additionally, H.264 video compression
is being used for signal transport to
exploit the available bandwidth for
transmission most efficiently.
"The idea of remote production is
not really new to us and - due to the
immense logistic efforts involved with
F1® there have always been efforts
to keep the on-location equipment
as small as possible. For example,
live-GFX [graphics] have always been
added during broadcasting from
Cologne - at short notice by the control
room at the race location," says CBC's
Production Engineer Fritz Behringer.
"Recently, however, the infrastructure
requirements have been established
for implementing further elements
of remote production. By using
directional lines, the locations can now
be redundantly - and economically -
connected to the CMC.
With an MPLS (Multiprotocol Label
Switching) network linking the race
venue to the CBC facility, all live
video and audio signals are delivered
and made available in the control
room in Cologne. This is achieved by
using a Lawo Nova17 router and DSP
engine plus an IFB mixer (all remotely
controlled from Cologne), along with a
Riedel intercom system.
File gathering and network control
run in parallel using the same MPLS
transfer. Production of the live
races and accompanying coverage is
managed using a touchscreen remote
control for the IFB mixer, as well as a
Lawo mc² audio mixing console in the
CBC production control room. "On-

location" production support
comes from a video server
with
replay
functionality.
"The
main
task was to find
connectivity
that
could
bring
all relevant live
signals and ENGfootage to Cologne - it
was important to keep the
performance and quality at
least on the same level as before,"
Behringer explains. "The second big
issue was the handling of signal delay,
originating from distances and codec
latencies." For checking the viability
of the remote production concept,
RTL hosted a test broadcast under
real-world conditions. All the signals
were sent around the globe once and
the staff involved ran through all
workflows to ensure that despite the
considerable distances the interaction
between control room and cameras
and among the broadcast team did not
suffer from delay issues.
With two months to go before the
first race, the equipment was set up
at _wige's headquarters, the "on-site"
production partner of RTL and CBC.
This general rehearsal included testing
the fibre connection to the control
rooms at CBC.
Essential to the remote production
was the low-latency IFB mixer setup,
running on a Nova17 router and
operated with two VisTool panels - one
on-site for setup and testing and the
second for the Sound Supervisor in
Cologne to manage the EQ, dynamics,
dimming, and other processing. In
case of a failure of the MPLS network,
VisTool provides fader access to
provide a simple emergency mix.

Lawo remote
production kit

Usually the Nova17 is remotely
controlled from the Lawo mc²90 audio
console at the audio control room in
Cologne, with virtual GPIs flying over
the network to the racetrack. This
setup provides a perfect low-latency
audio mix for presenter, reporter and
two interviewees in the pit lane or
paddock, and two race commentators.
A VSM (Virtual Studio Manager)
system on-site controls all routings in
the local SDI router, the Nova17 and
Lawo V__pro8 processor, which is used
for video and audio.
The new production operation went
live-to-air from the first race of the
season at Melbourne's Albert Park
circuit. Having visited the Middle
East, China, Russia, Europe, and
North America, the remote setup has
proved itself both capable and reliable
throughout.
"Besides the pure signal transport,
the main focus was on the
functionality of equipment and mainly
on workflows so that everybody in the
team became aware of the different
handling of the production, especially
the communication between venue
and the Cologne production center,"
adds Behringer.
"The Formula One® implementation
is a very strong demonstration of
how all Lawo products are able to
exchange signals via IP using common
control, and offering the customer
an integrated solution. In front of
the cameras, the reporters were
unaware of any changes to their work
as a consequence of using remote
production. All talkback and TB
mixes were as good as those from a
conventional production with OB van
or container control room," concludes
Felix Krückels, Lawo's Director of
Business Development.
- RTL F1® production truck
http://www.inbroadcast.com https://www.lawo.com/products/video-processing-core-infrastructure/v-remote4.html https://www.lawo.com/products/video-processing-core-infrastructure/v-remote4.html
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