Thanks Adam! This was really helpful. I thought the lack of national boosterism was just British reserve and good manners, but I should have know that never stopped the British Empire from looking after its own interests.
Definitely some of the NBC commentators are at home in the US, but there are some on site. It seemed to me that the main commentators for the cycling road races (which I watched on USA tv I think) were not anywhere near the course; (they did have an on site reporter near the finish line), to which I attribute their failure to describe/comment on an interesting feature of the end of the women’s race. Also, in a newsworthy development in the gymnastics competition today (I got up early this morning to watch it near- live on the website) the commentators seemed to not be on site, and getting information fed to them piecemeal. While the NBC Gymnastics crew seems to be on site, even though everything they show is like 12 hours old on tape. On Tue, 27 Jul 2021 at 8:50 AM Adam Bowie <[email protected]> wrote: > On Tue, Jul 27, 2021 at 4:12 PM PGage <[email protected]> wrote: > >> Adam, do you think it is this Discovery coverage that NBCOLYMPICS.COM is >> streaming? The commentators all seem to have some sort of British accent >> (my ear is not good enough to rule out an occasional Australian or South >> African, and there was at least one Irish accent, though not sure which >> one). >> >> > No - I think that mix of accents, which will include people from multiple > English-speaking countries, is being provided by Olympic Broadcasting > Services (OBS). They're the company that provides everyone with the basic > feeds of the sport. Obviously larger broadcasters can supplement those > feeds with their own camera positions, close-ups of coaches etc. But the > idea is that if you buy coverage, you get a basic minimum. > > One part of that offer is what in the trade is usually called a "World > Feed" commentary team. And I think that the majority of sports get these > commentators. When someone hear earlier this year posted the big NBC press > release about who was calling what, that release noted that there would be > some "World Feed" commentary teams in place. Tell-tale signs are neutrality > about favoured nations (although they may cover English-speaking countries' > competitors a little more), and no reference to the network they're being > carried on. > > I watched the mountain bike races and there was a South African man and a > Australian woman doing the coverage. In the UK, both Eurosport and the BBC > used that World Feed commentary as neither really had their own experts. I > also saw some of the Women's Triathlon earlier on Eurosport and that too > sounded like a World Feed to me (Irish man/Australian woman, I think). > > One key thing to note is that the World Feed commentators from OBS are > often at the venues - which is much rarer this year. And even in normal > years, a lot of commentary comes from booths in the massive media centre, > rather than actually in booths at the events themselves. I'm not sure how > many people NBC have in Tokyo, but many events on the BBC and Eurosport are > being called from the UK/France (Eurosport's HQ is in Paris) rather than in > Japan. That's pretty unusual. Obviously there are still reporters on the > ground for interviews/features. But far fewer. > > If you want to learn lots of technical detail about how OBS operates, > there's a lot here: > https://www.sportsvideo.org/2021/07/27/live-from-tokyo-olympics-obs-technical-area-offers-inside-look-at-how-the-games-come-together/ > > It's all being made in 4K, although in the UK nobody is showing it that > way. The audio is captured 5.1.4. The 5.1 is regular Surround Sound and the > .4 is for "ceiling" speakers - think Dolby Atmos without the branding. > Apparently there are 16 "channels" of sport being produced from Tokyo. So > that's the maximum number of simultaneous feeds you could be watching! > > > > Adam > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "TVorNotTV" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAD_sJGDgPTHOH7-fWVmJ7EYMvur9f5XN4SdCesR77Jo49r1YUg%40mail.gmail.com > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAD_sJGDgPTHOH7-fWVmJ7EYMvur9f5XN4SdCesR77Jo49r1YUg%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> > . > -- Sent from Gmail Mobile -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAKGtkYL1829%3DAPDV6HOzDr_PDSoiB5EP323H-cxCCUhw_H%3D3XQ%40mail.gmail.com.
