J Sports remotely produces Yokohama baseball season with LiveU

Broadcaster J Sports and its partner Express have decided to use a selection of LiveU products in the production of the Yokohama DeNA Baystars baseball team’s games.

The technology will be used for a total of 70 games that will be available via J Sports On Demand, J Sports’ video-on-demand service that debuts this year. Initially, the production company planned to offer basic coverage through this service, with only commentary and graphics customization. However, Express and LiveU made it possible to expand the production capabilities by implementing remote production workflows.

As Kanji Kato, CTO of Express, explains, the goal was to transmit multiple camera signals over mobile networks. To achieve this, they opted for LiveU’s LU800 technology: “We were convinced that LiveU was the technology partner we needed,” says Kato.

LiveU workflow

The clean signal, switched between multiple cameras, is sent from a mobile unit through a LU800 along with two additional signals: a wide shot of the terrain and the scoreboard. Commentary for this service is added remotely at the J Sports studio, while graphics and audio mixing is done by Express at its Tokyo studio, called Avenir-Hub. On the other hand, a return video signal with graphics is sent to the commentators so they can see the ball, the strike and kick-off count, and can check the effects of slow motion.

Yojiro Tomihisa, technical director of J Sports, points out that remote production allows them to avoid moving large production teams. The performance, as he notes, has exceeded their expectations: “We are looking forward to deploying this very dependable LiveU technology on other productions and increasing the complexity of them. We are ready for the future!” In parallel, Yaal Eshel, general manager of LiveU Asia, said he was honored “to see one of the leading sports broadcasters in Japan, J SPORTS, together with innovative sports production company, Express, select LiveU as their remote production technology partner.”