We had another opportunity to use the Lance Design ADX units at SuperBowl 43 this year in Tampa FL. We created a cobranet distribution system for the audio portion of the international telecast of the NFL’s SuperBowl43. The solution was key in keeping cabling costs ( both shipping and installation) at a manageable level as the world economy continued to tank in Q1 of 2009. Additionally the quality,low latency, and flexibility in routing the digitized signal proved to be integral to our complex distribution needs. The accompanying diagram shows the general flow of the network which involved sourcing audio content from NBC’s compound a good 500 meters, on fiber to the international television compound on the opposite end of the stadium. When the network reached our compound we integrated a monitoring station, an analog conversion station, a transmission station and distribution network to the international client base. This year that client base numbered more than a dozen onsite, many of whom were within the cobranet spec of 100 meters, so we could use Cat5 to get the signals to them. Some of the clients were across a road a good 300M away. For these folks we were able to use the switched network and GBIC connectors to convert the signal to fiber and have a receiving switch at the other end providing more networking capability.
Perhaps the single biggest benefit to the cobranet system was its ability to leverage IT based technology to distribute digital audio at a significant savings over analog audio and all its inherent issues (grounding/crosstalk/broken wires,etc). Additionally the network appliance offers greater distributive power than is available over point to point fiber based solutions. All these benefits were obtained from built-in fiber ports on standard, LOW-COST ethernet switches for the fiber transmission.
One of the keys to the design of the network, was the ability to provide audio slates for signal paths so the client trucks would have both a voice ID and a reference tone to see that their feeds were correct prior to game-time. The Lance ADX boxes provided us with a way to get these slates on and off the distributed circuits in a simple fashion without having to interrupt the network flow. In fact by use of user memories in the ADX box we were able to configure a “slate” mode and a “game” mode so that 1 switch changed the user configuration with ease. In particular this was helpful for the elaborate transmission scheme that was necessary to provide unique content to various international systems while keeping the world production truck, NBC’s production trucks and other client’s in preproduction mode. Had it been as simple as switching to bars and tone as might be standard from a given production truck life would have been easier, but alas, the need for surround components and a variety of sources demanded a more efficient design.
This years team included the usual suspects of Steve Urick, Steve Fisher and a guest appearance by Bill Lance himself (creator of the ADX cobranet based system) who had worked on a number of SuperBowls in years past. The growth of the international feed, which might once have been considered a “split”, has been staggering and Bill had some unique insights that made the entire effort a much more manageable affair.
In addition to the source content from various show elements we used an Alesis 24HD recorder with loop points to playback our audio slates. The slates themselves were voiced up at NFL Films in NJ and edited on site with Apple’s SoundTrack Pro before being ingested into the Alesis for playback. This unit proved to be a great solution to a problem that had not been dealt with effectively in the past.
