Handheld camera at Roland-Garros capturing players before the match start on Court Simonne Mathieu in June 2023
The men’s and women’s finals at Roland-Garros 2024 brought another groundbreaking broadcast operation of the Grand Slam event to a close.
Marking the fourth year of the Fédération Française de Tennis (FFT)’s collaboration with HBS on the host broadcast coverage, this edition marked the first time ever that a tennis tournament implemented referee cams to give immersive views of the decision-making process.
This innovation put viewers right at – and on – the court as the umpires made their trips onto the court to verify calls.
Microphones were added to the coaches boxes as well, following the previous introduction of remote mini cameras in the Philippe Chatrier Court boxes in 2023, further evolving the full immersion for viewers into the narrative around the showcase matches.
Meanwhile, digital board replacement (DBR) overlays were added live for the first time on two feeds.
“The FFT would like to sincerely thank HBS for its unfailing commitment over the years,” says François Quisfix, director of media and production at the FFT. “The internalisation of production led by HBS in 2021 as host broadcaster has enabled the FFT to take an important step in its development. This successful collaboration between the HBS and FFT teams has offered international and domestic rights holders a broadcast production that meets the highest international standards.”
States Philippe Oziol, project director, HBS: “We are incredibly proud of all that we have achieved for the FFT over the past four years. Each year our team has worked closely with the FFT to bring new angles and production methods, ensuring that France’s Grand Slam event is continuously at the forefront of innovation in tennis coverage. It is our pleasure to work on this mission with our close neighbours in the Paris suburbs.”
Raising the quality
HBS, having worked with the FFT since 2019 providing the world feeds, and with a longer relationship dating back as far as 2010, was the natural choice as the FFT’s first host broadcaster (HB). Tasked with raising the quality of the coverage for the Grand Slam tournament year on year, the inaugural edition with a host broadcaster in 2021 saw the broadcast format evolved to UHD HDR for the four main courts, a first for a Grand Slam event.
Three of the courts were delivered with multichannel 5.1 audio, with the placement of the microphones rethought to improve the sound capture of the players’ slides on clay, marking out a trademark sound for Roland-Garros internationally.
Additional content, as well as the live tennis action, was made available to broadcasters in 2021 through a live media server – Roland-Garros Live Server (RGLS) – for the first time, accessible to them through a dedicated and user-friendly web interface.
A live feed focused on offering a full experience from the famous venue was debuted and shared on RGLS, adding details of the story before the first serve on the clay with cameras in the players’ gym, following them on their arrival and to the court pre-match. The introduction of new cameras, such as the baseline and towel cameras, made a big visual impact, leading the trend of bringing audiences closer and closer to the action.
All of this was preceded by the organisation of a World Broadcaster Meeting (WBM) for the event for the first time, marking it as a major milestone for the rights holders’ calendars with its importance requiring an annual information share in advance to brief them of the year-on-year innovations and new coverage options.
Continued innovation
Technological innovations followed in 2022, with the first deployment of a remote production operation designed to reduce the event’s broadcast footprint and following the earlier relocation by HBS of logging services off-site in 2019. Operations off-site from the Boulogne-Billancourt venue were applied for 13 courts, while a full IP-core workflow from production to distribution was introduced.
The first live drone coverage was introduced in 2023, offering views of the newly developed stadium and panoramic views of the Paris skyline. Viewers watching around the world were brought closer to the match with the main three courts enhanced by gyro-stabilised netcams for the first time.
Catering to the growth of content consumption on hand-held devices and social media platforms, a social media interface was introduced to offer ready-made digital content to broadcasters for their own social channels
