When the University of Notre Dame women’s basketball team captured its second NCAA national championship earlier this year, Mike Bonner’s head began to spin as he imagined the possibilities.
Bonner, Notre Dame’s executive producer of live events, envisioned a championship parade that would wind through the university’s picturesque campus. But as the person tasked with bringing that celebration to a world-wide online audience, Bonner knew having LiveU technology at his disposal would make his job much easier.
Unlike in the past, a celebration of this magnitude wouldn’t have been possible or would have been confined to a venue with fiber connections. Bonner realized that high-quality coverage of the parade could be captured live with a camera and backpack and distributed to the school’s website or social media channels for the world to enjoy as it was happening.
“To me, that is the coolest thing,” Bonner said. “It still blows me away.”
LiveU portable transmission technology is now used by a number of Division I colleges, which, like Notre Dame, rely on LiveU to make streaming campus events in real-time possible. Without investing in costly satellite or production trucks, LiveU clients can reliably produce high-quality content that audiences want to experience live.
Social Media platforms like Facebook Live and Periscope have given audiences a desire for increased live-viewing options. Bonner, who once had to wait hours—or even longer—for live content to be shared, knew that people don’t want to wait for things they want to see.
Bonner formerly worked as a producer for the NFL’s Denver Broncos and understands that you have to make the case for technology that will add value to your productions and generate greater awareness for a school’s athletic programs. He was able to sell university officials on the idea of live event coverage after they were initially reluctant to do so. In the past, Notre Dame had attempted to live stream events, but hadn’t been happy with the unreliability of the technology it used at the time.
Since Bonner had used LiveU gear during his tenure with the Broncos, he trusted its reliability, and convinced school officials that LiveU was worth taking a look at—especially given the company’s latest innovations in HEVC technology that promise higher efficiencies, greater stability, reliability, and the best video quality in low bandwidth situations. His message: the school was missing a big opportunity by not airing events or game day behind-the-scenes live. But he realized that those he was trying to sell LiveU on needed more.
“Seeing is believing,” Bonner said.
Now, Bonner produces a post-game show for Notre Dame’s football team, which, during this season alone, has aired games in New York City and Los Angeles—the nation’s top two media markets. Notre Dame recently faced Syracuse at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx. Bonner’s team not only produced content from the game itself, but also live streamed coverage of Notre Dame’s marching band’s performance in Bryant Park the day before the game. They even used LiveU to cover the Drummer’s Circle performance later that same day on the ice rink at Rockefeller Center. Streaming video of events like that to an audience extending beyond Notre Dame’s athletic program is part of what is possible with LiveU.
Schools like the University of Iowa and the University of Oklahoma are now able to cost-effectively produce live coverage of events on the road, when in the past, such a concept would have come with a hefty price tag. With technology like the LiveU Wireless At-Home Production solution, schools are able to send crews, or even just students majoring in broadcast media, on the road with a camera and one of LiveU’s portable units. Using that they can cover events as they happen, rather than having to wait for video to be uploaded and sent back to an on-campus production studio.
At Oklahoma, broadcast operations director Brandon Meier has been able to produce live stream coverage of track and field and golf—sports that would have never been covered before LiveU, especially on the road due to connectivity challenges and lack of budget.
“Without this technology, it would be impossible to produce these events from a cost and infrastructure standpoint,” Meier said.
LiveU has made providing coverage of Iowa’s 24 varsity sports a reality, expanding the kind of content that exists on HawkVision, the school’s digital media arm. Without the need for live production trucks, a full on-site production team and satellite uplinks that can often be unreliable, LiveU portable units have allowed quality content to be shot and produced in a cost-effective manner.
“LiveU has been a silver bullet,” said Andy Kromphardt, assistant director of HawkVision Productions. “It has cut our set-up time significantly and has allowed us to focus on elements that make the actual production better.”
At Notre Dame, Bonner has plans to expand live coverage to the school’s lower profile sports, including rowing, tennis, and golf. The more he uses LiveU, the more possibilities he imagines, which for Bonner—who got his start producing local news broadcasts in New York City—is a mind-blowing proposition.
But opening such doors is all part of the LiveU sales pitch when potential clients are approached about signing on to use the technology. Suddenly, events that would have never been able to be broadcast in real-time are being seen—all while allowing budget-conscious clients to breathe easier.
“Content is king and really getting that quality and reliability of LiveU is helping to bridge that gap between what you’re doing now and what you want to be doing down the road,” said Janel Fleming, a sales manager with LiveU’s sports division.