NESN fuels live programming expansion with production automation

New England Sports Network has been rapidly expanding its live news production, broadcasting pre- and post-game shows and other news live from 5:30 p.m. to 1 a.m. daily.

Consistently rated a top ten global sports brand by Forbes, NESN has long been considered a technology innovator, having, among other things, begun broadcasting in HD in 2003, before its competitors. Its latest expansion tripled the amount of live programming it airs daily.

To accomplish this, producers and technologists knew they needed to automate.

“We needed a solution that would be elegant and simple, yet sophisticated enough to work on a traditional news show where we’ve been doing things without automation,” said Joseph Maar, VP programming and production and executive producer.

“Automation changes that workflow and enhances what we are capable of – but also to do pre- and post-game shows which in some ways have a newscast element but in many ways are like an election night, where you really don’t know in a post-game show what’s coming next, who’s going to say what, and where you’re going to go…

“So, we needed a solution that would do the traditional type news content as well as do something as ambitious as a daily production of an election format and workflow.”

The company selected a production suite from Ross Video that included Cambot camera robotics, Acuity switcher, Xpression graphics and the OverDrive newsroom computer system.

“Whenever you’re going to embark on an adventure as different as changing over to an automation system, one of the things you have to say is who are the people that are going to be on the journey with you, and we found that Ross would really be an exceptional partner, not just because we know that they’re going to answer questions, but they’re going to come up with solutions for things that haven’t been done yet.”

Learn more about the Ross OverDrive Automated Production Control System here.