In The Loop: Olympic Comms

When the International Olympic Committee declared “Syd-en-nee” as the successful bidder for the 2000 Games it was to have on-going consequences for our industry beyond what many people even imagined at the time. The Sydney games was an unparalleled success leading to them being declared “the best Olympic Games ever” – probably something the IOC President at the time, Juan Antonio, has rued ever since, because subsequent games’ hosts now wait with bated breath to hear those immortal words said again about their efforts – suck it in fellas, it ain’t ever going to happen. For the record, Juan Antonio wasn’t being so original. Six years earlier the 1994 Lillehammer winter games were declared “the best Olympic Winter Games ever”. Maybe Juan printed out the wrong speech and had to wing his way through the mistake?

NEXT STOP EARLS COURT

The grand spectacle of the Sydney Olympics owed a lot to the technical innovation and prowess of the Australian production companies involved – and it has been a hard act to follow. It’s led to an interesting trend. As the ensuing Olympiads in Athens and Beijing were held, not to mention the Commonwealth Games in New Delhi (has all the gear come back yet?), instead of being an almost exclusive opportunity for local production companies to strut their stuff, the Games’ organisers have still encouraged overseas providers to submit tenders. The reality they recognise is there can be no substitute for knowledge and expertise when it comes to the sheer scale of production we see at events like these now–and Australian companies got that in spades-full in 2000. When you’re staging an Olympic-like event we have seriously gotten our act together. Despite these accolades, you might think the logistics of sending large, trained crews and a warehouse full of gear halfway across the world would make it uneconomical or, at least, the tenders couldn’t be competitive against the locals in the first place. Again, having the experience is telling when it comes to keeping large productions cost-effective. Shipping containers of equipment over distances becomes a relatively small component of the overall – admittedly large – budget.

So it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise that several Australian production companies are heavily involved in the London Olympics all thanks, in part, to the legacy of the 2000 Games. One of them is Sydney-based The PA People, which is playing a big role in providing communications throughout all the sports venues for the duration of the competition including the following Paralympics. It should be pointed out that this is completely separate from the opening and closing ceremonies. That’s because the ceremonies are true entertainment productions that have little to do with the sporting side of things – it’s two (or three, really) entirely different production environments. Think about it – Sir Paul McCartney would throw a crap javelin… unless maybe he was aiming for his second wife.

NICK OF TIME

We all witnessed that it was apparently going to be a nail-biting finish to get London and all the sporting venues ready in time – it’s an obligatory news headline leading into every Olympics. It’s fair to say that a lot of requirements for communications were decided later, rather than sooner. Normally, establishing final communication points is pretty much the last thing done after other technical aspects are satisfied anyway. While the basic design on many venues was clear earlier on with the likes of commentary boxes, scoreboards and OB vans inked-in on the plans, other considerations such as extra cameras locations and audio positions were all subject – as you’d expect – to the whims of media producers and directors arriving and demanding that their two cent’s worth (or should that be tuppence?) be heard and acted upon. The comms for each venue centred around a Clear-Com Eclipse matrix, either a Pico or a Median system. Clear-Com V- Stations were typically provided for the Sports Producer, Announcers, Audio Operator, Vision Mixer and Scoreboard Operator while the Timing, Results and Graphics operators were accommodated using beltpack units.