Leveraging the Skill of the Sportscaster

For the most part, the role of sportscaster is simply commentating on the game — narrating what’s happening, giving some insight into why things are happening and how they’re being done, et cetera. Yet as the most passionate and knowledgeable person with respect to the game, athletes, and strategy, they have the knowledge and expertise to do so much more. Perhaps even more importantly, giving sportscasters more control allows them to tell exactly the story they want to tell.

Consider the legendary commentator, John Madden. He expanded the commentator role with more than just his big personality and colorful descriptions of play. In fact, Madden was also an early user of telestration tools, which helped bring his insights to viewers with on-screen illustrations. From there, how can today’s sportscaster fully utilize their skills and knowledge of the game?

• What if the sportscaster could control more than just the telestration? What if they could choose the shots they want to display?
• What if they could control the graphics and messaging, such as headshots and stats, to support the story they want to tell?
• And, what if they could work from anywhere, making the best in sportscasting talent more widely available?

Since its launch, Chyron LIVE has provided live sports producers with the tools they need to take full advantage of great sportscasting talent. This article will discuss how you can better leverage your sportscaster or talent to improve or just get the best quality out of your production.

What is Chyron LIVE?

Chyron LIVE is a complete cloud-based live production platform that enables most users to start working with the system in less than an hour of training. Available on a consumption basis, LIVE gives every team member access to powerful storytelling tools while a match or event unfolds. Multiple people can work on the production, all accessing the tools they need through a single, intuitive UI.

LIVE empowers the sportscaster to contribute more fully in three ways: by giving them more control over applications, driving graphics, and allowing them to work from anywhere at any time.

Extended Roles

First, LIVE helps sportscasters apply their expertise beyond the audio realm by giving them control over replay and illustration. Because sportscasters working within the LIVE interface can visualize all aspects of the production in real time, they see more than just replay and illustration. In fact, if they have the motivation and can build it into their commentary workflow, they also can take control of those elements themselves — they can go in, create clips of particular plays they want to highlight, and illustrate it the way they think best highlights the point they’re making. They can even take the telestration interface live on the program feed to mark something interesting.

Unlike the conventional production truck scenario, where a replay operator sits at a separate keyboard and controls replays, this model allows someone who’s an expert to tell the story behind everything fans are seeing during the game, making for a far more compelling broadcast or live stream. Alternatively, the sportscaster might just hop in for a specific segment while a dedicated operator handles those elements the rest of the time.

Controlled Graphics

Second, LIVE allows sportscasters to drive graphics for the show. For instance, say that the commentator wants to show a specific player’s stats. With LIVE, they just click the player button, select the player information that’s preloaded into the system, and take it to the program feed. The same goes for team rosters — they’re easy to pull up, and they already include all the team info, logos, colors, images, and player information.

These functions may be especially streamlined, thanks to LIVE’s new Matchpad technology, which makes it easy for any user to manage dynamic motion graphics in sports production. To prepare for a game, users can add each team’s colors, logo imagery, rosters, jersey numbers, names, positions, and more to a simple configuration spreadsheet. These codes will then automatically populate the graphic design template. From there, users are presented with a visually intuitive control panel that provides straightforward tools for highlighting important game elements, such as goals, penalty flags, lineups, and substitutions.

Commentators in the esports realm have already discovered the power of this model, and it’s not uncommon for the show caster to pick graphics or even switch cameras during the show. The same is true for illustrated replay, again with the goal of letting the subject matter expert drive the show. With the ability to manage all this with a few clicks, LIVE’s Matchpad feature puts the sportscaster in the driver’s seat and helps them keep the narrative flow at the pace they want — without spending much time directing colleagues on other systems. LIVE makes it easier to provide good analysis and to bring viewers along for the ride.

Flexible Workspaces

A third way to better leverage sportscaster talent is to be flexible to their working location and schedule. As a cloud-based platform that supports remote access and provides a remote commentary interface, LIVE makes it extremely easy for a subject matter expert to provide expert commentary from wherever they’re working. They simply pull up the program preview window to see the feed, and they can access a link by which they send in audio.

This model is critical because it addresses several scenarios. By supporting remote commentary, LIVE allows a production team to incorporate expertise from someone whose schedule or circumstances won’t allow them to make the trip. And while it’s often nice to send talent to an event, it can be expensive. Nowadays, it’s becoming less necessary. An on-demand platform like LIVE makes higher-end live production far more accessible and affordable for people who are super passionate about whatever niche sport they’re working in. They can just spin up LIVE for the games they have without going out and buy a whole kit.

Summary

With enough knowledge about the sport, passion for doing the broadcast, and incremental building of skill with LIVE, sportscasters can operate the show while providing expert, intuitive commentary — knowing not only what should be covered but also how it should be talked about. To review, Chyron Live can help you:

1. Bring expertise from pure commentary to on-screen content, in terms of making replays and illustrating them in the way that helps you tells the story better.

2. Drive graphics, even on the fly, especially if you want to talk about a certain player or review rosters.

3. Work more flexibly, leveraging talent wherever you may be and in whatever the circumstances are, for ultra-light to large-scale productions.

In short, the Chyron LIVE platform is set up in a way that a single person with advanced sports knowledge yet little production background can hop right into the driver’s seat. Armed with a prime graphics engine and a paint replay system, sportscasters become a force to be reckoned with — able to drive graphics, make replays, and draw illustrations as they tell the story.