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Plazamedia is a service provider for the German television industry in the areas of field and studio production, spot production, post-production and programming. The company, located in Ismaning near Munich, produces more than 15,000 hours of sports programming in 25 codes each year, also handling up to 20 TV programmes (sport and non-sport) at any one time. In 2002, Plazamedia, which is Germany's largest producer of sports programmes, had a turnover of around $80m. Sport and Technology takes a closer look at the EM.TV AG-owned company that was once part of the Kirch empire, and has clients including DSF, SAT 1, Premiere, ARD, ZDF, the Disney Channel, Vodafone and T-Mobile.  Above and beyond its traditional television commitments, Plazamedia also delivers images for broadcast via MMS and on the web, with the German soccer league, the Bundesliga, providing integral content. During the 2003-04 Bundesliga season, Plazamedia delivered 612 games to TV, web and mobile audiences. To this end, each weekend saw 500 permanent and freelance staff working in the stadia of the Bundesliga teams involved. "We are producing for a league, not an agency," says Marcus Hochhaus, manager of business development at Plazamedia. "We cover 18 games each weekend, managing all the processes and transmission times which all demands a lot of planning to defined high quality standards."
On location at the stadia, the entire installation of production technology, along with the production of image and sound, takes place under the management of Plazamedia subsidiary, PMM. Around 200km of cable is laid and 100 cameras and 10 remote broadcast vehicles maintained per match. The images and sound are transmitted via fibre-optic cable and via satellite directly to the Plazamedia production centre. From there, the signals pass through the main switching room for further use in sports TV production centres, web producers and by mobile network operators worldwide. "Having several distribution channels helps sports federations create more products to sell," sums up Hochhaus succinctly.
"We are a technically advanced company compared to a lot of our competitors," he adds. "It's all about speed for sport content and we have developed software especially to improve standards. There will always be someone cheaper out there, but the rigorous planning and continuous research and investment we undertake makes us much more efficient in the end. And that means quality and speed for our customers." And working to create a higher level of TV standards and resolutions, Plazamedia could deliver every mobile or internet standard virtually tomorrow. "Just give us a couple of days to implement and test the encoding software. We have everything else already," Hochhaus says.
 Bundesliga and new media
As far as new media production of Bundesliga matches is concerned, Plazamedia uses four servers to capture live feeds of up to nine simultaneous soccer matches. The captured material is stored on a central SAN Fibre Channel disk array using MPEG2 at 50mbits/sec to maintain picture quality. The GaSSS SAN storage system allows instant access to the recordings for editing. Eight networked logging stations work with the servers to produce, simultaneously, sub-clips of the highlights as live recording of the games takes place. The logging stations provide a simple interface to allow the operators to review recorded material as the matches progress and select the best highlights. They also provide frame grab of selected frames and a facility to create an immediate 'Highlight Sub-clip' of any dramatic event by simply converting the last 30 seconds of live action into a new clip.
All the newly created highlight clips are immediately available for further editing or voice-over. Four Incite editing systems are attached to the same SAN, allowing the final highlight clips, with voice-over material, to be produced within minutes of the live event. The Incite editors are also used to produce compilations of highlights either from one or several matches.
The finished highlight clips are available for network transfer to web streaming and other New Media systems. They can also be played out for traditional broadcast or archived to tape for future use.  New products
Plazamedia prides itself on adding value to its clients through the development of new technology. "For example, the completely new developed remote camera system SportsCam opens up new horizons," says Eduard Palasan, manager of OB production at Plazamedia. "All the control functions and video signals are transmitted digitally by cable or radio and can facilitate extremely fast movements. The camera is just 230mm high and has a diameter of 136mm, meaning it is extremely compact. Plus with an acceleration from 0 to 100km/h in 2.4 seconds on our new meter high speed track, we overtook every Formula One race car at the Grand Prix at Nurburgring just recently and could therefore deliver pictures from the pit lane for host broadcaster RTL."
Meanwhile, GoalCam is a radio-controlled camera used inside an ice hockey, handball or soccer goal. "It can rotate 360 degrees and is controlled by a joystick," explains Palasan, "giving viewers interesting new angles."
Plazamedia's new GolfTracer product generates 3D animations of golf courses, simulating a virtual bird's eye view that broadcasters can use to enhance event coverage. Utilising satellite imaging, "GolfTracer is aimed at all rights holders, not just those in golf" says Palasan, "that are looking to produce unique and specialist transmissions of their events."  Getting ready for HDTV
Plazamedia is already preparing for 2006 when the FIFA World Cup hosted by Germany will be produced in a high definition (HDTV) format and penetration of HD sets in Europe is expected to be significant. The company has formed a strategic alliance with outdoor broadcasting specialist Alfacam, the latter of which will be responsible for HDTV broadcasts for a large part of the 2004 UEFA European Football Championships in Portugal and the 2004 Olympics in Athens. Plazamedia has contributed its stake in Munich-based Euro-TV Mobil to the deal. "But it's not just about the World Cup," adds Hochhaus, "or when HD becomes standard in Europe. We are seeing HD firmly established in the US, Japan and Australia and there are therefore opportunities for us in those markets. Our TV production facilities are open to the international market and meeting the needs of new clients."
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