The USA hosted the first ever broadcast of an NBA match using surround video technology

On March 16, the world’s first broadcast of the NBA match between Brooklyn Nets and Dallas Mavericks took place using Canon Free-Viewpoint Video surround video technology, commonly used when creating video clips. The game was broadcast by the popular American cable sports channel ESPN.

To create a three-dimensional video, 110 cameras located around the basketball court were used — this allows you to track the actions of each player at any given time. After that, the data obtained is combined online with 3D models of each athlete. As a result, thanks to the “environment” of virtual cameras, viewers can watch the game from any angle.

The observed effect is impressive even in the presence of some failures and artifacts. For example, the arena is not so clearly visible in the video compared to the basketball sports simulator produced by Visual Consepts 2K22. However, the volume dynamics of the players’ movements more than compensates for any fuzziness, which practically “erases” the difference between normal and virtual broadcasts.