Esports tournament organiser ESL has teamed up with Australian video technology company Blackmagic Design.
As a result, ESL has enhanced its production facility, located in Katowice, Poland with video equipment provided by Blackmagic Design. This includes WAMM Video Solutions video equipment, ATEM Constellation switchers and Universal Videohub deck control routers.
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Krzysztof Pawlus, Head of Engineering at ESL Gaming Polska, spoke on the announcement: “We produce a huge variety of live events, including ESL branded formats and white-label content for other tournaments or events. With that in mind, the entire workflow is reconfigurable to meet those needs and demands.
“The entire facility is fibre-connected. Essentially, we can distribute any incoming source to anywhere in the facility, depending on the production’s requirements.”
According to Pawlus, flexibility was a key element when designing the production workflow and control infrastructure.
The facility now incorporates four new control rooms and three multipurpose halls equipped to host a wide range of events. This includes greenscreen virtual production capabilities, a space with the capacity to accommodate up to 64 PUBG Mobile players and an option to incorporate remote sources into the production.
“Recently most of the talent has been remote, and we also have to ensure the production teams continue to stay safe”, said Pawlus.
“We’ve also made sure the studio infrastructure can bring in external sources alongside signals from the studio floor, without any latency issues. It’s imperative that our streams are accurate and put our audience at the heart of the action.”
According to the release, the new studio facilities will allow ESL to expand its range of events and enable further innovation of its content production.
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“Availability of Blackmagic’s SDK [software development kit] allows us a high level of workflow customization, while the ability to automate complex processes through custom macros is a real advantage and helps us to diversify our streams,” added Pawlus.
“We’ve already been able to develop some very clever and efficient solutions to ensure our content remains at the pinnacle of esports production, and I’m sure there are many possibilities we’ve still to explore.”
Founded in 2001, Blackmagic Design manufactures a variety of video production equipment, including video editing products, digital film cameras, live production switchers, and real-time film scanners for the feature film, post-production and television broadcast industries. The company has offices in the USA, UK, Japan, Singapore and Australia.
Esports Insider says: With esports audiences continually growing, it’s necessary for any esports broadcaster to have the technologies needed to accommodate real-time broadcasts of matches, with all the specificities it comes with. It will be interesting to see how ESL’s content and broadcasts will be ehnaced thanks to its newly upgraded gaming studio infrastructure.