Bexel is once again playing a big role at the big game, as a team of 20 staffers are making sure core component boxes as well as engineering and fiber management services for Fox Sports, ESPN, and NFL Films are all functioning as needed during the run up to Super Bowl XLVIII.“We’re managing the edit facilities at Metlife and in Times Square for Fox Sports as well as their IPTV system and then we also are providing fiber support,” says Lee Estroff, Bexel, vice president of account development.Justin Paulk, fiber business segment manager, Bexel ESS, says that the unique aspect of the Super Bowl project this year is that a system has been put in place that allows Apple Final Cut Pro editing, Adobe After Effects, and Autodesk Smoke graphics systems in Times Square and the Metlife compound to be connected via fiber.“In Times Square there are two 72-strand fibers from the [editing and graphics area] in the Millennium Hotel on Broadway to the production truck for the set,” he explains. “Everything is touching our fiber, whether truck equipment or cameras.”Bexel has supplied more than 70 fiber cables to Fox Sports while NFL Films is using more than 130 cables. Bexel also has built four new booth connectivity kits for NFL Films and is also assisting with additional support gear, the instant replay system, and even helping out the photographers. And on Radio Row at the Sheraton Hotel it provided a flypack for FS1 with four cameras, including robotics, for daily broadcast needs.“We have 32 miles of cable and if you lay it out strand to strand it would be about 438 miles worth of fiber optical cable,” adds Paulk.Bexel’s team also includes four engineers who, since Tuesday, have been working around the clock to make sure the editing systems are working as needed.The editing and graphics systems are working with content stored on a 48 TB SAN in both the Millennium Hotel and at Metlife Stadium. Those two systems are also connected to the Game Creek Video FX production unit at the center of the Super Bowl game coverage as well as the Fox facility in Los Angeles.“We have identical systems at both locations and everyone is networked together so everyone can see everybody and all the media on the EVS servers,” says John Robledo, systems engineer for Bexel. “We’re pushing media files between all locations and I have not seen one tape yet.Estroff says this week’s action is the culmination of months of pre-planning with the Fox Sports production team.“This involved six to eight months of routing and mapping the runs,” he says. “To maximize the cables usage there has to be pre-planning on our part to get everything on fiber and run them and then tie them into the Level 3 circuit.”Read story on sportsvideo.org[sc name="news-footer"]