October 13, 2014 – U.S.A. - Are you ready for some football? Monday Night Football that is, and the team at Bexel is more than ready. Bexel strategically developed a plan to introduce new technology to this season’s Monday Night Football broadcasts on ESPN.

The current Monday Night Football season, which kicked-off September 8th, is being produced in 1080p/60fps. Formerly shot in 720p, the move to a higher resolution standard warranted a change in camera systems as well. Bexel is providing ESPN’s Monday Night Football with six Sony F55 cameras, a small, light and modular camera that can acquire images in 1080p. The F55s are being used at a frame rate speed of 240fps, which combined with the higher quality of 1080p provides better looking images when replayed.Of the six cameras provided, two are used in hand-held mode with Fujinon HSS18x5.5BRDS lenses, while the four fixed cameras utilize Fujinon XA101x8.9BESM long lenses. Paired with the F55 cameras are four 8-channel EVS XT3s servers, running on a 10 Gigabit Ethernet network. The larger network is required as the higher density images being recorded cannot travel across a typical 1 Gigabit network. Bexel is also providing ESPN’s Monday Night Football with two Evertz Dreamcatchers, which provide enhanced storytelling capabilities by allowing a production team to capture an event from all angles, without ever missing a moment of action. The Dreamcatchers are being used in conjunction with cameras that output an UHD (Ultra High Definition) image at multiple frame rates, which the Dreamcatcher has the standard ability to record.

Dreamcatcher’s zoom capability lets broadcasters zero in on the action and extract an HD image from a larger UHD frame, enhancing narrative and providing definitive coverage of close calls.

“With the Dreamcatchers, you can really see if someone’s foot was on the line and whether or not a player fumbled the ball,” notes Joseph Wire, vice president of business development for Bexel. “Because it is such a high quality image, it stays clear even when you are zooming in 300 to 400 percent. There is enough data within the UHD image that it doesn’t distort with the Dreamcatcher, which is really key for football coverage.”

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