IBC has announced the 10 finalists for its 2019 Innovation Awards, which will be announced during IBC 2019 in Amsterdam this September.
The IBC Innovation Awards are meant to recognize technical excellence and “cutting-edge technology” in the media and entertainment industry. They are not awarded to products, but to applications that make innovative use of new technology.
Finalists were announced in three categories. In Content Creation, the four finalists include Fox Sports’ Nascar augmented reality studio; Riot Games’ League of Legends World Championships in Seoul, which were remotely produced in L.A.; SailGP and Timeline Television for SailGP, a remotely produced global sailing championship; and Vodafone Romania for a holographic projection system that used a 5G remote link to allow an 11-year-old guitarist to seem to be performing on stage with a band.
In Content Distribution, the three finalists include the Associated Press, for a system using lasers to transmit video through open water from depths of 200m; BT Sport for its demonstration of the use of 5G technology in remote production, and Copa90 for its global social media fan engagement program tied to the FIFA World Cup in 2018. (See our recent interview with Base Media Cloud MD Ben Foakes for more background on Copa90.)
Finally, the three finalists in IBC’s Content Everywhere category are Deutsche Telekom, for a 6K 360-degree immersive video service; India’s ETV Bharat for a news production and playout platform serving 5,000 journalists and 24 OTT channels; and Mediapro’s delivery of matches and other content from LaLiga Spanish football via Facebook Watch on the Indian subcontinent.
“Although we never look for a theme in our list of finalists, the shortlist usually reflects the wider industry,” said Michael Lumley, chair of the Innovation Awards judging panel, in a prepared statement. “This year you can definitely see that there are a number of projects which are global in their scale and which use new opportunities in connectivity to bring us astounding images, whether that is capturing life under the sea or the excitement of sports.”
The IBC Innovation Award-winners will be announced at the IBC 2019 Awards Ceremony, scheduled for Sunday, September 15, at 6:30 p.m. Entry to the event is free with an IBC visitor pass.
