[SBE] automating sports broadcasts

[Tim Berry]

To all of the braintrust, 

Please forgive the multiple posts if you are subscribed to more than one radio-related listserver. I am need of some answers from the collective group. 

I am responsible for a major university's sports broadcasts as the Chief Engineer of the Radio Network and also of the flagship station. At present, we are using a circuitwerks tone encoder to send 25/35/combined tones to the affiliates via ISDN and then to satellite. As I'm sure you know, this method works well as long as the level and pass filters are OK on our end, and the affiliates have the levels set to their decoder properly. We will at some point be required to switch to closures with the new generation of receivers (XDS, Max receiver, DG receiver, etc) but for now the subaudibles work ok. I monitor the tones back thru a decoder that is connected to the satellite receiver that receives our originated broadcasts to insure there is nothing wrong with what we send out. 

My question is two-fold: If you are using automation (of any kind) to control your sports broadcasts, how do you handle the end of game? Do you have a closure programmed to drop the game broadcast and go straight back to "normal" programming, or do you depend on a "local adjacency" (playing a local commercial at the networks last segment and then dropping back to 'normal' programming?  How does the originating network signal to you that they are ending? If you can answer this question for your station, which kind of automation are you using? 

If you are originating a sports broadcast, how do you signal the "end of the broadcast" to your affiliates? Do you just send a "local break" closure at the end of your network broadcast and then expect the affiliate to get themselves back to "normal," or do you send a particular "end of game" broadcast?  And if you are using closures only, is there any way to delay the closures as you do the audio in order to match the TV delay? 

The reason for my line of curiosity is this: I have just found out that my producer has been sending several "local break" closures (25 Hz tones) repeatedly at the end of our sports network broadcasts, and then after doing that, sends an "end of game" closure 25/35 tone).  Before I tell him to STOP doing that and just do the "end of game" closure I wanted to ask the listserver members how they do it elsewhere. I know how our Scott Studios machine would handle this, but I don't know how the other manufacturers' automation systems would react under this circumstance. His reason is to allow stations to "catch up" in their logs if they missed a break command...my contention is that it screws up the many to try to accommodate the few (that line is partially borrowed from a Star Trek movie, BTW).  Also, if I must change to one of the newer platforms that I mentioned above, I am need to see if there is any way that I can continue to use a precision delay to match the TV feed and delay the break closures as well. Right mow I can pass the 25/23/combined tones thru our precision delay and not distort them to the point that they are unusable. 

Sorry for the long post, but I would really appreciate any input from you if you are in either one of these scenarios. Private reply is great. Thanks in advance! 


Tim Berry
timb447457 at aol.com

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