SkyItalia taps RedBee Piero technology for World Cup

Red Bee Media’s Piero system will be used in SkyItalia’s World Cup coverage to let viewers see matches from angles that cannot be captured by cameras.

The Piero technology transposes pictures of real players into a virtual stadium, where it is possible to view and analyze play from different angles in animated sequences. Offsides and other offences can be seen from the best angle for analysis – even if the play has not been captured at this angle.

Sky Italia plans to use Piero in its football coverage on an ongoing basis and first used Piero on April 18 2006 in its coverage of the Champions League semi-final of AC Milan versus Barcelona.

Piero is operated using an easy-to-use touch-screen interface, which
program presenters and pundits can operate on-air. It allows them to
draw directly on the pitch, even with a moving camera, and can switch
between real and virtual views at the click of a button.

Piero also features the ability to track players across the grass and
place pointers and badges on the pitch in ‘live’ video. It can also be
used to place virtual advertising in real footage or virtual stadiums.

Andy Townsend, Design Systems Manager at Red Bee Media, says SkyItalia has a real appetite to make the most out of their World Cup footage, both new and from their archive.

“Piero is the only graphic system of its type with a seemless transition from real images into a virtual stadium,” he says. “The Piero graphics can be integrated with match statistics to create an inclusive package for in-depth tactical analysis.”

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