University of Southern California to Deploy LiveU for ‘Tunnel Vision’

LiveU’s video uplink solutions have been deployed by the University of Southern California (USC) athletic department to power the school’s Tunnel Vision live programming from Memorial Coliseum, coverage from road games, and stream full-length, live games online.

Since the start of the 2013 football season, The Trojans have leveraged the LiveU solution to transmit pre-game and post game live shows from the field branded as “Tunnel Vision.” Coverage includes live feeds of players running onto the field for warm ups via the tunnel, Trojans Walk-by with fans down the 50 yard line seats, team prayer, cheerleader drills, Trojans mascot riding on to the field on horseback, and interviews with coaches and the Athletic Director by talent Katie Boggs in the 60 minute countdown to the game, and after the game. The show also mixes in b-roll taken earlier in the day such as players getting off the team bus, and more. USC also uses LiveU technology for other events throughout the week and the season including press conferences and banquets.

Memorial Coliseum has hosted world-class sporting events ranging from Super Bowls to Olympic games. USC fans now get a new perspective of this landmark venue. “With LiveU, we can offer new unique types of very appealing content for fans, and a lot more of it,” said Rich Rodriguez, USCTrojans.com Executive Producer. “This is extremely important given the length restrictions on actual game highlights we can post on our website. LiveU technology allows our fans to become ‘a fly on the wall’ and get a unique point of view they couldn’t see before. Each live hit generates thousands of views in real time; we then post clips on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, which in turn bring in even more views.”

USC, which is celebrating its 125th anniversary of athletics in 2013, is one of the nation’s most successful athletic programs. Currently fielding 21 men’s and women’s sports, the Trojans claim 120 national team championships, an unprecedented 419 Olympians and 52 NCAA Postgraduate Scholars.

USC will also use LiveU for game and competitions that were never before covered live. “We discovered LiveU after building our new sand volleyball stadium and needing a cost-effective uplink solution to stream our first tournament from the venue before it was hardwired, without renting expensive satellite trucks,” Rodriguez continued. “LiveU came to the rescue and was easily able to transmit high quality video, even when the stadium was crowded, thanks to LiveU’s unique antennas. In fact, we now prefer to use LiveU even when a hardwired connection is available in venues such as baseball, soccer, lacrosse and others thanks to its simplicity, portability and ease-of-use.”

In addition, USC uses LiveU technology to streamline the posting of video highlights. “While our teams are on the road, we use LiveU to feed our ftp footage. We send post game pressers directly to PAC 12 for use on-air. Also, we send footage to our own production facility in real time, so that we can easily post all of our game highlights and related content immediately after each game. In the past, we had to wait several hours until we arrived back home to do so,” added Rodriguez.

LiveU, the leader in portable live video-over-cellular solutions, offers a variety of portable devices that bond together multiple cellular connections for cost-effective HD-quality video uplink from anywhere, including its LU70 backpacks, Xtender external antennas for high-quality signal even in congested sports venues, LU-Smart smartphone bonding app, and a variety of complementary video services for sports organizations.

According to Tim Prukop, Head of Sports and New Media Sales at LiveU, “USC is a school with a long history of success and extremely avid fans. We are very happy that we can assist them in creating new and exciting content around their athletics programs.”