BT Sport - Launch of BT Sport Ultimate

Spent an illuminating few hours with @rioferdy5 at @btsport getting ready for our @ChampionsLeague coverage. The studio is astounding.

— Gary Lineker 💙💛 (@GaryLineker) September 2, 2015

it does look pretty good, you know. Hopefully it'll be on screen a bit more than it has of late.

Tonight's Rugby Aid will be the first UHD broadcast on the channel downscaled and re-transmitted on HD (and SD) - The previous UHD productions being wholly separate from the HD service.

Ideal opportunity to test out the tech.

Edit ....

Seems that another test run of this arrangement will be on Sunday with a WSL game.

If anyone cares to play spot the difference with the studio, you could try to spot some things which are new in this trailer:

The new home of the @ChampionsLeague - every game exclusively live on @btsport from Tuesday 15th September. #UCL http://t.co/RliDkVFIK8

— BT Sport (@btsport) September 8, 2015

Besides the obvious new desk, I couldn't notice too much different there to be honest - seems there may be more vertical video screens? More screens under the big tower ones as well. Beyond that I couldn't see much else that's changed, but obviously it's not a full look at the studio so it may look different when shown properly.

You only have to look at the schedules this week to see what a loss the Champions League really is to Sky - their only live "sport" on Tuesday and Wednesday is poker and greyhound racing.

It's actually worse than that.
Sky Sports 1 at 8 on Tuesday will be siml-casting an invented for Sky pro/am darts tournament also being shown on Sky1.

If its the usual production that Sky Sports use from the Greyhound Racing BAGS tv productions (similar to Racetech with the horses) the Greyhound racing coverage won't even be in HD.

Image of the Champions League set from a keynote address given by Delia Bushell at a trade show in the Netherlands this morning.

https://twitter.com/paolopescatore/status/642975446053875712

Looks a lot brighter than previously, and seemingly with some AR features as well.

https://twitter.com/IBCShow/status/642975500923727872

Are they having two presenting teams for the English games (presumably one on location, one in the studio) or is the secondary match being treated very much as that with just commentary?

EPG says Lineker hosts the 'main' game from the studio (and the build up programme from 6/6.30) and that Humphrey will be on site for the secondary game involving English teams.

Have heard a suggestion that BT Sport UHD 2 or at least a BT Sport Extra UHD channel might be with BTTV users sooner than some expect. Nothing to substantiate yet though.

The AR use doesn't surprise me. BBC Sport/ITV Sport and Sky all use it - so we'll see how BT Sport use it on Tuesday evening.

Looking at the first tweet picture, the angle is a strange one, but it looks like the CL presentation desk is roughly where the desk for (the much missed) Baker & Kelly VSPO was. The multi-screen rotunda is towards the centre - and the(now very under used) lined light football pitch is behind the slated LED screens to the right.

Slightly related I was wondering whether they've managed to source another UHD setup, as they're advertising both Champions League Tonight and the Man City v Juventus match as being in UHD on Tuesday - I wasn't sure how they'd do this without presenting CL Tonight from the ground or nearby, as they apparently only have (had?) the facilities for one UHD broadcast at a time at the moment - but since Lineker has confirmed he'll be in the studio, presumably they've acquired extra facilities.