The Euroderby semi-final second leg of the Champions League between FC Internazionale and AC Milan on 16 May saw international television production by EMG Italy for Mediaset, licensee of the UEFA event and holder of the rights to the match.

For the occasion, the EMG Group was also present at the TV compound with the ob vehicles of EMG Belgium and EMG UK, committed to other broadcasters, but in synergy with each other with a view to a collaboration that increasingly improves the efficiency of each productive process.

The technique in the field: Michele Iorio, OB Production Manager

“EMG is the television service of Milan and Inter for the football championship”, says Michele Iorio, OB Production Manager of EMG Italy. “I am the producer who mainly follows Serie A football, fixed in Milan on all Inter and Milan matches for the championship, the Italian Cup and the Champions League for Mediaset. As an accountant for the AC Milan and Inter clients, I follow them for all stages of production. According to the three typical standards A,B,C, I select the necessary personnel respecting the production budget and I also follow the unilateral integrations, with accreditations, logistics, and relations with broadcasters, also towards national and international takers".

The setup in the Champions League

The set-up as regards the host broadcaster production begins two days before the match, from the audio-video stations, with a reduced crew. On "match day -1" the first tests are usually carried out with training from the away team plus press conferences and flash station interviews, which did not happen on this occasion as the two teams met the day before the match they are trained at Milanello and Appiano.

Preliminary tests were carried out on the LED walls inside the stadium and on the entire audio-video technical circuit. In fact, the San Siro facility is semi-permanent and is set up at the beginning of the season in August, to remain in place until the end of the championship.

The Derby

Mediaset broadcast the derby on Canale 5, entrusting the production to two large OB Trucks, the EMG Nova 103 unit in charge of international host production and the Nova 128 which carried out Mediaset's customized national production. The technical team fielded for the host feed was led by Mediaset director Giorgio Galli and his assistant Stefano Schiavinato. 

The host director's technical crew consisted of 5 camera controls, 1 video mixer, 7 EVS operators, 1 RVM operator, 5 audio assistants, 2 chief technicians, 2 sound engineers, 5 machinists and 1 production manager, plus 21 operators for 22 cameras. Twenty-three people were instead hired for the unilateral production of Mediaset, and included a producer, a technical chief, two sound engineers, a video technician, 3 stagehands, a camera control, a video mixer, two EVS operators, 4 camera operators, 5 microphone operators , led by Mediaset director Marco Di Francesco.

Other unilateral integrations

In the TV compound, next to the stadium, there were also two other large mobile control rooms: the EMG Nova 119 and EMG Nova 102, as we said, responsible respectively for the production of Amazon Prime Germany and the British BT Sport.

In addition to the 22 cameras for the host feed, a drone was used, plus two other cameras dedicated to the multi-pitch and flash locations (path 1 and 2). The two positions on the pitch in the pre-match and in flash post-match were dedicated to international multi-feed customizations and enslaved to numerous foreign TV channels holding the rights which alternated in interviews for 10 minutes each, in rotation.

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“It was very exciting to see 4 international production vehichles from the group working together”, underlines Michele Iorio, “and to see the football that counts in Milan again, in a very special evening. Among the peculiarities of this event, to involve the public even more, Mediaset set up an RF room outside the stadium to collect all the emotion of the fans live. Furthermore, to make the most of the atmosphere of the evening and the spectacular nature of San Siro, a drone was also used which flew in well-defined areas, and captured a different perspective from that of the cameras on the pitch.

To further enrich the event and return the excitement of the stadium to the audience at home, the audio was recorded entirely in Dolby Atmos. Among the supports for special filming, two back-of-the-door polecams were used, two steadycams, to the right and to the left of the field, which filmed the arrival of the teams and accompanied the players in the corridors before the changing rooms. The replays were enriched by 5 Sony Super Motion cameras”.

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