Regional sports network relies on new trucks state of the art mobile capabilities for high-intensity HD production of 170 home sporting events.

NEP today announced the launch of NCPII, a purpose-built mobile broadcasting facility designed to the specifications of longtime NEP customer Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia (CSN Philadelphia). At 53 feet long and 20 feet wide when fully expanded, NCPII has enabled CSN Philadelphia to enhance its coverage of all home games of the Philadelphia Phillies, 76ers, and Flyers sports teams — a total of 170 events each year. 

“For more than 15 years, CSN Philadelphia has maintained the highest levels of accomplishment that a regional sports network can achieve,” said Shawn Oleksiak, senior executive producer of live events, CSN Philadelphia. “When we launched this project, our objective was to raise our game to the next level and beyond in terms of what we provide our viewers and how we present our team partners. Through our partnership with NEP, we’ve embraced this challenge by adopting the latest technologies available for production switchers, audio consoles, cameras, replays, and graphic platforms. Through the innovation, expertise, and experience NEP is known for, NCPII is enabling us to present national network-level television at the regional level.” 

Previously, CSN Philadelphia produced home games for the three teams from a fixed control room located at Wells Fargo Center. With the mobile capabilities of NCPII, the network is now able to produce games from both Wells Fargo Center and Citizens Bank Park within the South Philadelphia Sports Complex. With full HD 1080i video and Dolby® 5.1 audio capabilities, NCPII features several mobile production innovations. One of these is the ability to program the router and other systems with a core set of recallable audio and video functions to accommodate the rapid set-strike nature of CSN Philadelphia’s schedule. Based on those core functions, engineers can make show-specific modifications very quickly, such as adding specialized cameras or graphics. 

“With this project, our objective was to offer CSN Philadelphia all of the fully integrated capabilities in a mobile setting that the production teams had been accustomed to in the fixed control room. Another unique aspect was the high-intensity production demands that would be placed on the truck due to CSN’s one-day set-shoot-strike schedule,” said Mike Werteen, senior vice president, sales and client services for NEP. “In NCPII, we’re proud to say that we have met these requirements with a highly scalable solution that can accommodate any size show and be configured rapidly to meet individual production requirements.” 

“With NCPII, NEP has afforded us both immediacy and evolution, providing today’s state-of-the-art technologies while keeping an eye on future developments and cost-efficient strategies to keep us competitive in a rapidly evolving market,” added Oleksiak.