Telefónica and Atlético de Madrid have gone hand in hand for a long time. And this time they want to present their new pioneer pilot to follow football matches at another level. Thanks to virtual reality (VR) technology and 5G connection, you can watch a football game with 4K quality through VR glasses. And best of all, even though you are in a specific area of the field, you will receive images from different parts of the stadium. So you will have a complete experience of the meeting.
Football matches in virtual reality
This new experience for broadcasting matches can make a difference in the future of broadcasts for this sport and others. More than anything, because this Atlético de Madrid and Movistar pilot wants fans to be able to enjoy a completely pioneering way of follow football matches live.
This specific project premiered with great results in the game that pitted Atlético de Madrid against Osasuna. And to fine-tune this pioneering pilot, it will also be tested next Sunday, May 28. against the Royal Society for those attending the Club Telefónica Empresas del Metropolitan Civitas.
This will be possible thanks to the use of some Meta Quest Pro virtual reality glasses who receive live match images thanks to 5G. To capture the match in real time, the four 360-degree cameras that are placed at different points on the Atlético de Madrid field are used, which are also combined with the HD image of the match and the SkyCam. In addition, the experience of watching the game from different angles through tablets is also offered.
An experience from different angles
Among the different angles that this pilot allows is the option of having the perspective of the north goal of the Metropolitan, the changing room tunnel area, the production control room or the media stands. And among other views, three pre-recorded scenes with 360-degree cameras are also made available to the fans, which are recorded at the moment they put the shirts in the locker room.
And to ensure that the experience is in real time, sending video can be done in less than 500 milliseconds from the 360º camera to its treatment in the cloud and its subsequent arrival in virtual reality glasses. All this is possible as we have mentioned the 5G connection, since it allows ‘the transmission to the VR glasses of a large flow of videoor with 4K quality at high speed with minimal latency’. Just like they use fiber optics to send the video streams from the cameras to the server.
The Innovation Manager of Telefónica Spain, Leonor Ostos, explains that ‘this immersive experience it has been a technological challenge with which we wanted fans to enjoy football in an innovative and unprecedented way’. So it is clear that the idea at all times is to offer unprecedented perspectives of the stadium.
