Do you know what to expect from this year's Paris Olympics?

Communication World Network News (CWW) When technology meets sports, what kind of sparks will be created? When Alibaba joins hands with its cutting-edge AI technology to bring the classic "bullet time" in movie special effects to the broadcast of real-world sports events, what kind of journey will the audience embark on?

"Bullet Time" captures every moment

Imagine the collision of rugby sevens, the moment when a badminton ball leaps over the net, or the beautiful gesture of a skateboarder flipping in the air at the Paris Olympics. This is not a scene from a science fiction movie, but a miracle that will be real-life on the Olympic stage.

"Bullet Time", a classic special effect derived from the movie "The Matrix", is now empowered by Alibaba, and has a new vitality.

How did Alibaba achieve this feat? It is understood that the high-degree playback "bullet time" provided by Alibaba Cloud for the Olympic broadcast is a broadcast technology that reconstructs the wonderful moments captured in real time in the game in the cloud through high-speed camera arrays and advanced cloud computing technology, and plays them back from multiple angles.

"Bullet Time" is not only a replay of wonderful moments, it is also an immersive interactive experience. The "space-time freeze" technology freezes the continuous movements of the time sequence into the 3D space, which not only allows the audience to see the movements clearly, but also realizes 360-degree multi-angle viewing, and plays back the wonderful moments of the athletes. Spectators feel as if they are in the middle of the arena, fighting side by side with the athletes. This way of watching the game greatly enhances the audience's sense of participation and immersion, and makes the charm of sports events infinitely magnified.

According to Alibaba, the technology has been tested in the field during the Paris Olympic Qualifying Tournament in Shanghai to ensure the smooth operation of the official competition. In fact, as early as 2022, this technology has already begun to be applied in curling and speed skating competitions at the Beijing Winter Olympics. At this year's Paris Olympics, the system will have more AI functions and be deployed in more competition scenarios. It is understood that this technology will be deployed in 14 venues of the Paris Olympics and used in the broadcast of events such as rugby sevens, badminton, track and field, basketball, beach volleyball, table tennis, wrestling, tennis, judo, break dancing, BMX freestyle and skateboarding.

Alibaba's initiative is not only a revolutionary subversion of traditional sports event broadcasting, but also another milestone in the application of AI technology in the field of sports. It is a testament to the power of technology to transcend imagination and bring fantasy scenes from movies to life, bringing unprecedented viewing experience to sports fans around the world.

For the first time ever! Cloud broadcasting surpasses satellite broadcasting

Since Alibaba became a global partner of the Olympic Games in 2017, it has continued to inject new vitality into the Olympic Games through its advanced technology and innovative thinking.

In 2018, Alibaba unveiled a cloud data center for the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics and jointly launched 0BS Cloud with Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS). At the time of the Tokyo Olympics, the official content portal of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games was launched on Tmall, and the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games became the first Olympic Games to be broadcast on the cloud. In 2022, Alibaba supported the Beijing Winter Olympics to become the first Winter Olympics with its core systems to be migrated to the cloud. In 2024, Alibaba will continue to provide technical support for the Paris Olympics with AI-driven cloud computing technology.

IOC President Thomas Bach revealed that OBS LiveCloud will replace satellites as the main way to broadcast Olympic events live at the Paris Olympics. More than two-thirds of the live broadcast signals of the Olympic Games will be transmitted from Paris to more than 200 countries and regions around the world through the Olympic broadcast cloud supported by Alibaba Cloud, reaching billions of viewers.

Yiannis Exarchos, CEO of OBS, pointed out that the newly upgraded OBS Cloud 3.0 will now support the largest cloud broadcast in history during the Paris Olympics while adding more features.

According to Sotiriss · Salamuris, chief technology officer of OBS, compared with the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, cloud technology will play an important role in the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, and its application is becoming more and more mature. Cloud broadcasting has become the mainstream method of content broadcasting, and it is applied to mega events such as the Olympic Games, and global audiences will watch the games through cloud broadcasting.

Cloud computing not only reduces the high cost of traditional satellite broadcasting, but also has lower latency and richer content. What's more, broadcasters no longer need to deploy equipment and systems in advance, drastically reducing the number of equipment and personnel in the field.

According to the International Olympic Committee, Paris 2024 will be another major technological advance since satellite television began broadcasting the Tokyo 1964 Games. This year will also be the first Olympic Games in history to make extensive use of AI technology. Alibaba Cloud's AI augmentation technology has been deployed in 14 venues, and it can achieve high-degree playback of images in the live broadcast signal that took more than 10 hours in the past.

Yannis · Exachers, CEO of Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS), said that at the International Broadcast Center, they plan to produce 11,000 hours of ultra-high-definition content, equivalent to 450 days of content, four or five times more than the previous year, and need a strong and reliable infrastructure to support it. At first, there were doubts about cloud technology, but after seeing the vision drive and technical expertise of the Alibaba Cloud team, these doubts were dispelled. This year's Paris Olympics will have 13% fewer international broadcasting centres than the Tokyo Olympics and 23% less than the Rio 2016 Olympics. Less space can produce more content, thanks to Alibaba Cloud's large-scale applications. Alibaba Cloud not only improves the efficiency of broadcasting, but also makes the broadcast of events faster, more interesting, and more engaging. At the same time, Alibaba Cloud has also supported the operation of olympics.com on the cloud, and the website is expected to become the world's largest sports platform. Exsax emphasized that Alibaba is extremely important to OBS as a partner, not only to help it transform, but also to make the Olympics more exciting and efficient.

From cloud computing to artificial intelligence, Alibaba's technological innovations have been a catalyst for the broadcast and operation of global sporting events. Let's look forward to witnessing every shocking moment brought by technology at the Paris Olympic Games, and feeling the infinite charm of the perfect integration of the information and communication industry and sports.