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SVG Audio Production and Distribution Workshop

Monday, December 15, 2025
Time: 1:30 – 5:30 p.m.
Location: Rendezvous, 3rd Floor

Immersive Everywhere, Virtualized Audio Production Workflows, and Next Generation Audio for Streaming

During this last year the transition to direct-to-consumer distribution of sports content from legacy linear broadcasting has continued to accelerate. This is great news for audio.  DTC enables improved encode-once straight audio paths to consumers. Streaming services are well positioned to layer-in next generation audio systems and take advantage of enhanced immersive experiences and consumer-friendly personalization and accessibly.  Sports content now sits on premium services alongside Hollywood-derived immersive HDR content, occasioning a step-up in production quality.  At the same time, some ad-supported services struggle to re-learn the basics of loudness management in the environment of third-party automatic ad insertion services.  As global rights for major events become a possibility for the largest services, the pressure to efficiently scale commentary and accessibility internationally becomes a challenge. On the production side, virtualization of workflow and infrastructure continue to leverage digital networking, software-based systems, and AI tools from the microphones on the field of play, to distributed console systems, all the way to QC, master control, and beyond.  Please join SVG Audio for an examination of the implications of evolving production and distribution technology and share perspectives and experiences from A1s, designers and technologists on recent and upcoming global events.

1:30 pm
Welcoming Remarks
Mon 15 Dec, 2025
1:30 pm - 1:45 pm - (All times are in EST Time Zone)
Speakers:
Roger Charlesworth, SVG Audio, Executive Director
Jim Starzynski, NBC Universal, Director and Principal Audio Engineer, SVG Audio, Chairman


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1:45 pm
Improving Dialogue Intelligibility in Media?
Mon 15 Dec, 2025
1:45 pm - 2:00 pm - (All times are in EST Time Zone)
Speaker:
Jim Starzynski, NBC Universal, Director and Principal Audio Engineer, SVG Audio, Chairman


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2:00 pm
Compressed Contribution and Distribution Flows for Next-Generation Audio
Mon 15 Dec, 2025
2:00 pm - 2:15 pm - (All times are in EST Time Zone)
The demands for increasingly higher channel counts for immersive audio, alternate music, multiple language support, and discrete object elements have completely outstripped the decades-old SDI-based channel counts common in program workflows throughout production and distribution. Can existing high-quality low-latency codecs be adapted into an open standard to synchronously transport significantly larger channels counts in existing transport stream bandwidth?
Speaker:
James Cowdery, Dolby Laboratories, Director Live Workflow Architecture, Entertainment Technology Group


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2:15 pm
IP-Enabled Digital Microphones
Mon 15 Dec, 2025
2:15 pm - 3:00 pm - (All times are in EST Time Zone)
This year native-IP digital beam-forming microphones have emerged to play a significant role in live sports production. We will get an update from their designers and end-users and discuss the use-cases that have resonated with A1s.
Panelists:
Jason Blood, Senior Audio Engineer
Gary Dixon, Audio-Technica, Director, Broadcast Business Development
Colin Ritchie, Voyage Audio, Co-Founder & Lead Engineer
Everett Salyer, Shure Inc, Senior Specialist, Business Development
Glenn Stilwell, AppleTV Friday Night Baseball, Sound Supervisor; Dolby Laboratories, “Live” Mixing Consultant; NBC Olympics, Senior Audio Maintenance Engineer


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3:00 pm
Networking Break in Exhibits
Mon 15 Dec, 2025
3:00 pm - 3:45 pm - (All times are in EST Time Zone)
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3:45 pm
Countdown to Milan Cortina 2026
Mon 15 Dec, 2025
3:45 pm - 4:15 pm - (All times are in EST Time Zone)
A final check-in with Karl Malone on preparations for this winter’s games and a glimpse at some of the audio innovations due for their first Olympic outing.
Speaker:
Karl Malone, NBC Sports and Olympics, Senior Director of Audio Engineering


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4:15 pm
AI Enabled Tools for QC and Analysis in Multi-Stream Production
Mon 15 Dec, 2025
4:15 pm - 4:45 pm - (All times are in EST Time Zone)
Adapting to scaled-up program offerings is one of the key challenges faced in the transition to DTC. Similarly global-scale streamers must increasingly contend with multiple language support across international footprints. These factors make manual QC and analysis of live programming virtually impossible. We’ll explore how AI based tools are evolving to perform detailed analysis of multiple concurrent live audio programs and are developing sophisticated.
Speaker:
Rob Oldfield, Salsa Sound, CEO and Co-Founder


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4:45 pm
Perspectives on Live Audio Production and Distribution
Mon 15 Dec, 2025
4:45 pm - 5:30 pm - (All times are in EST Time Zone)
Our panel will share their perspectives on live audio production and distribution, including the role of direct-to-consumer models in opening up premium immersive and NGA formats, while expanding the volume of content production required.
Panelists:
Florian Brown, Sound Supervisor
Karl Malone, NBC Sports and Olympics, Senior Director of Audio Engineering
Rob Oldfield, Salsa Sound, CEO and Co-Founder
Brian Rio, BVR Consultancy, Principal
Ceri Thomas, IMMERSV, Founder


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5:30 pm
Opening Night Reception in Exhibits
Mon 15 Dec, 2025
5:30 pm - 6:30 pm - (All times are in EST Time Zone)
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