Next year’s Olympic and Paralympic Games, set to take place in Tokyo, aim to provide spectators, athletes, and viewers with an unforgettable experience by way of facial recognition technology, 3D athlete tracking, 5G, virtual arenas, personalized experience for its viewers, and a melodic rhythm to energize venues and encourage athletes. Here’s the latest on those stories:
FACIAL RECOGNITION FOR ATHLETES AND MEDIA
Tech giants Intel and NEC will roll out a large-scale facial recognition technology system at next year’s Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.
The aforementioned companies will be partnering on a large-scale facial recognition system that will aim to shorten the waiting time for athletes, coaches, volunteers, and media to be processed through security checkpoints.
3D ATHLETE TRACKING, 5G, AND VIRTUAL ARENAS
The PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympics was the first event to be covered by the partnership between Intel and NEC, with Intel showcasing a range of 5G and Virtual Reality (VR) applications.
Connectivity, including 5G, will once again be a focus aside from new experiences powered by Intel’s technological capabilities such as 3D athlete tracking and virtual stadiums.
THE OLYMPIC CHANNEL TO CREATE PERSONALIZED EXPERIENCE FOR VIEWERS
Inaugurated at the closing ceremony of the Rio 2016 Games, the Madrid-based channel will be working side by side with the Tokyo Games organizers to keep the fans engaged in the Olympic Movement during and between the games, with its first real test coming in Japan.
“For us, Japan is the most important market. From January of this year through October of 2020, Japan is our most important market,” Mark Parkman, general manager of the Olympic Channel, told Japanese outlet Kyodo News.
“We want to be a place where those interested in the games can come and find great stories, great original programming, and information. We want to collaborate with Tokyo 2020 so that the digital experience for the fans is one of the best they’ve ever seen,” Parkman added.
To this day, the Olympic Channel is the only online platform dedicated to Olympic sports broadcasting 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The channel provides viewers with original programming, news, live coverage, sporting events, and highlights.
In order to create a personalized experience for its viewers, the broadcaster is now creating localized Japanese content, including articles and videos which it will provide to games organizers to use on their online sites.
TOKYO 2020 LAUNCHES ‘MAKE THE BEAT!’
The Tokyo 2020 Organizing Committee will launch ‘Make The Beat!,’ a project bringing sound, technology, and social media together all at once, allowing fans worldwide to partake in energizing venues while they encourage and cheer on their favorite teams and athletes.
‘Make the Beat!’ will fans closer to the official Tokyo 2020 beat, a melodic rhythm that spectators can dance or clap along to, encouraging fans to create their own #2020beat content to be played in venues and at Live Sites.
The official Tokyo 2020 beat was created from a range of 1,000 different sound samples reflecting the themes of “sports”, “Japanese culture”, “daily lives” and “nature”. Five different rhythms were compiled from these using Olympic Worldwide Partner Intel Corporation’s AI technology.