Calrec Craft Interview With Jamie McCombs

This Sunday February 9 sees the annual return of the US' biggest television event, the Super Bowl LIX. Jamie McCombs, Fox Sports Audio Consultant / Sr. Audio will capture the sound creating a dynamic fan experience using Calrec consoles.

Can you tell us about your background Jamie, and how you started in the industry?
It all started about 39 years ago, when I was in high school. I was given the opportunity to run the parabolic microphones on the sideline for NFL games. Being out there every weekend, I fell in love with it and kept learning and moving up. I had some great mentors in college, and I stuck with television. It really feels like yesterday!
I moved through the ranks from an A2, setting things up on the field, to an A1 where I started mixing shows for Fox. I mixed NFL and then moved over to college sports for ten years when they started covering college football. Then I came back about four years ago to mix the NFL games for Fox Sports.

Can you tell us about your Super Bowl experience and how you approach planning such a massive event?
I covered the Super Bowl in Phoenix in 2023. There's a huge amount of planning behind the scenes, lots of zoom calls and meetings. For this year's event, we've been to New Orleans for meetings two or three times to do walkthroughs with the NFL and microphone placement. This enables us to plan how much we can use out in the field and in the announcement area. It takes a lot of time, Fox Sports starts planning way earlier, it's year-round for management.

How many audio channels are you managing?
In the field, just the microphones to capture the event. I think we have upwards of 50 microphones to hear everything that could possibly happen in the locker room and hallway areas, and the field of play. For our show, we have three talent including two roving talent on the field.

Do they introduce new tech each year?
We try to experiment with something new, but Fox has broadcast the NFL for quite some time. They know what we're expecting and what we want to do, especially the basics of trying to capture all the sounds on the field: what the announcers’ positions are, how many people, how many announcers, that kind of thing. They have a very good idea of what to expect, but if we have the opportunity we try and do something special.
We mic the goal posts, so you can hear when the ball hits and we always use several crowd mics to capture the experience and the family action. We really like to emphasise those things.

How has this developed over time? Are there changing trends?
I think we just push it more and more; you want to hear the fan reactions. Just last week, we were at the NFC Championship in Philadelphia and the fans started their chant after the scores and the whole stadium spelled out 'Eagles'. You want to capture that sound. You want it big and expansive, so we put out quite a few crowd mics around the stadium to capture its vast size. You can kind of hear the space and feel how big the stadium is, it sounds really good.

What do you strive to achieve when you're approaching a major live sports event like the Super Bowl and how do you think it’s developed over the years?
It’s truly special because so many people watch it, and you just want to give people at home the most exciting experience; you want to give them that 'wow' factor. So, we try extra hard to bring what we feel they want to hear during the game.
It's got bigger for sure. Not just from the game aspect, but the pre-game too. Our studio presence here is massive. We have sets in the stadium, sets out on Bourbon Street, on top of parking garages. It's a big footprint, game side and studio side.

How do you approach the mix?
It’s a fine balance because you want the fan reaction but we're truly here to capture the sounds of the game. Viewers really want to hear the quarterback cadence, the snap of the ball, the impact when a really big tackle happens. You're hoping everybody at home is saying 'Oh, wow'. That's when you really know you've captured something. It's a fine balance, you hear the crowd and the fans, but you really want to capture the sounds of the game because that's what gets people excited.
We've been doing multiple mixes from one of the trucks all year. We also facilitate the international compounds, and we have our domestic Fox Sports mix using the Calrec Apollo console in Game Creek's Encore truck. There's a group called Cosm that we send feeds to. They have a fan experience where fans can go and watch the game in a big screen immersive setting.

When it comes to the audio output, do you think viewer expectations have changed?
Sure, especially in terms of how they’re listening at home. They're not just listening through their TV anymore. They have 5.1 rooms now, sound bars have come a long way, as has the quality of audio. They want to hear more and to have a better product. We push the 5.1 atmosphere because we know people at home are enjoying it. Fans can really maximise the home viewing experience in the 5.1 world.
I'm very lucky, I work with top-notch people including Kevin Burkhardt and Tom Brady. When they hear things that are really good on the field, they will just lay out because they want to hear it too. It's a fun relationship I have with them, they'll hear if I'm sneaking in something that sounds good, and they'll just stop talking so we can really enjoy it.
But we must have balance, we want to bring an exciting sound to the game, but we don't want to compete with the announcers. They're experts and you’ve got to be able to hear their commentary, but you still want to make it exciting and bring the sounds of the game.
On social media, you'll sometimes see when we're having too much fun and we're pushing the effects a little too much, it just sounds so good. You're excited, and everybody's doing a good job, but you’ve got to reset and get the announcers back in there a little bit more.

Tell us about your audio setup?
The Super Bowl is a hybrid IP setup this year; we have three Calrec Apollo consoles in Encore, PrimeOne and Varsity Game Creek trucks and four Calrec Artemis consoles across Encore, PrimeOne, Edit 4 and FSJE in the compound. All Calrec consoles are interconnected with ImPulse cores or Hydra2 cores via AoIP Gateways, and some via MADI streams.
Encore, which is being used to mix the game and PrimeOne, which is being used to mix studio shows, both use Calrec Apollo and Artemis consoles and are connected to the AoIP network, and Hydra2 network via Gateways and MADI streams. The Artemis consoles in the Edit 4 truck do all the early shows from Bourbon Street. Our studio show called 'Purple Carpet' where all the celebrities come in, is mixed on a Calrec Apollo in Game Creek’s Varsity truck and Fox Sports FSJE truck uses a Calrec Artemis to operate tape release.
Being able to share between all the consoles is fantastic. Right now, we're running AoIP through an AoIP Gateway so we can share stuff back and forth between each console. The MADI streams make it really easy - we share a lot of information throughout the whole compound with all the different entities.

Do you think we've reached a plateau with flexible workflows, or do you think they will continue to develop?
I'm sure there's ways to develop. As an industry leader, Calrec definitely makes connectivity easy, and the products are very user friendly, but I'm sure there's something coming that I don't know about yet that would make it easier. Every time I think we've hit a plateau, there's improvement, so it's very exciting.

What project have you most enjoyed working on and why?
Definitely the Super Bowl, it is a big one. But there's been plenty of other projects I've worked on that are a lot of fun. When you go to Daytona 500, the energy there, seeing those cars at 200 plus mph is impressive.
Shawn Peacock and myself worked on the British Open for ten years and that was a very special event. I'm sure there's a few more I'm missing out but definitely big events where a lot of people are watching; it's a lot of fun.

How do you see audio evolving over the next five years?
I'm curious about 5.1 and 7.1 immersive channels and what we can do with new technologies, transport and transmissions. We can include more audio channels; they keep adding more and more. I don't know what the end is or how far we can go with it, but it's exciting.

Do you think COVID impacted how you approached those first games and how have things changed since then?
I came in right after COVID, so there were already fans back in the stadium when I started with this crew. I was still doing college football during COVID, which was a little more relaxed about allowing fans in. We had an 80,000-seat stadium with about 20,000 fans.
When we came back from COVID we really pushed the fan experience, so you could hear the crowd more because everybody was so excited to be back. Full stadiums and people cheering, we really pushed that.

How long have you been using Calrec products and what are the benefits?
I started working on Calrec's Q and S series back in the analogue days, so it's been quite a while. I would definitely say Calrec is an industry standard. Any time we walk into a truck and there's a Calrec, you always feel comfortable, like you're going to have a great show. It definitely makes it easy, just sharing and working the workflows with other consoles in the compound.
With a Calrec it's muscle memory, we've used them for so long and we're very familiar with them. They're very user-friendly and have all the screens that you need to do the show in front of you. They're also very easy to set up quickly; I really enjoy working on them.

Do you have any tips or words of wisdom that you'd give to audio engineers who are starting out?
I look at the younger generation coming up and wonder where you start in this industry, because it seems like every show we work on now is tough. With the time constraints and the size of the shows it's hard, so when you get your opportunity, take it!
Work hard, embrace and keep up with the technology and always try and help. You’ll shoot up the ranks if you make everything work like it should.