CBS Used 8K Cameras During Super Bowl LIII Broadcast

If you’re trying to put a new technology through a true stress test, what better way to do so than by incorporating it into one of the largest national television broadcasts of the year? That’s exactly what CBS did with their broadcast of Super Bowl LIII on Sunday night in Atlanta. There, the network became the first to use 8K cameras during a live television (and streaming) broadcast of the country’s marquee sporting event.

As the New England Patriots and Los Angeles Rams were busy battling for the NFL’s Lombardi Trophy, the CBS crew, headed by lead producer Jim Rikhoff and CBS Sports’ innovation chief Ken Aagaard, worked together to put on a broadcast that included some 115 cameras spaced throughout the Mercedes-Benz Stadium. Three of those cameras, Aagaard told Sports Illustrated prior to the big game, sported Sony 8K lenses.

“This could give us that one little shot,” he told the publication, “So of course it’s worth it.”