SpotlightOmega At The Olympics: Project Paris 2024 And The New Timekeeping Advancements
In their 31st turn as official timekeepers of one of the oldest and most followed sporting events in the world, Omega have developed a few new advancements in how they’ll not only time the events, but also gather data on performance. That itself is not completely new, but there are plenty of new features that we’ll see at the upcoming Summer Olympic Games, Paris 2024. Here’s the lowdown
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Last month, Omega launched their campaign for the 31st time that they’ll be the official timekeepers of the Olympic Games. The visuals and videos all showcased prominent athletes, who will be competing this year, in larger-than-life avatars, taking over the city of Paris, just as an event as big as the Olympics will. It highlighted the spirit and passion of sportspersons dedicated to outperform themselves, and the energy of the games enveloping the city. While that was more about the glamour, emotions and spirit surrounding the event, Omega soon came down to business, as they always do. Earlier this month, they unveiled the new technologies that they’ll be using to time Paris 2024, with a number of new innovations to not just time, but to measure performance intricacies, for several of the events among the 329 that they’ll be timing, across 32 sports.
Closing in on 92 years of timing the Olympics—barring a few editions of the games in the 90s-2000s, when they’d handed over the torch to sister brand Swatch—Omega have constantly developed new ways to better the accuracy of timing, for fair and unchallengeable results. From using simple timing equipment such as the humble mechanical stopwatch, to developing highly advanced technology including sensors and whatnot, Omega have done it all.
Here’s a comprehensive history of Omega’s evolution as the Olympics’ official timekeepers
Up until Tokyo 2020, it seemed like they were all set with their timekeeping prowess, and it just couldn’t get more advanced than that. However, with Paris 2024, they have a few more tricks up their sleeves.
The Scan ‘o’ Vision Ultimate For Paris 2024
Capturing athletes’ moves that the naked eye may not be able to grasp in a split second, without leaving a shadow of a doubt is essential. For that, the highest-resolution cameras are required, not just for action replays, but also to track and record performance analytics data. The new Scan ‘o’ Vision Ultimate is just that and more. With its ability to capture up to 40,000 images per second at finish lines, it’s going to add tremendous value to judging performance at Paris 2024. Other features include colour sensors for cleaner, sharper images for foolproof recording of action on the tracks.
Paris 2024 To Have Enhanced Computer Vision Technology
With the Computer Vision Technology that Omega will use at Paris 2024, the focus shifts from the ultimate in recording, for clarity in results beyond dispute, to tracking finer nuances of performance on the field. The angle at which a serve is made, the distance between the jumper and the bar, the speed of a ball, and so much more—this is what the enhanced computer vision technology will do. Single and multi-camera outputs inform AI models trained for every sport that this technology will be used for.
With this enhanced computer vision technology at Paris 2024, Omega’s real-time data capturing will build a ‘narrative’ of every event, for definitive results of the competitions, without athletes being required to wear sensors. Meanwhile, it helps offer the audience a more ‘immersive experience’, and provides judges the tools for more sound decisions, hence reducing deliberation.
The Vionardo Debuts at Paris 2024
With the new Vionardo, 4K UHD graphics and visuals will be generated, real-time, in multiple languages for the use of broadcasters globally. Additionally, the remote graphics it can produce will reduce the need of on-site infrastructure, and that will hence be more sustainable as well.
With all of this, in addition to timing, tracking and gathering of data that has already been used in the Olympic Games up to Tokyo 2024, it’s quite clear that Omega’s research and development as the official timekeepers of the games will not end here. While the focus right now is completely on Paris 2024, they are already preparing for the Winter Olympic Games, Milano Cortina 2026, and the next Summer Olympic Games, Los Angeles 2028.
All the while though, Omega’s ‘day job’, of watchmaking, is definitely not forgotten. Last year, they presented a Paris 2024 special edition Seamaster to mark the one-year countdown to the Olympics. And to mark the 100-day countdown earlier this year, it was the Speedmaster Chronoscope line that saw Paris 2024 special editions in gold and in steel.
We’re just days away from Paris 2024, and the excitement is surely building up in the French capital. Let the games begin.
