We’ve been expanding and upgrading our fleet of portable production units, and our newest system — PPU4 — is now in the final build stage. As demand for live event filming, multi-camera production, and broadcast-quality streaming continues to grow, keeping our equipment at the highest standard is essential.
With a packed summer schedule ahead, all eight PPUs and both of our outside broadcast vehicles will be fully deployed. That makes getting this new unit operational a top priority. We have just four days to complete the build before it heads straight to the Hay Festival for its first multi-camera production.
One more day of wiring, assembly, and system configuration should see PPU4 ready for a full day of soak testing — ensuring every camera channel, audio path, and engineering workflow performs flawlessly.
Another day, another build — and another upgrade that strengthens our live production capabilities for clients across the UK.
We’re filming Kim Wilde tonight — four cameras, a four-person crew and a full comms rack on site. This time we’re working for another director who wants to remotely direct our team while we capture four isolated camera feeds for post-production.
These will be mixed later with an additional four static cameras positioned around the venue, giving a full multi-camera view of the concert. A straightforward setup — and a perfect throwback to the best of the 80s revival.
Reaching 100,000+ live viewers might sound like something reserved for major broadcasters. However, with the right planning, technical infrastructure and experienced crew, large-scale live streams are more achievable than many organisations realise. Instead of relying on a single destination, this project required a fully synchronised broadcast across YouTube, Facebook Live and a private corporate platform. As a result, every component had to be designed for stability, redundancy and professional-grade quality.
At Bubble Production, we recently delivered a multi-camera broadcast that hit more than 100,000 concurrent viewers with zero buffering or downtime. Thanks to careful engineering and a robust workflow, the stream remained flawless throughout audience spikes and platform switching. This behind-the-scenes breakdown reveals exactly how we built the system — and what it takes to scale a stream to this level.
The Challenge: Delivering a Live Event to a Huge Online Audience
The client needed a real-time broadcast capable of reaching viewers on multiple platforms simultaneously. Additionally, the event required:
High-definition multi-camera coverage
Smooth branded graphics, lower thirds and sponsor content
Complete redundancy across all mission-critical systems
Zero visible interruptions for the audience
With tens of thousands expected to tune in, reliability became the top priority. Consequently, we approached the project as a full outside broadcast operation rather than a standard livestream.
The Setup: Multi-Camera, Multi-Platform and Fully Redundant
Armistice OBSteve Ryder on camera and Mark Nuttall on sound join Sharon Thomas (Calender Girls fame)
To meet the requirements, we designed a broadcast-grade, scalable workflow equipped to handle both high viewership and multi-platform distribution.
🔹 Cameras & Crew
A six-camera 4K setup covered the stage, audience, reaction shots and backstage areas. Meanwhile, a dedicated team — including a Director, Vision Mixer, Sound Engineer and multiple Camera Operators — ensured smooth coordination and continuous coverage.
🔹 Vision Mixing & Graphics
Live switching was handled through a Blackmagic ATEM 8K Constellation, allowing rapid transitions between camera angles. Furthermore, we integrated:
Lower thirds
Branded overlays
This provided a polished, television-style viewing experience.
🔹 Encoding & Transmission
To improve resilience, we implemented parallel encoding paths:
Primary: LiveU hardware encoders
Backup: Blackmagic encoders
Additionally, we delivered using bonded 4G/5G uplinks, ensuring the stream never relied on a single service. As a result, we could transmit SRT feeds to YouTube, Facebook Live and Vimeo Enterprise concurrently.
🔹 Audio & Comms
A full PA mix fed directly into the stream, while an internal comms network allowed the director, operators and control truck to respond instantly to changes on the ground.
The Infrastructure: Purpose-Built for Scale
Delivering a stream to 100,000+ concurrent viewers requires significant infrastructure. Therefore, we used adaptive bitrate encoding so that viewers with slower connections could still watch smoothly. Additionally, CDN distribution through Vimeo provided the global capacity needed to support heavy traffic without performance dips.
To increase reliability even further:
Redundant feeds were sent to separate ingest servers
Real-time analytics monitored latency, playback behaviour and live viewer numbers
Consequently, the entire broadcast ran without buffering, frame drops or audio loss.
Production Day: A Broadcast Operation in Motion
Our team arrived a day early to complete setup and deploy cabling on the street. Once the event went live, the production ran like a coordinated TV broadcast.
During the stream:
The Director called shots and managed pacing
The Vision Mixer handled transitions and source selection
The Technical Director monitored stream health, backups and CDN performance
The Marketing Team received live viewer statistics and engagement updates
Throughout the event, audience numbers climbed steadily and peaked at more than 100,000 concurrent viewers, eventually surpassing 250,000 total views within 48 hours.
Post-Event Results & Highlights
Once the event concluded, we supplied:
A high-quality master recording
Short highlight edits for social media
A comprehensive analytics report detailing viewer behaviour, watch time and geographic distribution
Feedback from the client was overwhelmingly positive:
“The quality was exceptional — smooth, professional, and exactly what we hoped for. We can’t believe how effortless it looked to the viewer.”
What We Learned: Key Takeaways for Large-Scale Streaming
Even with months of preparation, high-audience live streams always require agility. Several lessons stood out during this broadcast:
✔ Over-provision your internet capacity
It’s always safer to double (or triple) your estimated requirement.
✔ Redundancy is essential
Backup encoders, power supplies, audio paths and network links can prevent issues long before they reach the viewer.
✔ Test all platforms in advance
Simultaneous test streams highlight issues that isolated tests may miss.
✔ Skilled technicians make all the difference
A knowledgeable team can predict, prevent and resolve technical challenges instantly — ensuring complete reliability.
Ready to Scale Your Next Live Stream?
Whether you’re planning a conference, product launch, music festival or national broadcast, scaling a stream to large audiences doesn’t have to be intimidating. With broadcast-grade systems and a proven production workflow, Bubble Production can deliver multi-camera live streaming across the UK with the same reliability used for six-figure audience events.
🎥 Want to reach tens of thousands of viewers — reliably?
What a fantastic day in London with the team, delivering the official broadcast feed of the Armistice Parade from Whitehall for the Western Front Association. Our coverage went out across the web and to major broadcasters including BBC, Sky, GB News, and many more.
A huge thank you to everyone involved — we couldn’t have done it without you. It was a pleasure working with Steve Ryder, Chris Fenton, George Tarplee, Brian MacKenzie, Sharon Thomas, Johnny Coburn, Josh Tate, and of course our long-time colleague Mark Nuttall on sound.
If you missed the event, you can watch it again online.
What an incredible 11 days at the Three Choirs Festival — an absolute pleasure working with such a talented and dedicated team. The quality of our output has been exceptional, and it’s been an honour to work alongside every one of you.
A huge thank you to the entire Team Bubble for your hard work, creativity and commitment throughout the festival. And a special mention to Jon Essex for the brilliant edit — we love it.
After a full-on weekend at the Hay Festival, Team Bubble headed straight to the British Museum for another powerful project. We filmed an important story for Ukraine, broadcast live last night for the Pinchuk Foundation.
A long day, a great team effort, and an honour to help share such an important message.
It was a chilly one in Hay this year — sub-zero temperatures throughout the Hay Festival Winter Weekend — but Team Bubble were on site live streaming 24 talks across the event.
Despite the cold, it was another fantastic weekend filled with brilliant speakers, inspiring conversations and a wonderful festival atmosphere. Always a pleasure to be part of it.
It was an honour once again to deliver the live production for The Western Front Association from Whitehall in London today, commemorating the fallen of past conflicts.
This year brought additional challenges. Large-scale protests in central London meant the area was heavily restricted, with extremely limited 4G/5G connectivity — making live transmission far more difficult than usual. Despite this, our team successfully delivered two live streams:
A pool feed distributed to global news stations
A live stream to The Western Front Association’s social channels
A demanding weekend, but a privilege as always to support this important act of remembrance.
This year the Three Choirs Festival takes us to Gloucester — the world’s oldest classical music festival — and we’re delighted to be back providing sound, vision, lighting and power for all 11 days.
Our setup includes:
Four PTZ cameras
One operated long-lens camera
Six fixed cameras covering the orchestra
Full broadcast, audio and technical support
We specialise in live classical music production, working with a first-class team of conductors who serve as Music Directors. Their role is essential, ensuring every musical cue is captured accurately and that the visuals are perfectly timed with the performance.
Another year, another unforgettable festival — and always an honour to be part of it.
We’re back in Manchester working on the multi-award-winning original podcast series The Overlap, featuring Gary Neville, Jamie Carragher, Jill Scott, Ian Wright and Roy Keane. This is one of our regular recordings for our partner BuzzTV, and always a highlight in the schedule.
Bubble Production provides the full outside broadcast (OB) facility, including crew, cameras, comms and live mixing. Each episode is recorded ‘as-live’, giving the production its natural energy and flow. After recording, the BuzzTV team add graphics, finishing touches and final polish before transmission just a few hours later.
A brilliant team, a brilliant format — always great to be part of it.
