Following the recent launch of the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max, Apple has been showcasing the camera capabilities of its new models in an inventive way: using the phones to cover Major League Baseball games. The last two editions of Friday Night Baseball on Apple TV+ have featured several shots taken from the iPhone 17 Pro, mixed in with shots from more traditional cameras.
“TV cameras are inherently large with big lenses, and they take up a lot of real estate,” Executive Producer of Live Sports at Apple TV Royce Dickerson told TechRadar. “It’s about getting into new places for customers to see an angle of a game that they might not have seen before, and being able to see a story told about a game in a different way.”
For coverage during a game between the Detroit Tiger and Boston Red Sox, four iPhone 17 Pros were positioned in different locations around Fenway Park, including the famous Green Monster and the home dugout. The phones run the Blackmagic Camera app, and use direct fiber connections or RF to communicate with the broadcast team, transferring the captured 1080p 60fps footage in real time.
“Those phones are being treated just like any other camera. It’s the power of the phone, and the ease with which it can be integrated into professional systems is amazing,” summed up Dickerson.
