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If you’ve watched NFL Sundays or coverage of the Euros this year on Fox, Gina Izerel might’ve created the designs on the screens behind the talent.
It has already been a big year in sports, between the Kansas City Chiefs winning their second straight Super Bowl and the Copa America and Euro Championships falling on the same day.
Gina Izerel helps bring these moments to life for sports fans. The 2023 Northeastern University graduate went from the classrooms of the College of Arts, Media and Design to Fox Sports in Los Angeles, taking a role as a graphics/realtime artist for the network. The designs you see on the stage during Sunday football games? She helps create them.
As if her first year on the job already wasn’t exciting enough, Izerel also snagged three Emmy nominations for her work for production design, graphic design, and for technical teamwork on Fox’s NFL programming.
“It felt really amazing,” Izerel says of her nominations. “It’s really cool to have those achievements recognized. I don’t do what I do for awards, but just to know that the work I’m putting out there is impacting our technology and art and also just bringing people joy every Sunday makes me really happy.”
Izerel works for the graphics team doing both design and technical work. Using 3D tools and software, including Unreal Engine, she helps build environments and backdrops that appear behind commentators for shows such as “Fox NFL Sunday.”
Each season and sport requires creating new packages and models. Right now, Izerel and her team are gearing up for football season, but her favorite project was working on the Copas and Euros. The soccer championships were the first projects she worked through from start to finish and the team worked overtime to bring their work to the next level.
Izerel studied game art and animation at Northeastern, drawn to the program for the way it allowed her to explore both the technical and creative sides of the field.
“It opened doors to both animation and game design,” Izerel says. “I’m an artist, but also a technologist. I wanted to be a designer and an artist, so that’s why I chose Northeastern. … Being a generalist and having all those doors open, I found that to be very useful.”
She ended up taking a class with Michael Swartz, an associate professor of game art, animation and game design, on virtual environment design and learned about virtual production, the idea of using LED screens instead of green screens. This method allows for the building of 3D backdrops instead of a flat one.
“I had a great time in Michael Swartz’s classes,” she says. “He definitely inspired me to pursue what I’m doing right now. I did a lot of side projects and personal projects along with my class projects to reiterate what I was learning and that helped me build up a really strong portfolio that really engaged a lot of my interests. That was a really large element of how I got to where I am.”
Izerel did a co-op at Universal Pictures where she created 3D environments for LED walls and screens for Hollywood films. After getting a taste of this, she wanted to continue to pursue this after graduating and ended up coming across an open role at Fox Sports. The position creating 3D environments for sports broadcasts was different from what Izerel had been doing, but still enticing.
“Upon a bit of research, I discovered Fox really invested a lot of time and effort into building up their virtual production stage and I was immediately blown away. I ended up interviewing with them and getting the role, and it really worked out for the best because I’m really happy here. … We’ve got a really talented team who’s able to realize a lot of ideas. The sky is the limit,” Izerel says.
“Every day in our industry, there’s so much that changes,” Izerel says. “There’s so much that we’re learning. Software is constantly advancing and our technology constantly has to keep up. Every day, we’re faced with a new kind of challenge to solve and we do so as a team. I’m learning something new every day and I’m at the forefront of technology. It’s a really exciting time in our entertainment industry right now.”