SuperJake and others,
1) Thanks for referring me to the NASA site that contains both playable and downloadable versions of the TriplePlay animation. That video is a great way to show newbies and sponsors/parents/teachers and other "outsiders" how the game actually works.
2) I did talk to somebody at FIRST today who stated that we can use that video and embed it into our own team highlights video as long as a) we give NASA credit for doing the animation and b) that we don't sell the highlights video.
3) I teach video editing and also do a lot of various projects for schools (sports highlights, etc). So, I will convert the MOV quicktime files into AVI, MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 and burn to disk or tape for anyone that can't do that themselves. Just send me a note.
4) I also saw that the team from Brazil used this animation video and did Portuguese overlays (subtitles). All of which is very easy to do using free software such as MS-MovieMaker or I-Movie (for Macs).
5) Yes, SuperJake is correct, in that RADtools and others can convert MOV to various other formats. You can do a google search and find many converters (shareware) via
www.download.com etc.
6) Here's what I plan to do with the highlights video. I will NOT be showing it full-screen. Instead, I'll do it as a window in the video, and in the frame around the animation, I'll have some simple text such as "autonomous mode for 15 seconds" that pops onto the screen in sync with the narrator's voice.
7) I have created many short videos including some very funny "public service announcements" that were played at the Toronto regional. You can see them on our photo-sharing site at "rollingthunder.smugmug.com" or link directly to:
http://rollingthunder.smugmug.com/gallery/459742