2013 Lessons Learned: The Negative

[Arthur Downer]

While I am sure this has been addressed, I want to make sure it is mentioned. Camera angles. Right now, for those who don't know, the official streams involve zooming in on "exciting" parts of the match and displaying fully on the screen. While I understand FIRST is trying to make it viewer friendly, there are several flaws to this methodology. We can see them best by seeing why it is used in most sports and why.

• Baseball: used to follow the ball and to observe player stances (think pitcher) during stagnant periods of play. Note that camera often goes to a wide shot.
• Football: used heavily during replays and play analysis. Camera also follows ball at wide angle during play.
• Soccer: same as football
• Tennis: used between play to show players, neglected during play
• Swimming: used in replays, other than that FOV is kept in a position to keep all swimmers in view

Based on a very small sample size, it would appear that in order to avoid missing action, these sports give coverage of large portions of the field during action-packed moments, saving zoom-shots for after the play. Note that there are some differences between those sports and FRC, most notably the fans caring about 1/6th of the players much more than the other 5/6ths, and there being many game pieces.
THE SOLUTION:
Make the stream Michigan-style; fixed, full-field, top-down view of the game. If you HAVE to zoom in, save it for a separate stream and/or instant replays. And yes, instant replays would be AWESOME!!!

If I have one final note, it would be that getting matches up on an official youtube page would be very much appreciated! I am sure teams would love to help out, but the team-led coverage in Michigan is exceptional, and FIRST could use to learn from it.