Coordinated Regional Video Archiving..

[Dave Flowerday]

Originally Posted by Joel J.

Ah.. so YouTube or Google video would be good as a complement, but should not be used as the main repository for storing all the regional video. I wonder what SOAP thinks about all of this? I would think they'd be happy to get all the regionals archived on their site. Maybe I should ask them.

At some point you run into the real problem of storage and bandwidth. Obviously the video itself would take up a lot of storage space. Not so big a deal if you're storing it on your 500GB USB hard drive at home, but that can be expensive if the storage is located on a real dedicated server on the Internet. The other problem is bandwidth. You need lots of it. In this case you really want to have a machine in a datacenter with multiple connections to the various Internet backbones that cover the US. A single T1 will not cut it. Having only a single connection to one provider will probably mean very poor download times for certain people as the data has to hop through a bunch of different networks. Of course, when you get such a server in a datacenter like this, they tend to cap the amount of data you can transfer each month. Having 100s of people downloading regional video will chew through this in a hurry!

What would be interesting would be to see if we could somehow come up with a server with plenty of storage (maybe a generous donation or maybe a bunch of teams pitch in and split the cost or something) that we could convince an institution connected with FIRST to host for us (some organization that has lots of bandwidth, like a major university or perhaps something like NASA). If we could pull off something like that maybe we could also standardize a webcasting system too (that also uses up enormous amounts of bandwidth).

[Jonathan Norris]

As I mentioned before google video allows users to download the video (as long as it is not copyrighted), here is an example of a video from GTR I posted a while back. On the right you can select to download it as a .mp4 file at high quality, same as I get from SOAP. Where as you can only download youtube files as .flv (flash video files). With both youtube and google video you can embed them into a web site, click the blue "Email - Blog - Myspace" button then embed HTML link and you can have a nice little 400X326 video player. I can hopefully see something like this implemented into CD Media, seeing the the videos are not hosted here and will be in the most central of locations, Chief Delphi. If we cannot make that work here, I think it is a good idea to try it on another service like SOAP.

[Mike AA]

Do most of you think the location would have to be available to be downloadable all year round? Or would only march through june or so be sufficient? I can get my ISP to up my upload speed for a few months with little effort. And at my current location I can probably get a donated connection to my BPW's fiberoptic to get a good 30MB upload speed. I will talk to them this coming week and see what I can come up with. The biggest issue, as already mentioned is the money factor. I can get a 1.5-3.0 MB upload but it'll cost me around $300/month.

-Mike

[Pavan Dave]

Hey,

If you cant find somebody else, depending on my schedule I might be able to break up some regional footage. But I'll give you a definate anwser when you ask me.

Pavan.

[lukevanoort]

Is there a reason the videos have to be stored centrally? Wouldn't it be easier to have, say, 100 sites with something like half a regional's worth of videos, and a central site that just links to them? Just a thought...

[Joel J]

Ok. I just heard back from Randy (at Sevaa, the hosting company SOAP uses), and based on what he says, hosting/bandwidth for these videos should not be a problem. So I guess now we just have to work on getting, parsing, and uploading the videos, as the regionals happen.

I'll see if I can contact the people at SOAP (or if someone on CD knows, then they can share) to see what they are working on as far as scouting information goes. I know that a few years ago they had a very nice scouting interface with information from pretty much every regional, and I'm curious if they are going to provide that this year.

The complete package:

1. Match Videos
2. Match scores
3. Robot pictures
4. Robot stats
5. Overall stats

Aiming a little bit high here, but whatever. One step at a time.

[soap108]

The last I heard the 108 team will be attending the Florida and Las Vegas events. I know firsthand there will be a SOAP effort in Boston again. You could add that to the list in this thread.

KA-108

[ay2b]

I'm planning on recording LA & San Diego (for my own sake). If someone wants to organize something more, I'm happy to share my recordings. Just let me know who/what/where/when/how.

--AJ

[soap108]

The capture device we used last year and intend to use again is Xpert DVD Maker USB 2.0 by KWorld. http://www.soap.circuitrunners.com/2...-1022inset.jpg
It captures at 720x480. We use windows media encoder (free) with the latest codecs.
If there's no real objection, may we ask that e1 try this format?

Regardless, if you digitize it we'll gladly host it.

Regards,
KA-108

[Joel J]

Ok, so things are coming together.. a little bit. Only 14 regionals that don't yet have people interested in recording.

I think I outlined the basic plan in one of my posts above, but will be trying to work out some details very soon, to actually see how the whole process may evolve.

BAE SYSTEMS Granite State Regional 	- J. Norris
NASA / VCU Regional 			- Rob2713g
New Jersey Regional 			- Alex Burman
Pacific Northwest Regional 		- M. Krass
St. Louis Regional 			- 
Arizona Regional 			- Donut
Bayou Regional				- DeepWater
Brazilian Pilot 			- Manoel
Finger Lakes Regional 			- Koko Ed
Florida Regional 			- SOAP
Great Lakes Regional 			- SAV1337
Los Angeles Regional 			- ayb2
Pittsburgh Regional 			- Noah K.
Wisconsin Regional 			- Kevin K
Boilermaker Regional 			- Mike AA
Chesapeake Regional 			- Alex Burman
Detroit Regional 			- 
Greater Kansas City Regional 		- 
Midwest Regional 			- 
Peachtree Regional 			- 
Silicon Valley Regional 		- 
UTC Connecticut Regional 		- 
New York City Regional 			- Noah K.
Boston Regional 			- SOAP
Buckeye Regional 			- Koko Ed
San Diego Regional 			- ayb2
Waterloo Regional 			- J. Norris, SAV1337
GM/Technion Israel Regional 		- 
Colorado Regional 			- 
Davis Sacramento Regional 		- 
Greater Toronto Regional 		- J. Norris, SAV1337
Las Vegas Regional 			- SOAP
Lone Star Regional 			- 
Palmetto Regional 			- 
Philadelphia Regional 			- 
SBPLI Long Island Regional 		- 
West Michigan Regional			- Mike AA

[SSMike]

That would be a great idea if we could videotape the matches. It would be cool to have them on video. Also it would help strategize against teams.

[Joel J]

Alright, its getting close(r) to showtime, so I think its a good time to revive this thread. For those who are willing to record, how are you planning on recording the regional feed? That is, are you recording to a VHS that has to be digitized, are you recording to a digital format? Are you going to use the setup SOAP108 has suggested? If you aren't sure, then what options do you have for recording? I think now's a good time to get an idea of what formats of video will be coming in, and of how to actually parse the hours of footage to get each match onto SOAP's website.

Also, there are regionals that currently don't have anyone interested in recording. If you are just seeing this tread now, and want help out, then certainly step forward.

Here are the regionals, and there associated recorders:

BAE SYSTEMS Granite State Regional 	- J. Norris
NASA / VCU Regional 			- Rob2713g
New Jersey Regional 			- Alex Burman
Pacific Northwest Regional 		- M. Krass
St. Louis Regional 			- 
Arizona Regional 			- Donut
Bayou Regional				- DeepWater
Brazilian Pilot 			- Manoel
Finger Lakes Regional 			- Koko Ed
Florida Regional 			- SOAP
Great Lakes Regional 			- SAV1337
Los Angeles Regional 			- ayb2
Pittsburgh Regional 			- Noah K.
Wisconsin Regional 			- Kevin K
Boilermaker Regional 			- Mike AA
Chesapeake Regional 			- Alex Burman
Detroit Regional 			- 
Greater Kansas City Regional 		- 
Midwest Regional 			- 
Peachtree Regional 			- 
Silicon Valley Regional 		- 
UTC Connecticut Regional 		- 
New York City Regional 			- Noah K.
Boston Regional 			- SOAP
Buckeye Regional 			- Koko Ed
San Diego Regional 			- ayb2
Waterloo Regional 			- J. Norris, SAV1337
GM/Technion Israel Regional 		- 
Colorado Regional 			- 
Davis Sacramento Regional 		- 
Greater Toronto Regional 		- J. Norris, SAV1337
Las Vegas Regional 			- SOAP
Lone Star Regional 			- 
Palmetto Regional 			- 
Philadelphia Regional 			- 
SBPLI Long Island Regional 		- 
West Michigan Regional			- Mike AA

[Kevin Kolodziej]

Currently, I will be recording in VHS. I MAY be able to transfer that to DVD within a week after the event, or I MAY get a DVD recorder by then. In either case, I will not have the time to parse anything until after all the regionals, which defeats the purpose of that - so I'll need to know who to send it out to for parsing and uploading via mail (I have no problem sending it overnight to get this all done as quick as possible).

Kev

[jakk]

I have a question about the camera feeds at regionals. Are they like the nationals where there are multiple camera angles? or is it just the long shot of the field? I'm looking for some action shots and close-ups of some robots in action but I don't think they will let me on the side of the field with a camera.

Any ideas about how to get good action video at regionals?

[Joel J]

The camera feed that is recorded is a direct mirror of what is on the big screen. If you are seeing it on the big screen, then its being recorded at the A/V drop by your equipment.