Championship 2008 - Atlanta - Your Thoughts Please

[Danny McC]

Originally Posted by ebarker

Newton(a) - Dome
Newton(b) - GWCC
Curie(a) - Dome
Curie(b) - GWCC
Archimedes(a) - Dome
Archimedes(b) - GWCC
Galileo(a) - Dome
Galileo(b) - GWCC

This is a good idea and all but that is assuming that we could get all the space requried for it. I do not any of the years we have been in Atlanta there wasn't some other kind of show going on. I would love to have the whole place to ourselves so we could have more matches but from the past it seems unlikely.

Now for what I thought of Atlanta. The only problem we had trouble with match Qing was the first match but that is understandable. Even though the tornado came through you really weren't able to tell besides the plywood but thats besides the point. The reffin during the matches in our division was great, thanks refs. The exhibit of the new control system was pretty cool, looks like it will be fun. The Finale was great this year. The food seemed a little less cold to me this year but I ate pretty late. I think the best part of the Finale, aside from the Fireworks, was the karaoke. This year was the best experience I have had in Atlanta yet. Lets hope that next year is just as good if not better. Also thank you to whoever returned my bag to 816s pits, it had all our beads in it.

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by Rick TYler

You have entirely misrepresented my point. By saying that I have no idea what FLL teams need I meant just that -- I've never done FLL, my kids weren't in FLL, I've never attended an FLL event, and at Atlanta I spent all my time watching Edison, so I never saw an FLL match there. So when I said "I have no idea" what FLL teams would want, that's exactly what I was trying to say.

Sorry if I put words into your post. I've worked with FLL in Atlanta for the last 3 years, and it seems that whenever FRC needs something, FLL is pushed. Examples: We had to remove all the FLL tables from Einstein Thursday afternoon following practice rounds - just so the FRC referees could sit on Einstein during opening ceremonies. Then we had only 1/2 an hour to move all them back onto Einstein for our rounds, having to shoo the VIP's out of the way. (By the way, thanks to the teams in Galileo blue queuing that helped us carry the tables over.) The FLL judges and referees did not get reserved seating during opening ceremonies, even though we had to be on the field immediately afterward. I will admit that FTC and FLL got some decent recognition during ceremonies this year.

Originally Posted by Nuttyman54

On the subject of FTC, I thought that the volume from the FTC fields were way too loud. We could hear them over on Archimedes better than we could hear our own field.

On Einstein for FLL matches, the sound "pollution" from Galileo and Curie made it very hard to hear what we were doing. We had at least one failed start because the teams couldn't hear. Remember, FLL has to push a button to get them started, it's not automatic.

Originally Posted by Nawaid Ladak

on moving the fields, i think this would be a good and bad idea, bad for people who want to watch the matches from the stands, but good for spacing.

move the fields sideways, and add another field on the back end. it would be cramped, but it would work, you could get queuing near the floor entrances of the dome. and this way, each division would work like GTR did in 2006, (this includes the special 12 alliance elimination rounds.)

Again, the noise overflow from one field to the other would be extremely annoying.

I like the idea of somehow adding another field or two, shared between the divisions, if space could be found somewhere and reasonable viewing areas could be arranged. Scheduling would be just a little bit more complex, but it could be done. Teams would have to pay close attention to where they were to queue up. I'm just not sure where it could be done.

With more and more regionals being set up, something will have to be done in the future. We've only got a couple more years of having open registration for the Championships; after that, only regional winners will have slots to go. If the program gets any bigger after that, we will have to go to a District/Regional/Championship 3-tier model.

[ebarker]

There has been discussion on various thread about sound levels at the regionals and the Championship event.

We have taken data at Atlanta and you can view some of it here:

http://www.kellrobotics.org/files/Sound_2008.pdf

In the future we will be logging as much data as possible at the Championship and at least two or three regionals.

Roughly speaking, the events runs in the mid 80 dbA. Large crowd clapping and excitement pushes the number to 100 dbA (which doesn't have a volume control)

There has been some instances of music levels approaching 90 dbA but generally below.

Anecdotal evidence on the regionals is sketchy but indicates inconsistent results across the system with some regionals in good shape and others clearly exceeding the limit so much so you don't need a meter to make that determination.

[dangerousdave]

Originally Posted by artdutra04

I would like to remind everyone that this is the FIRST Championship Event, not the FIRST Robotics Competition Championship Event.

FLL and FTC both deserve their time to compete in the Georgia Dome. They work hard, and there is no reason they should have to "go play somewhere else so the big boys can play in the Dome". Kicking them out so FRC teams can get in a few extra matches seems like quite a selfish and ignorant decision....

I certainly agree with the above statements. Everybody needs to have the chance to compete on the big stage. Each group that makes it to the Championship event, FLL, FTC & FRC all work hard on their robots and deserve to be recognized.

Concerning having more space available for FRC, I think it is possible that in 2011 the Championship event may be held in another city. Perhaps the next venue will have even more floor space available than at the GA Dome.

The dates for Championship's in 2009 are April 15-18 and the dates in 2010 are April 14-17.

Any discussion as to where you think the Championship's should be held beyond 2010 should be directed here however.
Dave

[ebarker]

Originally Posted by Danny McC

I would love to have the whole place to ourselves so we could have more matches but from the past it seems unlikely.

Definitely do not want the Whole place. That is 3,900,000 sq.ft. we only need under 10% of that.

[Zyrano]

Just one thing to add in terms of having FLL/FTC/FRC under one roof (one really big roof)-

Keep in mind that the national competition is as much of a showcase of the entire first program to sponsors/potential sponsors/government officials as much as anything else, that's why governers, CEO's and such are well represented at the event. Having all programs competing under one roof allow for easy access and grasp of the scope of first by visitors. The additional comment would be as new regionals are being added, the number of teams participating will increase, so there will need to be a solution in one form or another...

[ebarker]

Originally Posted by Zyrano

JKeep in mind that the national competition is as much of a showcase of the entire first program to sponsors/potential sponsors/government officials as much as anything else, that's why governers, CEO's and such are well represented at the event.

In addition to showing GP to FLL and FTC, the showcasing is another feature of the A-B plan I outlined above.

The showcase still works. Recently in Atlanta we didn't really focus on the robot competition because our design, while reliable was simply not competitive. We spent about 75% of our efforts working to promote FIRST, providing a lot of student tour guides and moving guests and VIPs around.

So from my experience in the program I think that the VIP's that are there would not be aware of nor really care that there is (B) court activity going on the the back room. There experience would not be impacted.

[B.Johnston]

I seriously hope ebarkers idea of 4 divisions with 8 fields gains notice from the FIRST executive.

It would allow the competition to grow and remain familiar to those of us who've "done it for years".

The scouting issue mentioned could be solved by tag teaming the two fields schedules so that they interleave and using the video screen for the other field.

Intro's could be shorter, saving the endless boo-yaa's we've all endured because another match would be ready to go.

I found the new finals a bit of a double edged sword though.

As a competitor who has run out of time for repairs in these high pressure moments I'm sure that any of the teams who needed time to recoop <sic> certainly appreciated it.

As a spectator it would need to be edited for TV as I almost napped out waiting between matches.

[Nica F.]

Good:
-I think that we all owe a lot of thanks to those who worked on the Georgia Dome + pits area + all over atlanta, because despite all of the damage, were still incredibly hospitable and continued to allow us to hold the event. Even if the pit areas were apparently cut smaller, I couldn't really find anything to complain about.

-I agree with about almost everyone else on this thread about Chairman's being announced first, but maybe Engineering Inspiration be before finals instead so that people dont abandon it like Chairmans last year.

-I do like how the Hall Of Fame booths were moved. Based on previous experience, it would allow more display area, as well as be more open to the public seeing it is in front of the pits in oppose to being imbedded on the side of one of the entrances.

Bad:
-The college booths should have gone either another day, or longer. I was really hoping to stop by, but couldn't because of matches.

-Trash bins were hard to find. I know one day the closest one a couple aisles down was actually moved farther on Saturday. (I'm sorry if that complaint is a little petty, but for safety purposes, as well as time consumption, even an extra bin here and there would've been a lot of help.

[=Martin=Taylor=]

A shadow hung over the Georgia Dome this year... Literally...

It was really dark in there with the black roof. Very different atmosphere than years prior... I believe the roof was covered to cover holes caused by the Tornado.

But I loved the blimps!!! Awesome!!!

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Hachiban VIII

A shadow hung over the Georgia Dome this year... Literally...

It was really dark in there with the black roof. Very different atmosphere than years prior...

Were you there in 2006? (Or was it 2005?)

[=Martin=Taylor=]

Originally Posted by EricH

Were you there in 2006? (Or was it 2005?)

I was there in '06. There was no covering that I remember.

[XaulZan11]

I really like the highlights after each match on Einstein. All those matches were so good that it was good to see it a second time. I would like to see regionals adapt this, too. In between matches there seems to be nothing to really show on the scree and showing highlights from the previous match would give fans something to watch inbetween matches. If that is too much work to do for every regional after every match, I think showing the current rankings would also be cool and benifical. Anyways, the highlights after each match was a very nice touch!

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Hachiban VIII

I was there in '06. There was no covering that I remember.

Humm... I remember one year the camera was so finicky that the roof was covered to allow the cameras to operate properly. It wasn't 2007 and it wasn't 2004 (no camera). Might have been 2005.

[artdutra04]

Originally Posted by EricH

Were you there in 2006? (Or was it 2005?)

They only two years they had the black cloth on the GA Dome roof was in 2005 and 2008; there was just the regular roof in 2004, 2006, and 2007.

The main reason behind the cloth in 2005 was for the CMUcam, which was not targeted at an active light that year, but rather a passive green target tetra. And for this year, it seems that they were impressed with how WPI has used climatic lighting at BattleCry@WPI for the past few years, and they wished to imitate it during the Einstein Finals.