Unified webcast portal

[StevenB]

FIRST students are an exceptionally talented group, and in the past few years I've watched the rapid proliferation of new websites related to regional webcasts and statistics. I even made my own last year for the OKC regional. Some are very good, others (such as mine) are mediocre.

I think it's time to unify these scattered efforts. There are a lot of reasons for doing so:

• Effort is all concentrated on a single project, rather than duplicated across a dozen similar sites. Rather than each one of us developing our own Twitter feed parser, database backend, and slick website layout, we could work together to create something truly awesome.
• Building on the above, we can better integrate with other existing sites: The Blue Alliance, CD and CD-Media, firstvideoarchive.com, etc.
• There is a clear starting place for new webcasters. If I wanted to set up a webcast portal for a regional I'm webcasting, my first instinct would be to start writing code from scratch. However, it would be far better if I could implement a turnkey solution. It would be even better if I could have it hosted elsewhere and just supply the video feed.
• It provides a better portal for casual spectators. The MMRambotics multi-feed portal is really cool, but it's not what I would send out to friends and family who just want to see my team's robot. Nor do I really just want to send out a direct link to ustream.tv: it's cluttered and doesn't display the relevant information such as scores, rankings, and other team information.

Code Red Robotics and the High Rollers have done excellent jobs with their portals, which are at their respective websites.

I propose that we create something similar to these, perhaps based on code somone has already written. Each regional webcast would have its own page with a single video feed and links to team stats. The idea isn't to aggregate feeds or do comprehensive statistical analyis, but to provide a rich portal for watching a regional.

Here's what I would consider optimal:

• An embedded video. The portal should be able to handle most common formats.
• Chat that's fast and easy to use. Ustream's is pretty good, but I know some people have had problems setting their nickname. Videos that don't use ustream also need a chat solution. On a side note, I really like 987's FirstnameTeam# nickname scheme - it reduces anonymity and encourages some team spirit.
• Twitter-based result feed, so we can get separate scores for tubes, minibots, and penalties. In a perfect world, we would use the Twitter feed to handle ties and replays as well.
• Links to video of previously played matches.
• A clear link to a page with a concise description of the game, including the game animation.
• Links to find information about specific teams playing. I'm particularly thinking of pictures on CD-media, team websites, and season records on TBA.
• Discreet links to other webcasts going on the same weekend.
• Appropriate links to regional sponsors, FIRST, and other contributors.
• Someone is going to suggest that the site show regional and national OPR/DPR. That would be cool, perhaps there could be an "advanced stats" tab along with scores, rankings, and awards.

I'd be happy to pay for a domain and host such a site, but I think the development should take place on FIRSTForge/SF/GitHub/BitBucket. Finally, I'm not a serious web developer; I've only dabbled in it. So if my suggestions don't make sense or if there's a better way, please reply and let me know! Or if someone has already done this and I'm just oblivious, I'd like to see that too.

[The Lucas]

Have you checked out theredalliance.com? It does a good job of one page per regional and aggregating everything (including what others are doing). Maybe a bit cluttered for your tastes but thorough. I personally try to watch every webcast live at once (some is doing instantly archiving like 987). I watch the MMS ones using multiple VLC and on my HDTV using XBMC hacked XBOX (my main one which is FL this week). I use something like MMARambotic to watch all the ustreams on a single page.

[Patrick Seeney]

I agree, there needs to be one unified network, or at least a scalable model that teams can adopt, or even organizations (such as FIRST in Michigan). The biggest downside I see to current methods, especially Ustream, is the ads that we are subjected to. We are letting ustream make money off of people viewing FIRST events. If we were able to cut out the middle man, we would open up the possibility to getting some big sponsors other than the typical technologically related sponsors. Imagine if Coca Cola sponsered a bunch of regionals in exchange for x amount of times for their commercials to run as well as maybe a banner ad on the regional webcast page. I think that you could run these webcasts like college sport events. In between matches when there is down time you could cut to 30 second commercials of the big sponsors that support the event. If say Coca Cola was sponsoring the broadcast, they could have a little watermark somewhere, or in the score board like you see on college sports.

I think this could also allow for teams to create 30 second promo's about their team, that way for the teams at the regionals, those could play during the in between matches and during timeouts. THis would give teams that nobody knows about a chance to be featured for 30 seconds, and the viewers at home could feel more connected to teams. This could also open the doors for another award category for best promo video. With the amount of matches that go on at each regional, teams could all have their promo videos play at least once.

In the end, the web is the future of online media. It used to be that media was produced for TV and then repackaged for the web, we are currently starting to see the opposite. With the amount of content on the web, and with many shows saying "check out our website for more content," it would seem logical for this to follow the same path. By taking out the middleman (ustream) we can use the money that could be generated from the ads that we all see to be invested in broadcast equipment that could travel from regional to regional.

[MagiChau]

@Patrick I think along with your plan FIRST would need to invest in high quality recording equipment for better videos of the event. I was thinking perhaps try a task force of 7 people recording the match instead of a lone camera-man. 1 Does an overview on the entire-field while the other 6 focus on an individual robot's actions. Maybe another person will control the 7 feeds and decide which one to show. This recording will be made available (all 7 of every match) after the competition onto something like the firstvideoarchive perhaps.

[Patrick Seeney]

I completely agree, and that is where the "Coca Cola" sponsors can really help out. I am current in a digital media program, and my current assignment is to find all the equipment you would need to start a production company. I have tailored it to creating this broadcast. Currently I have about $30,000 worth the equipment I would like to purchase that could help execute this. Hey if we could get B&H Video to be a sponsor, then maybe we could get alot of this at a discount. I think that you could create a compelling broadcast using the following camera angles...

2 remote control cameras mounted on each driver station. This would give full view of the other side of the field as well as have the ability to zoom, pan and tilt.

A 3rd remote control camera mounted up high to simulate the press box view, once again controlled by remote, but probably not neededing to be adjusted much.

2 ENG type cameras that roam the sidelines that would be used for getting tight shots on the action, as well as shots of the audience and whatnot.

I am guessing most teams that currently stream are using wirecast or a similar client, and these cameras can all be controlled using the desktop interface.

Now I know the 30,000 price tag is alot, but lets say here in Michigan we run two districts a week, that would be two sets of equipment needed every week. $60,000 plus the cost of the internet connection and programming needed to create such a website could run around 100,000. That is a drop in the bucket for Coca Cola's advertising budget...and it would give them access to the leaders of tomorrow.

[Joseph Bisch]

If we wanted to cut out UStream, we would need an alternative video streaming solution.

I've never tested it, but there appears to be a streaming solution using VLC on the computer connected to the camera and the <video> tag on a webpage. It is detailed in this blog post. It is also possible to transcode a flash stream using VLC.

The alternative would be for a flash/native program combination like UStream uses.

I like HTML5 video. The only problem I see is Internet Explorer and Safari. Other than those 2 browsers, all browsers support Ogg Theora. I propose offering 2 streams, one using Ogg Theora and the <video> tag, the other using Flash.

[Joseph Bisch]

I made a github repo for this project.

https://github.com/josephbisch/FIRST...Webcast-Portal

[StevenB]

I've coded up some stuff which will at least meet my needs for webcasting OKC.
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...threadid=93612