Braodcast and web coverage of regional competitions

Competition Regional Competitions
1

Now that robot construction is complete, efforts to scout other teams (as potential alliance partners or opponents) are beginning to heat up. We have been asked what webcast and/or broadcast coverage of the regional an national competitions is currently planned for this year. Enclosed below is a list of the coverage that NASA is currently planning to make available.

All webcasts will be available through the NASA Robotics Education Project web site. The webcasts will cover the activites on Friday and Saturday of each regional event. Currently, we will be providing webcasts of the following regional competitions:

VCU Regional - Richmond VA March 3-9

KSC Southeast Regional - Kennedy Space Center FL March 3-9

Buckeye Regional - Cleveland OH March 14-16

Silicon Valley Regional - San Jose CA March 28-30

Southern California Regional - Los Angeles CA April 4-6

In addition, we are currently seeing if we can obtain resources to provide webcasts of the following events:

Philadelphia Regional - Philadelphia PA March 21-23

Pacific Northwest Regional - Seattle WA March 28-30

St Louis Regional - St Charles MO April 4-6

In addition, we will be providing televised broadcasts via NASA TV of the following events. NASA TV is broadcast on GE-2, transponder 9C, C-Band, located at 85 degrees West longitude. The frequency is 3880.0 MHz, polarization is vertical and audio is monaural at 6.8 MHz. Many cable TV systems also carry NASA TV. NASA TV coverage of the regional events will not quite as extensive as in some prior years, due to conflicts with ongoing Space Shuttle operations schedule for the many of the regional competition dates (the Space Shuttle/Space Station programs own the NASA TV satellite and they have priority - we can only use it during periods when they are not using the satellite).

Silicon Valley Regional - San Jose CA March 30 (Saturday activities only)

Lone Star Regional - Houston TX March 16 (Saturday activities only)

FIRST National Competition - Orlando FL April 26-27 (all three days)

Please note that all these plans are just that - plans. The set of events to be covered and the extent of coverage may change as resources, venue limitations, and access constraints become finalized.

-dave

2

well, any coverage at all is still cool. we really need to get like, ABC or some big network company like that to cover at least the nationals in addition to NASA, because many people, including me, don’t get the NASA station due to it not being in the basic package for cable. Oh well, i havea cable modem, so i can always watch the web casts. :smiley:

3

I DEFINITLY AGREE BUT I COULD OF SWORN THAT I HAVE VOTED FOR ABC TO HOST IT, I MEAN IF THEY ARE GOING TO BROADCAST THE NATIONALS THAT SHOULD COUNT AS SPONSERING!

4

Well, is ABC covering the Nationals? Just because you voted for them doesn’t mean they will. FIRST would benefit fro mABC covering the nationals, but i’m not sure if ABC really wants to do that. OF course, it would be really cool to say you were on national television. :smiley:

5

but, just look at the poll on the forums page, ESPN is the next closest winner and anyway last year it was televised on ABC anyway…
wasn’t it?

6

Woah, hold up here.

NASA has been wonderful these past few years in donating NASA TV to webcast certain regionals and the Nationals (though I know it can’t be helped, it’ll be irritating this year with Nats conflicting with shuttle coverage). Their coverage is different from whatever everyone else does.

From what I can see, this thread was to announce where the NASA broadcasts were (which was a wonderful post because I hadn’t been looking for it yet).

ABC, CBS, Associated Press, CNN, PBS, Discovery Science, among other broadcasting companies, were all present at Nationals in 2001. But just because they’re there doesn’t mean that they’ll show the coverage they’ll shoot.

As far as I can remember, Good Morning America always does a little bit from Nationals (they did in 00, I cant recall for 01)

And anyway, indirectly, ABC and ESPN are both huge sponsors of FIRST…after all, Disney does own them both.

7

ABC and ESPN are both huge sponsors of FIRST…after all, Disney does own them both

now that would definitly clear everything up in my head about that poll on the forums page!

  but just for the record... NASA tv is great but nobody in my family has a satillite dish so it realy isn't a nation-wide broadcasting station. not all people have it!
8

All right, here is my weekends schedule in terms of watching broadcasts:

March 3-9: Kennedy Space Center regional, teams to pay attention to: 21 ComBBAT, 57, 61, 180 SPAM, 312 Heatwave (00’ & 01’ regional champion), 342 team BOSCH (01’ regional finalist), 343 metal in motion (01’ regional champion)…

KSC regional should be as cool as it was in the past years… Teams across the country should pay extra attention to the first regional, since this regional is going to set strategy examples to the all other regionals this year.

March 14~16: Cleveland regional, teams to pay attention to: 1 (99 national champion), 27 Team Rush, Delphi Technokats 45 (98 national champion), Chief Delphi 47 (01’ regional champion), Delphi Elite 48 , Robotics Knights 49, HOT Team 67, X-cats 191, Cyber Blue 234 (01’ regional champion), Cheesy Poofs 254 (undefeated regional champion since 99’)…

Cleveland regional is going to be a sweet competition! Before the Michigan teams didn’t have the chance to go on live broadcasts, now they do. If you don’t understand why we look up to these Delphi and GM teams (and other big name teams), this is your chance to take a look at them! You WILL learn to love and fear those robots!

March 16: Lone Star regional: 16 Baxter Bomb squad (00’ regional champion), 34, 57, 192 GRT (01’ divisional finalist)…

There should be a lot of experienced Texas teams attending this regional… Pay attention to my old team 192 GRT :wink:

March 21: Is Philly regional going to be broadcast?

Match 28: Silicon regional, going to be at the regional myself. Teams to pay attention to: 60 Bionic Bulldog (01’ regional champion), 100 Woodside robotics (95’ National champion) a team I helped out this year :wink: , 115 MVRT (01’ Divisional champion), 190 Gompei and the HERD, 192 GRT (01’ divisional Finalist) my old team :wink: , Cheesy Poofs 254 (undefeated regional champion since 99’), 330 Beachbot (01’ regional champion), 376, and the Hawaii teams 359, 368…

West Coast regionals might not seems too much in the past years… But this year there are some really cool robots which I think would be really competitive even among the top teams. I would like to think that my motors workshop taught these team something about building robots and good drive train. And we even have team 190 who came all the way from east coast to attend this regional. See for yourself and decide if you want to attend this regional next year :wink:

Match 28: Pacific northwest regional: 64 Gila monsters (01’ regional champion), 159, and 360…

At the same time as Silicon regional… A new regional this year, but that doesn’t mean the rookie teams aren’t as competitive as the veteran teams in it.

April 4: Southern California regional: 60 Bionic Bulldog (01’ regional champion), 64 Gila monsters (01’ regional champion), 294 (01’ National champion), 330 Beachbot (01’ regional champion), 362 Archer school for girls, 376…

The last of west coast regionals. There are a lot of local LA teams who would be really competitive in this competition… Catch this before you are off to National!!!

April 4: St. Louis regional: 16 Baxter Bomb Squad, 34, 312 Baxter Heatwave, 343 Metal in motion…

Look forward to watch these great teams competing with/against each other yet again! Maybe, a Baxter/Baxter regional champion alliance this year just like 00’?

Oh yeah, let me know if I missed some teams I should pay attention to at competition… Just that there are so many of them out there, and I can only remember so much.

9

*Originally posted by Ken Leung *
**
March 3-9: Kennedy Space Center regional, teams to pay attention to: 21 ComBBAT, 57, 61, 180 SPAM, 312 Heatwave (00’ & 01’ regional champion), 342 team BOSCH (01’ regional finalist), 343 metal in motion (01’ regional champion)…

KSC regional should be as cool as it was in the past years… Teams across the country should pay extra attention to the first regional, since this regional is going to set strategy examples to the all other regionals this year.

**

Awwww… I’m hurt Ken. No VCU? :wink:

~Tom Fairchild~, who will be having a blast in Richmond with the rest of 122!!

10

Yes. What about VCU? Maybe we can even finagle a camera so the shaving of Daves head will be on NASA TV…
That would be really cool…:smiley:

11

Yea!
According to the web page that lists the NASA Television Schedule, the KSC Regionals will be shown on NASA televison beginning at 1:00 PM on Saturday, March 9th. Is this in addition to the webcast?

12

Ken how could you miss 111 Wildsang!

13

*Originally posted by Dima *
**Ken how could you miss 111 Wildsang! **

He didn’t forget them, they just aren’t going to a televised regional, which was the point of this thread.

14

March 3-9: Kennedy Space Center regional, teams to pay attention to: 21 ComBBAT, 57, 61, 180 SPAM, 312 Heatwave (00’ & 01’ regional champion), 342 team BOSCH (01’ regional finalist), 343 metal in motion (01’ regional champion)…

Woo! We were the first team listed!
(and don’t tell me that it was in numerical and chronological order, I don’t want my bubble burst ;))

15

Hmmm, now here is quite a dilly of a pickle…actually two of them. Do you watch the KSC Regional this weekend, or do you Watch VCU??? I love watching teams such as Heatwave, ComBBAT, and Metal in Motion compete, it will be an excelent regional. But man, I gotta see that Moe-bot in action! This is gonna be a tough decision.
An even tougher desision…
Next week do you watch the Lone Star Regional on Nasa TV, or do you decide to forgo the television viewing advantage to see what could be one hell of a competition at the Buckeye regional with all those tough midwest teams. Not to say that the Lone Star Regional won’t be as exciting (looking forward to seeing the Bomb Squad back in action there as well as GRT making the trip), but whenever you got the Delphi’s, GM’s, and my god, is that the Cheesy Poofs I see (undefeated in regional competitions), there is gonna be some crazy stuff goin down! Which ones will you watch? Let the heavy hitting begin!
peace,
Andy Grady

16

I would recomend VCU.

17

Wetzel,

I think people want to watch a lot of experienced teams, not just maybe 20 teams that have more then 2 years experience…I’m just playing, I can’t WAIT for Thursday’s first day!! VCU will be cool!

Wetzel, you have clippers and a razor? I’m ready to lose all my hair if Dave is ready!

18

Ok, it may not have as many really cool bots, but I think it will be quite interesting to watch how the noobs work with each other. I am willing to bet there will be more than a few matchs where only rookie teams are on the field.
But then again, I am more of a socialolgist than an enginner…

19

Beside broadcasted regionals, is there anyway other regionals can share some of their footage?

I heard SOAP is doing a video archive this year, so I will look forward to the regionals they are doing…

As for others, many some teams are willing to share their video and make copy of the tapes, or capture it on computer and compress them into mpeg/divx format?

It would be great to see some of the other regionals, so maybe your team will be on the “teams to watch out for list”. :wink: :wink: :wink:

If not do this to get on the list, you should do it to help scouting effort, and help others to see what’s going on at your part of the country. It would be great to see some amazing machines out there, as well as the great spirits I heard a couple of Michigan and New England regionals have.

Pretty Please~?

20

Our team isn’t doing an organized video taping of events, but I do know that the VCU regional has great web coverage thanks to a few very special people from NASA Langley. http://robots.larc.nasa.gov is the site with a lot of information, including updated scoring from FIRST database.

~Tom Fairchild~