Correction: This post initially misstated the company providing the tracking technology being used to provide security and safety for NFL personnel. The company is US Fleet Tracking.
The NFL has been using Twitter to spread the word about the latest and greatest happenings in Tampa during Super Bowl week. The feed is just one of a number of technologies being used at the Super Bowl that are little known or seen.
(Credit: Twitter)At its core, football represents the polar opposite of technology: A bunch of large men run around a field, battling for position and the control of a small pigskin ball.
Of course, the production of an actual NFL game requires lots of technology--from the headsets coaches use to communicate, to the computers used to calculate statistics to the HD cameras that record the contest for the viewing audience.
When it comes to the Super Bowl, one of the biggest sporting events in the world, technology has always played a very central role, and this year is no exception.
Indeed, as the NFL gets ready to put on the big game this Sunday in Tampa, Fla., between the five-time champion Pittsburgh Steelers and the perennial bottom-dwelling Arizona Cardinals, the league and its many partners will be rolling out a wide variety of technology, much of which has been used in the past, but some of which is all new.
And a good deal of that is behind-the-scenes tech that most fans never see, would never think of, or is new and niche enough that they will never even know it existed.
For example, even though Twitter has become a mainstay of the Web 2.0 world, it is still a mystery to most people. But the NFL decided to embrace the microblogging service, and has already rolled out its Super Bowl Twitter feed. There, an unknown number of people have been posting regular updates for the last few days about the goings-on in Tampa--the big press events, the behind-the-scenes developments, all kinds of football-related observations that fans may or may not appreciate.
"Midnight at the hotel bar, no celebs," a Wednesday night tweet began. "Oh wait...there's Donovan McNabb! I'm sure he's still shocked he's not preparing for Sunday's game."
"Wow," another began. "Sully and the crew of US Airways Flight 1549 will be honored during Super Bowl XLIII pregame! Very cool."
To be sure, a Super Bowl Twitter feed isn't the most advanced or glamorous thing in the world, but to the NFL, it's a way to share a little bit of the flavor of the excitement gathering around the game.
"Our digital media group has been working furiously to find new ways to help our fans experience Super Bowl week," said NFL.com spokesperson Joanna Hunter in an e-mail, "even if they can't travel to Tampa Bay to be there in person."
Yet there were just 1,940 followers for the Super Bowl Twitter feed as of Thursday afternoon, a tiny number when compared to the millions of fans who will watch the game on TV, and a sign that this technology is, even now, something that has risen to the attention of only the smallest number of people.
Another online innovation the NFL is touting is a system its SuperBowl.com site employed for the league's annual Media Day on Tuesday. Online viewers were able to select from five different cameras filming the event and watch the player they wanted to see speak.
Again, a small development, but one the league hopes enhanced the overall experience of its fans.
What viewers will see
While the Super Bowl game is the main event for football fans, watching the elaborate and expensive commercials made to air specifically during the contest has long been a favorite of even the most sports-averse.
This year should be no exception. But for the first time, TV viewers will be seeing two extremely technologically cutting edge ads, modern 3D commercials for SoBe drinks and for NBC's Chuck, as well as a 90-second preview of the forthcoming 3D Dreamworks film, Monsters vs. Aliens.
According to Steve Schklair, the CEO of 3ality Digital's technology division, 3ality Digital Systems--the company whose cameras were used to film the included live-action footage--all of the 3D spots will be possible to watch without special glasses, but will be much richer with pairs of 3D specs that are being handed out all over the country at retail outlets where SoBe drinks are sold.
Instead of the traditional green and red 3D glasses, these are yellow and blue and, Schklair said, different than the eyewear required to watch the new style of 3D films being shown in theaters around the country these days.
Schklair added that the value of showing 3D ads and trailers during the Super Bowl comes from the fact that research has shown that the retention rate for messages put out in 3D is far higher than for traditional 2D. Further, he said, the Super Bowl 3D ads will be a good test case for potentially running 3D trailers in movie theaters in the future.
The NFL and 3ality have a previous history, as well. In December, the NFL used 3ality's technology to broadcast a regular season game between the Oakland Raiders and the San Diego Chargers in 3D.
When it comes to TV, of course, the biggest piece of the Super Bowl puzzle is the broadcast of the game itself. This year, NBC has the coveted rights to the NFL championship, and, as it did with its recent coverage of the Beijing Olympics, the Peacock Network is putting huge resources into the project.
For the most part, viewers won't see many differences during the Super Bowl from NBC's regular-season Sunday night NFL broadcasts. One small innovation will be a new on-screen graphic.
"The biggest change...viewers will see is a slightly refined graphic look," Broadcasting & Cable reported, "as NBC will have individual player stats briefly pop onscreen to replace the 'score bug' in an effort to reduce on-screen clutter."
To put on its broadcast, NBC will have 200 crew at the game, and more than 450 total production and engineering staff in Tampa. And the effort will feature 52 high-definition cameras, 45 vehicles (including control trucks, mobile units, office trailers and a horse trailer), 24 digital video replay sources, eight digital post-production facilities (five Avid suites and three Final Cut Pro suites), 20 hand-held cameras, five robotic cameras, two RF hand-held cameras, one "cable-cam" camera that is suspended above the field, 50 miles of camera and microphone cable, 93 microphones, and much more.
"Specialty cameras for the Super Bowl include robotic units on the goalposts and in the hallways outside each team's locker room," Broadcasting & and Cable reported, "dedicated goal-line cameras, overhead Cable-cams and X-Mo ultra-high-frame-rate cameras from Inertia Unlimited that will be used to deliver incredibly detailed slow-motion replays. The X-Mo cameras will give frame-by-frame views of both the goal line, to gauge whether a touchdown has been scored, and the sideline, to see exactly where a player stepped out of bounds."
What viewers won't see
For the NFL, supporting all its efforts in Tampa is a very computing-heavy project. As such, the league has partnered with IBM and is using a series of four IBM BladeCenter S chassis, one at each of four venues the NFL has set up around Tampa: one for general media and PR, one for the league's offices, one for game-day media and PR, and one for credentialing and in-house security.
According to Jonathan Kelly, director of computing infrastructure for the NFL, the league chose the IBM blade servers because they offer a high degree of mobility--the blades are briefcase sized--and very quick set up.
Each chassis has two of the blades, which offers all-important redundancy, Kelly said.
"It's about time criticality and high availability," he said. "If one host goes down, the other immediately picks up."
The NFL is using a series of BladeSensor S chassis to power the computing at its four venues in Tampa during Super Bowl week. For the NFL, the blade servers allow quick setup, high mobility, and all-important redundancy.
(Credit: IBM)For the NFL, the IBM blade servers are a clean break from what the league used in many previous years: large numbers of individual servers and computers, all of which took a lot of time to set up and and a lot of manpower to operate.
The blades run VMware's virtual platform and give the league the ability to run virtualized operations at each of its four venues in Tampa, said Joe Manto, the NFL's vide president of information technology.
In 2008, the league did run beta versions of the IBM blade architecture, but this year, it is standardizing on full production versions, and plans to roll them out after the Super Bowl for each of the 32 NFL teams.
And lest the players themselves not benefit from technology--or at least be involved with it--a company called US Fleet Tracking says it is helping to ensure the safety and security of the dozens of "key NFL and entertainment personalities" as they are bused from location to location in Tampa this week.
US Fleet Tracking's technology is being used to track the location and movements of the players, as well as Bruce Springsteen--the halftime performer--around the Super Bowl city. The idea is that by employing tracking devices, the NFL's Gameday Operations personnel can be kept aware of the precise location of all these people.
"Through real-time information updates, security officials can ensure that the proper authorities and escorts are always in the right place at the right time," a statement from the network provider, Kore Telematics, said. "Officials also have the ability to respond instantly if any vehicle leaves the expected route, becomes delayed or is subject to other unexpected events."
In the Gameday Operations area, then, NFL officials will be monitoring the players and other VIPs in real time on six 42-inch LCD TVs, and they will get updates on the locations of their charges every five seconds. Further, they'll be able to see precisely where the various vehicles they're watching are, down to accuracy of a quarter mile per hour and eight inches.
Whether dozens of highly-paid, young professional football players in a town full of parties and nonstop entertainment will want to have their movements tracked to within an accuracy of eight inches is another matter.
Still, with all this technology in place, the game will commence on Sunday, just as it has on 42 previous occasions, with the entirely low-tech flip of a coin, and the kicking of an inflated pigskin ball. When all is said and done, it's nice to know that behind the many layers of the very latest technology available, the Super Bowl is, at its roots, just a kids' game played by a bunch of men.
A group of the biggest Hollywood studios said Wednesday that they will invest more than $1 billion to upgrade 20,000 North American movie theaters to digital projector systems.
According to Reuters, Disney, Paramount Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal Pictures, and Lions Gate Entertainment have reached a pact with investors, including Blackstone Group and JPMorgan Chase. The work would begin in 2009 and could take as much as 3 and 1/2 years to complete.
For some time, the studios have wanted to embark on the upgrade project, Reuters wrote, but have been unable to nail down the financing. But now, with the money in place, work can begin with the goal of making it possible for the studios to send films digitally to theaters--which would be a sea change for studios, allowing them to cut costs immensely on prints and distribution--as well as to more easily present 3D films.
"Our initial goal is to convert existing theaters of our owners, AMC and Cinemark, and Regal, which operate a little over 14,000 screens in the U.S. and Canada," Travis Reid, CEO of Digital Cinema Implementation Partners, told Reuters, adding that each screen upgrade costs around $70,000.
Already, Hollywood and theaters around North America are in the middle of a major expansion of 3D screens and a major change in the technology being used for 3D films. In the spring of 2007, there were just 720 screens equipped to run 3D films, but that number has now jumped to 1,300, Reuters reported.
For the studios and the theaters alike, adding 3D screens is a boon because of ticket premiums of $3 or more.
And that's why several studios are planning on rapidly increasing the number of films they release in 3D.
The new film, 'U2 3D,' depicts the mega-popular rock band in concert in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It is shot all in 3D, but to someone without normal, binocular vision, the 3D effect is somewhat meaningless.
(Credit: U2 3D)After months of hearing about it, I finally went to see the new film, U2 3D today, full of anticipation that for the first time in my life, I would be able to actually see the 3D effects in a film.
A little background: I have strabismus, better known to some as "lazy eye," a condition that, among other things, means that I don't have normal, binocular vision, like most people.
In daily life, this condition means very little. I can drive, hit a baseball, probably even fly a plane. I do see a little bit differently in each eye, but basically, it makes no difference.
Where it has always made a difference, however, is with 3D films. Historically, when I would go to such a film, I would put on those ugly glasses with the red and blue lenses, and I wouldn't be able to see the 3D effect because of my lack of binocular vision, which the 3D technology depends on.
But when I wrote a story last year about the emergence of a new era of 3D cinema technology, I was told by one of the people I interviewed for the story that there was a high degree of likelihood that this time around, I would join the masses in getting the benefit.
And that's why I was excited as I walked into San Francisco's Metreon IMAX theater this morning for a press screening of U2 3D.
Alas, for me, at least, my excitement proved unwarranted.
From the first minutes of the film--which, I must say, is quite spectacular, especially on an IMAX screen--I wondered whether I was seeing what my seatmates were seeing.
The film is spectacular, and on an IMAX screen, it is truly larger than life.
(Credit: U2 3D)There was little question that the film was larger than life and that the imagery on the screen was big, explosive, and more lively than I'm used to seeing in films. And, to be sure, when I took off the special glasses--no, they're not red and blue--I did see double. But if I closed one eye or the other, I saw the same thing that I was seeing with both eyes open.
But I felt pretty sure I was missing something. So when the film was over, I asked my friend, who had been seated with me, if she felt she experienced 3D imagery.
Absolutely, was her unequivocal answer: No question that what she saw was 3D and that the film jumped off her screen in a way that normal films do not.
For me, I guess I got a hint of it. A few times, when something in the film was right in front of the camera, I got the sense of 3D. Some examples were shots taken right behind audience members. I will admit that it felt like they were right in front of me.
And a more visceral moment was a scene when U2 lead singer Bono stands in front of the camera, singing into it with his hand outstretched. That felt much more three-dimensional than anything else I could remember.
But that was about it. It makes me wonder why I would get these small tastes of 3D but that, for the most part, I wouldn't experience it.
Either way, I come away a little depressed and with dashed hopes. I had honestly been hoping that my condition would be made moot by the new technology and that for the first time, I would get to have the same viewing pleasure at a 3D film as everyone else.
But I guess not. I suppose I'll just have to keep waiting for the next generation. Until then, I'll just go on enjoying movies the way I always have.
And by the way, U2 3D is quite the film, 3D or no 3D. Go see it.
Using 3D Mailbox, e-mail recipients can see images of 747s that represent the origins of their messages. So, for example, a message from someone in Australia would be represented by a Qantas 747.
(Credit: 3D Mailbox)You might have noticed if, for some reason, you have followed my work over the last couple of years, that I have a thing for 747s.
I can't really explain why that is. I suppose it's just that the jumbo jets are sort of a physical manifestation of adventure for me: When I see them flying overhead, I know they're off to some faraway place where I'd probably like to be going.
So when I heard about 3D Mailbox, an e-mail client that uses visual images as representations for e-mail messages, and the fact that the second version of the software uses an airport motif and 747s for messages, I knew I had to check it out.
Unfortunately, the software doesn't work on Macs, and I'm a Mac guy. So I wasn't able to play with it myself. But I had a good long talk with its developer, Robert Savage, who has built interesting projects I've enjoyed in the past, and I got the gist of the software.
It's actually very simple. As I mentioned above, the software employs 747s to represent messages. If, for example, you have a message from someone in France, you'd see an Air France 747 taxiing into the terminal (the in-box). Similarly, an Australian message would be seen as a Qantas jet. Messages with attachments are seen as UPS, DHL or FedEx planes.
If it's a message from someone in the U.S., 3D Mailbox randomly selects from one of 12 airlines' 747s.
There's even a separate terminal where Spam Air--spam messages--pull in.
And, of course, when you send a message, the planes take off on a separate runway.
All this time, as you're using the software, Savage explained, you can hear air traffic control chatter and the sound of planes taking off and landing that are included to bring a sense of verity to the experience.
Savage said that the software doesn't show a plane for every message. That would be far too unwieldy. Instead, it does it some minimal percentage of the time, all while keeping a normal-looking e-mail in-box and out-box for regular usage.
In fact, the airplane element has no real purpose other than to be a visual stimulant.
"It's not a game," said Savage, "in the way you have to do something to make your e-mail work. It doesn't get in the way of the process of how e-mail works. It just provides entertainment."
Some have scoffed at this notion of a visual e-mail client. TechCrunch, for example, bestowed the headline "Worst. App. Ever" on its posting about an earlier version of 3D Mailbox that uses a Miami beach scene as the visual motif for e-mail.
Having not used the software myself, I unfortunately can't comment. But personally, I like the concept of using the airplanes to represent e-mail. Much more so, I think, than some bawdy beach scene.
But what can I say? I just love 747s.
A screenshot from the film U2 3D. According to Real D, the number of theater screens using 3D technology will jump from 100 to more than 1,000 in less than two years.
(Credit: U2 3D)A few months ago I wrote that one of the hottest tickets at this year's Cannes Film Festival was U2 3D, a 3D concert film about the popular band made using the technology of two companies helping to make 3D films a regular part of the movie going experience: 3ality and Real D.
Now, U2 3D is set to be accessible even to those of us who couldn't make it to the Riveria to hobnob with Leo and Bobby and the rest of the gang.
According to a release I got this morning from National Geographic Cinema Ventures, the outfit plans to make U2 3D its first "major international" release, and expects the film to hit theaters equipped to show 3D movies in January.
I'm kind of excited by this, even though I'm not a huge U2 fan. I think that this is exactly the kind of movie that could really get people to see the value of 3D, and that's in spite of evidence that the market for such films is taking off in a big way.
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