Sports franchises mired in red ink (like the Portland Trail Blazers) or stadium complexes (like Portland’s PGE Park), might revive their franchises and create new wealth by utilizing technology that transforms real-life games and celebrities into video games.
Intel’s Oregon software labs and Orad teamed up two years ago to “vectorize” sports events like soccer in real-time. It let you “Be the Ball”. Using multiple cameras at different angles around the field, players are “vectorized” in real-time. Games can be stored, replayed, and modified with user interaction. Players can zoom in or “fly” overhead.
Intel‘s TOPlay controls the view of a game. One perspective is a ball’s-eye view. This is the first use of Intel’s Interactive Sports software, (press release & video demo) and OradNet’s sport-tracking technology.
The initial version of the sports program takes live soccer matches and converts the actions, including player and ball movements, into data. The data is then used to create three-dimensional representations of the game. Viewers can zoom in and out of plays, use slow motion for replays and change the perspective so they can watch a game through the eyes of a player–or from the ball’s perspective.
An entire soccer match takes up about 4MB. The audio streams at 5kbps and the video at 25kbps so the games can even be streamed from a Web site over a 56kbps connection. Intel and OradNet held talks (before the dot.com bust) with various sports Web sites, including ESPN.com, to make the technology available to visitors of the sites. The technology is probably sitting in a warehouse somewhere, virtually unused. Now is the time.
Intel’s Oregon software labs could team with TOPlay for Digital Sports Entertainment and put Portland Family Entertainment (which runs PGE Park) online to the world (or at least 500 million Playstation 2s, X boxes and broadband PCs). Digital Entertainment isn’t webcasting – it’s games. It may offer revenue streams that franchise owners simply can’t ignore.
Sports Franchise owners get:
- Internet rights
- New advertising opportunities
- Increased use of historical sports content
- Develop customer communities
- 24 hour, 7 day a week availablility and marketing
Viewers get:
- View game from any angle
- Interact with other viewers with “chat” or voice
- Generate custom stats
- Be the coach inserting custom plays on previous games
- Compare analysis with experts
The new character-creation software could turn the gaming world on its head. “Now we can take our cameras along to Rangers or Celtic for the day, and film the whole squad, as well as the managers and fans,” says Dr Colin Urquhart, company founder.
“That is a lot more straightforward than employing a team of experienced software modellers, which is very expensive. “It can take four weeks or more to translate just one player into a game character. We can now do that in minutes.”
Many of the top-selling game titles, such as the football simulation FIFA 2003, feature the world’s best players, among them Ronaldo and Zinedine Zidane. But video-gamers regularly criticise the way the stars look, saying they are unrealistic.
For 3D capture, two digital cameras take separate stereo pairs of images of the subject from different angles. The subject’s exact shape and features can then be captured and computer processed to create a realistic 3D model.
This is coupled with a process called mesh confirmation – which allows an existing video- game character to be morphed to the shape and appearance of a captured individual.
Similar technology has also been used by cosmetic surgeons to help patients see how they will look after an operation. Oregon Health Sciences, for example, might utilize the software.
Other related developments:
- Intel and Avid Sports are developing solutions to automate the generation of interactive sports content and deliver live play-by-play cybercasts along with personalized, searchable video highlights.
- Intel is working with the NBA to develop and distribute interactive NBA content, including enhanced broadband programming and interactive game broadcasts. It will be distributed through a new company, Convera.
- Intel’s Oregon lab developed the 3D software used by Macromedia.
- Real Arcade has over 50 Web Games in nearly every conceivable category. All free! They run on PlayStation 2,X-Boxes as well as ordinary PCs using streaming video.
- ESPN provides Emblaze-enabled PDA’s and phones with streaming sports programming. Their wireless solution uses standards-based MPEG-4. ESPN is 80 percent owned by ABC, which is a subsidiary of Disney. The Hearst Corporation holds a 20 percent interest in ESPN.
- FOXSports.com and iVAST deliver MPEG-4 sports content.
- Digital Cinema (exhibitors) can be received by satellite. HDTV micro-theatres in pubs and coffee houses might show independent films or create gaming spin-offs.
- NHL hockey fans get video highlights from the 2001 Stanley Cup playoffs using Virage video content on IEEE 802.11b allowing users to search and stream video clips in real-time using handheld PDAs. Virage has a Video Application Server.
- Intel’s Internet Exchange Architecture (IXA) is an end-to-end family of high-performance, flexible and scalable hardware and software building blocks that tap into the Optical Future.
- State-licensed wagering delivers live audio and video and wagering to 81 racetracks in 39 states from a hub in Hillsboro, Oregon. YouBet.com (FAQ), multicast to a global audience, providing multi-currency, multi-language games with a distributed high-speed transaction platform and provide a CD-ROM for end users. Other betting hubs in Oregon include WinTicket.com and the Television Games Network (TVG), also out of Hillsboro. They use touchtone phones with voice response. US Off Track supports Palm, WAP phones, on-line and voice response. They work with the Oregon Racing Commission which supports Portland Meadows and Multnomah Greyhound Park. Digiturf, the brainchild of a former racehorse owner and trainer, offers the opportunity to own, train, race and bet on virtual horses against other Digiturf members for real money. Some 98 virtual horses battle for $130,000 in prize money this summer.
Shoot 3D. Traditional 3D requires two cameras synchronized to shoot the same images simultaneously, but Canon’s 3D lens (right, $8500) utilizes two lenses in one, with stereoscopic synchronization controlled by the camcorder, to capture the same effect. The lens captures right and left eye images alternately on the CCD for 1/60 second using an LCD shutter panel. Many stereo photography enthusiasts are in Portland (Viewmaster was headquartered here). Check out the Cascade Stereo Club, the National Stereoscopic Association, Stereo World Magazine, Lewis & Clark in 3D and the 3D Web Ring.
Be Here has a simple 360 degree surround-video technique. They screw a bowl-shaped lens on a 1300×1300 pixel DVC camera ($6,000). Only one camera is required and no browser plug-ins. RealVideo works as a window. The Superbowl was broadcast in 360 degrees. Telemersion offers a similar technique using Apple’s Quicktime for stills and video.
Surround video needs a cheap HDTV camera (to shoot it) and broadband (to view it). A 360 video might [essentially] create a 240 x 1200 pixel video window which can now be generated by $3000 Prosumer HD camcorders. Getting 30 frames/second over the internet is the hardest part.
Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Lab developed “Visualized Reality” which creates effects similar to “Matrix” modeling QTVR modeling where the viewer “flies” around the subject. It could be the most significant advancement in sports television since the advent of instant replay says CBS. CBS used 33 robotic cameras, each pointed at the center of the football field from different angles. It produces a 3-D field that can be rotated around at will. Motion can be viewed from any angle.
Circle your local stadium (or city) with 24 Nikon Wi-Fi cameras. Get some “Homeland Security” money for a test in your local stadium.
And watch what happens. On your PDA.
