Space-age footy coverage sky high
21 May 2004
Herald Sun
Damian Barrett
TELEVISION coverage of football will be revolutionised next Friday when a 14kg, $1.5 million camera will hover above the play at Telstra Dome.
Channel 9 will introduce Skycam, which can travel at 40km/h – along four wires in a pulley-type set-up – and be positioned to provide coverage from virtually all locations and angles.
Should the AFL, as expected, endorse its use, it will be considered, for match rules purposes, as being part of the Telstra Dome roof, meaning a dead-ball adjudication will apply if it is struck.
AFL football operations manager Adrian Anderson said yesterday Skycam would be declared eligible for use should it pass official scrutiny in a test run at Telstra Dome on Thursday.
"It hasn't been given the all-clear yet, we will await the outcome of that trial and take it from there," Anderson said.
"If it gets approval, then it is proposed that it operates similar to the roof policy, where it is a dead ball and a ball-up (if hit)."
The camera is one of only two worldwide and will be rented by Nine for four matches, beginning with Essendon-Fremantle next Friday, and two rugby league State-of-Origin games.
Skycam has been used for the past four years by American-based ESPN and ABC for NFL matches on Sundays and Monday nights.
It has also flown at Olympic Games, NBA matches and NFL Superbowls.
The unit to be used in Australia will be the same one used in this Saturday's FA Cup final between Manchester United and Millwall.
It will arrive in Melbourne on Tuesday and take two days to install at Telstra Dome.
Channel 9's executive producer of football Cos Cardone said yesterday use of the camera would be as subtle as possible.
"We will be conservative with it and be making sure that it is above the goal post height," Cardone said of the camera that is costing Nine more than $250,000 while in Australia.
Skycam will be used in four AFL matches – Essendon-Fremantle (Round 10), Collingwood-West Coast (Round 11), Carlton-Hawthorn (Round 12) and Essendon-Kangaroos (Round 14), as well as two rugby league State-of-Origin matches.
Four wires, each about the width of a standard rubber band, will be bolted into the Telstra Dome structure at various points behind the goals, allowing the camera to be suspended above the field.
Representatives of Skycam, a Philadelphia-based company, surveyed Telstra Dome in February during the Wizard Cup series.
"This is the hottest sports broadcasting technology going around, the most innovative thing ever tried in AFL coverage, or any sport for that matter," Cardone said.
Nine intends using Skycam for some live-play action, but more so for replays and crowd shots.
"We are conscious of over-using it, it is there to complement what we have already got," Cardone said.
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