Toured Tiananmen Square

Now that our schedule has eased a bit at the boxing venue, we've been able to hit the must see landmarks of China and Beijing. Monday it was Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. Very impressive...

Check out the photos here:
http://photobucket.com/tvcommando_tiananamensquare
http://photobucket.com/tvcommando_forbiddencity

Olympic Scoring for Boxing: Are You Seen'n What I'm See'n?

OK, checking the big boxing tote board, two sessions a day...24 bouts a day...times seven 16hr. competition days in a row so far...errr...carry the one...man, they're starting to run together!


Day 8 (I think!) from the Olympic boxing venue and like many of you watching boxing from Beijing, confusion reigns. Judging from the line up of countries with their boxers in a bunch, international amateur boxing has a huge problem on it's hands. Their credibility is on the ropes.

Indeed, after shooting over 150 Olympic Boxing matches from my perch in the upper deck of the Worker's Indoor Arena, I think I'm ready to offer a humble TVCommando's through the lens opinion on Olympic boxing scoring - wacked!

It appears the International Boxing folks have managed to do the impossible; design a scoring system more complicated (and flawed) than the scoring for Olympic Figure Skating. No easy feat. Sadly, the Olympic boxing ring like many other Olympic fields of dreams suffers from scoring controversies.

In it's current form, boxing scoring has no accountability by turning judges into button pushers. With all of the dynamics of two guys moving, jabbing, weaving and throwing sometimes multiple punches, this system seems too complicated and painfully slow. For a punch to register as a point three of five judges have to press a button (a red button for the red corner, and blue button for the blue corner...get it?) within one second of impact for the scoring system to register one point. It's almost comical to watch a fighter land what is obviously a scoring punch and have the point register with the other fighter, or worse, not at all.

For now, I've learned from boxing pros like Teddy Atlas that several sure things exist in international amateur boxing, left jabs will slow down a charging opponent, everyone hates the scoring system, and by the time the next summer Olympics roll around, the scoring system will probably change.

NBC Covers Olympic Boxing: With a Little Technical Slight of Hand!

Several people have asked technical and production questions regarding our Olympic venue, on which NBC affiliated network our shows air (CNBC), and other behind the scenes TV tidbits about how the sports are covered, so here’s the skinny:

In terms of event coverage (not including news), basically there are two sets of broadcasters working in Beijing, the Host Broadcasters (the world feed known as BOB) and NBC. While NBC has paid a pagoda full of cash for the right to broadcast the games back to the US, the Host Broadcasters are charged with providing TV coverage for everyone else.

What the NBC folks have done is rank their Olympic venues on an A, B, C scale, divided up their assets and augmented coverage at the smaller venues with these BOB video feeds.

At our venue, we’re ranked a “C” with a small, but mighty crew of 30. (Track & Field has a crew of 100.) At the Worker's Indoor Arena NBC has three dedicated cameras, one shoots reporter Jim Gray in the interview area, another shoots the “play-by-play and analyst/former boxer” at the desk ringside, while the third (the one I’m manning) shoots Anchor Fred Rogan in a small “booth” perched in the upper deck of the arena. Those cameras are connected to a whole separate (and portable) HDTV control room that has been built outside in the parking lot of the Arena right next to the BOB broadcasters.

Simultaneously to our coverage, the BOB feed has nine cameras covering every one of the 286 boxing matches, so what our NBC production team has done is to structure their CNBC shows to seamlessly shoot our anchors and then to “cut” to the world feed of all of the actual boxing matches. But like much of what’s on TV it’s really a constructed reality. At home, it looks to you like NBC is “covering” boxing, and technically we are, but not without a little technical slight of hand.

Hope this helps!

Boxing in Beijing: A Look Inside the Arena

Much to the NBC crew's ire, trying to communicate with home via the Internet is not easy here in China. The wireless router failed in our building (overloaded!) so I'm a couple of days late and filing from my work site. Here's a look at my office for the next few weeks. We are covering 286 boxing matches!

Here's our schedule. All of our matches air on CBNC/Telemundo.
A History of Olympic Boxing is here.


My camera with teleprompter. (Notice there's no viewfinder. I'm using a small monitor gaffe-taped to a garbage can underneath the tripod! Hey nothing but the best...)

My view of the ring. The anchor (Fred Rogan) will sit in the chair next to the HD monitor.



  





The announcer table ringside.

Beijing or Bust: Travel Day

Here's the TVCommando (and Hoover) route to China! (Not the recommended way to travel abroad!)

Sunday, August 3rd (Mountain time)
- 6am wake up call. Check out. At golf course by 7:15am.
- Shoot final round until golf goes by 13th hole (about 3:30pm). While viewers watch the rest of the tournament, early hole crew begins tearing down cameras on the course.

- Teardown equipment until 6:30pm. Released from site.
- Drive directly from Colorado Springs to Denver, about 90-minutes.
- Arrive/Check in to Hampton Inn at Denver Airport 8:30pm.
- Repack for a 6am international flight.
- To sleep 11:50pm.

Monday, August 4th (Mountain time)
- 3am wake up call. Check out of Hampton. Board 3:45 shuttle to airport.
- 4:30am, Hoover and I check in for flight to Beijing through Chicago.
- 6:02am, wheels up to Chicago. Take short nap. Land ORD 9:15am. (Central time)
- 12:05pm, board UAL flight 851 to Beijing.
- 12:40pm, Pilot informs us we've been given a "ground stop" and can't
 take off due to weather in Chicago.






My bldg. is on the left...

- 12:50pm, Pilot announces it will be at least a one half hour delay.
- 1:05pm, Plane taxis out to holding area and stops.
- 1:20pm, Pilot says because of delay (and the fact we will be flying over Russian airspace) that new flights plans have to be filed. Refiling should take "a few minutes..."
- 1:50pm (Central time), final begin to taxi and take off. Flight time: 12 hours and 50 minutes. Napped for a total of about 2hrs. total in fits and starts.
 
The view out my room window. (PS haven't seen a thing since Monday because of the haze!)

 
- Flight includes three movies, one meal (chicken or meat loaf), many, many snacks. I eat my big bag of peanuts and drink 12 bottles of water.
- Read 225 pages of my book, One Bullet Away, by Nathan Fick.
- Land in Beijing 3:50pm local time.
- Shuttled to Media Village, check in...
- 6:50pm Beijing time fall asleep.

Seemed like my 7am alarm happened an hour later. Reported for first day of work at boxing at 8am Tuesday.
Tomorrow, a look at the boxing venue!

Broadmoor CC: Senior Open (aka Wild Kingdom!)

We TVCommandos had quite the day at the office today. While this year's Senior Open field includes a Shark and a Walrus, the real wild kingdom is the wide array of creatures calling the Broadmoor CC home. The grounds have a rather large collection of what the locals call mule-deers. My daughters didn't believe me when I told them the deer just walk around on the course. To prove it, I set out this morning with camera in hand. It didn't take long for me to find a very cool deer family out for a little brunch.

Photo Gallery

 




Wild Kingdom Update: In case you missed it, the SportsCenter highlight and the latest animal story from the Senior Open this afternoon had a rather large black bear making his way onto the course today. See Story.

Your intrepid TVCommando (and Hoover) were manning our post atop the 13th tower when the bear headed across our fairway! So like any good cameramen, we bagged our golf coverage for a shot of said bear ambling amongt the golfers, caddies and spectators.   












Courtesy: USGA.ORG (USGA Museum | John Mummert)

 

The good news is the bear made his way off the course and no one was hurt. (I kept hearing Nick Nolte's voice as Vincent the Bear from the movie Over the Hedge! for the rest of the day!)

The bad news is I was concentrating so hard on my impromptu TV shot I didn't grab my still camera and squeeze off at least one once in a lifetime shot. And I call myself a cameraman!

Royal Gorge:

We shutterbugs have been busy in the 'Springs this week. First, we checked out the Royal Gorge! And, of course, took pictures!

Photo Gallery

ps Some of the really brave (OK, really crazy!) souls on the crew paid extra to strap themselves into the "Royal Skycoaster," which basically swung them out over the edge of the 1,000' gorge from an extra 200' feet above the Arkansas River... PASS!

Garden of the Gods!

Next, we explored around one of Colorado Springs' coolest attractions - Garden of the Gods! Enjoy!!

Photo Gallery:


If you squint, (or click on the image) you can see two climbers atop this rock preparing to repel down from their climb. I'll stick to taking pictures from the ground!

Broadmoor CC: Day1: Hoover Shoots Golf

Beijing or Bust: Day 1 (For Shawn)

Dear Shawn,
I know we said our goodbyes on Sunday. I miss you too, buddy! Thanks for the hugs.

Hey, you know that Gibson Les Paul Signature Original guitar you were telling me you wanted? I think you said, "I gotta have one!" Well, after a little research today at the Guitar Center in Colorado Springs, I found out the particular guitar you seek costs a little more than the price you quoted me.

I've got some good news and some bad news...

The good news is for the actual $7,500 price - which is about $7,000 more than what you quoted me - and at $10 a lawn that's only 375 lawns! What's the bad news, you ask? Well, (I don't know what they were thinking...) but they let me play it! OK, well, actually they said, "Please stop! Don't play in the store anymore the screeching scares away the customers!"

When it comes time to shop for yours, you probably shouldn't go in that store...
Love, Daddy

Beijing or Bust: Day 1!

Long Goodbyes!

Dear Maddie & Leyna,
Despite Daddy's tears you girls were very brave as Daddy set off on his big trip to China. Thank you so much for the little bear to keep me company on my adventure! I hope you don't mind but I named him, Hoover. I thought it was a good name. He flew with me all the way from Akron-Canton to Colorado Springs and then rode with me in the car to the hotel. (Daddy only got lost once!) Hoover even helped Daddy keep his cool when the airline made him pay $25 for his second bag and then LOST it! Thankfully, the bag made it four hours later on the last flight in... I'm gla!d Daddy's clothes caught up with him

I think you will be seeing a lot of Hoover in the coming days. This week Hoover is going to go to a very famous golf course where Daddy is working on the tower behind the 13th green. He may even help me run my camera! Stay tuned!

That's all for now. Hugs and kisses...goodnight!        
Daddy

Aspiring TVCommandos Work Behind the Scenes at Beijing Olympics!

We teachers love authentic learning environments, and the big show in Beijing is no different for aspiring broadcasters. Besides international competition, passing out some gold, silver and bronze keep-sakes, these summer games will also provide an authentic classroom for some lucky college students. Check out what these Asbury College (in Kentucky) students will be doing next month! Game on kids!

TVCommando Trivia #2: Senior Open Golf-style!

Class...thinking caps please. This week's trivia comes from the world of senior golf...

Three golfers have won the Senior Open title in back-to-back years, name the three and the years they won.




Good luck! Since I am traveling to Colorado Springs to cover the event, next week's winner will be drawn from the trivia bucket at the Broadmoor CC, site of this year's championship.

Golf fans, the TV schedule is here. FYI, the crew is the same, only the broadcasting network changes.


PLEASE NOTE: DUE TO MY TRAVEL SCHEDULE TO BEIJING ON AUG. 4TH THIS WEEK'S TRIVIA DEADLINE HAS CHANGED

Remember, submit your answer via email to: golftvcommando@yahoo.com
A winner will be selected from all of the correct answers submitted by Saturday, August 2nd at midnight est. This week's winner will be announced on Sunday, August 3rd along with a new question!

TVCommando's Olympic Television (and other good stuff) Trivia Contest WINNER!

Of the 40 winning entries carefully transported to TVCommando HQ by Pricewaterhouse Cooper accountants for the very first drawing, TVC Journal is proud to announce Hoover HS math teacher and all-around good guy, Mr. Travis Ackerman's name was drawn from the official trivia bucket (actually, it's a DVD spindle cover!) Ackerman's name will be etched on a videotape label as the first week trivia contest winner! (An honor never to be taken away Mr. A!!)

And the answer was...

The '96 Men's Olympic basketball (aka. Dream Team Lite) had 59% of Americans rooting against them, according to an ESPN poll.


As a lovely parting gift, Mr. Ackerman has won a white NBC Sports cap to help keep the sun off that dome! Congrats TA!

(Modeled by the always cute TVCommando girls!)

Stay tuned for this week's trivia question!!

TV Technology Update: Budding Broadcasters, Whisper Rooms and Congress...Oh my!

The games of the XXIX Olympiad, by the way, will be the first shot entirely in HD. TV Technology and TV Broadcast are trade publications and for my money, the places to go online to learn about all of the technology being developed and deployed for your viewing pleasure. Sports broadcasting, and the Olympics in particular, provide fertile ground for technical innovation in broadcasting and production.

WARNING! Reader discreation is advised: the following links contain lots of techie stuff! 

Here are a few highlights from this week's Olympic-related TV tech news:

• Learn about China's Chief Broadcasting officer in charge of Orchestrating the games.
• See how the Olympic Broadcast Training program lives on in Beijing (My students take note!).
• How shipping HD gear to China prompted an act of Congress.
• Learn why we TVCommandos won't be "roughing it!"
• This just in from the Whisper Room! (How cool is that?)

Shhhh! Stay tuned...

TVCommando Olympic Television Sports Trivia (Take 1!)

According to an ESPN poll, what U.S. team did 59% of American viewers root against during the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta? (I was there shooting Judo for the Japanese then...)



Remember, submit your answer via email to: golftvcommando@yahoo.com
A winner will be selected from all of the correct answers submitted by Sunday, July 20th at midnight est. This week's winner will be announced on Tuesday along with a new question! Good luck!!

TV, Travel, Freelance & Family Matters

The prospect of my departure on the 29th for a four week trip to the opposite side of the globe has dredged up some old memories for me. OK, call it guilt. I can't shake the feeling, "What have I done?"

Below are the four reasons why I'm not looking forward to traveling next month to Beijing to cover the Olympics. Indeed, they're all pretty cute, huh? They are, in fact, the reasons I stopped traveling full-time as a freelance TVCommando almost seven years ago. So what was I thinking when I agreed to this crazy gig? I'm not sure.

Was it a momentary lapse of judgment? Always a possibility. Ego? I don't know. One of the things that so appeals to me about working in education over television is the lack of ego on everyone's part. Is it the seduction of a "few gold coins?" I never thought I had a price. Is it the "prestige?" As I tell all of my students, the prestige of being a high profile TV gypsy doesn't pay the bills. The truth is after all of the air travel, inevitable delays and TSA security...and then, even tighter security Chinese government-style, the inside of the TV compound or the back of my camera will look the same whether it's Beijing or Pebble Beach. Been there, done that. So why are my second thoughts leaving me staring at the ceiling at night?

Yeah, it's probably guilt.

My wife knows exactly what's in store. I can see it in her eyes as she begins to steel herself for the upcoming reality of parenting a 12-year-old, a 6-year-old and a 5-year-old alone. She knows very well having spent many years living, working and parenting as a married single when I was traveling 200 days a year. She may be out of practice, but her resiliency and toughness always impressed me. She is much tougher than I. That still doesn't make it any easier for her, or on the relationship.

Shawn has many memories of traveling to exotic locations. Of warm weather and hotel pools and being Daddy's "assistant cameraman" at the "big parks" as he used to call all the golf courses we visited together. He also remembers a Dad who missed a lot. He knows exactly how many birthdays I missed to this day. They're not proud parental moments for me either, pal. If you strung all of the days together I missed in the first six years of his life, it adds up to almost exactly half.

My girls have no idea what's ahead. And I can only hope and pray these digital postcards can ease the burden with a few pictures of Daddy's face and a few words on a computer screen. I know from experience it doesn't equal all the missed bedtime books and back scratches. As a prelude of things to come, I traveled to California to do some training last month and after a few days my wife reported both girls definitely thought absence did not make the heart grow fonder. They wanted their Daddy back.

It's not getting easier as my departure day nears. Every time I have attempted to leave the house during the last few weeks my 5-year-old, Leyna, has dropped whatever she's doing and insisted on us completing the same goodbye ritual before I leave. The conversation goes something like this:

Leyna: (When she see me leaving.) "Daddy stop!" (She has run out into the driveway several times while yelling this.)
Daddy: "Yes pumpkin..."
Leyna: "Are you going to China now?"
Daddy: "No, honey, I'm going to ACME (the local grocery store)."
Leyna: (Despite the fact we've repeated this long goodbye a dozen times so far, it still gets to me...) "Will you tell me when you're going to China?"
Daddy: "Yes, Leyna, Daddy will tell you.

What was I thinking? 17-days left to departure.

Definitely guilt.

The Family

COMING SOON: TV, Olympics, Beijing Trivia Contest

Don't miss out on your chance to win NBC Sports hats, Olympic pins (and whatever else I can scrounge while I'm in Beijing!) as we play another round of TVCommando Trivia! (Olympic Edition)

Categories will include (but are not limited to): Olympic Event History, Olympic TV History, Chinese Culture, Geography and History, TV technology & Behind the Scenes (i.e. Guess how many cameras shot Opening Ceremonies?)

And, oh yeah, my student's favorite category:
Things I should have learned in Video Production class, but didn't!



Contest Rules:
The games are simple. I'll post one trivia question per week beginning on Tuesday, July 15th. Email your answers by Saturday night at Midnight EST to: golftvcommando@yahoo.com. Myself, or one of my bribed...errrrrr... drafted fellow TVCommandos will pick a lucky winner from all the correctly emailed answers out one of those spit bucket they have ringside at boxing (don't worry, I'll 'borrow' one.) The lucky winner will receive a gift! Winners will be posted on Monday (which will be Tuesday for you...) and we'll start all over! Void where prohibited, need not be 18 to play!

31-Days & Counting: Olympic Event Schedule

FYI, here's an easy to read schedule of Olympic events:
http://www.nbcolympics.com/resultsandschedules/index.html

Peace!

Beijing Olympic Numbers: Television Sports Coverage

19
Days of Olympic coverage on NBC, starting with Aug. 6 soccer matches two days before the opening ceremony and ending with the Aug. 24 closing ceremony.

1,200
Hours of Olympic coverage offered by NBC's network and cable stations.

15
Beijing is 17 hours ahead of Ohio. Nightly prime-time shows will have swimming, gymnastics and beach volleyball live — when it is morning in Beijing.

9
Channels that will carry Olympic coverage — NBC, MSNBC, CNBC, USA, Oxygen and Telemundo; high-definition users can watch USA HD, Universal HD and NBC HD.

2,200
Hours of live streaming video, replays and highlights offered free at www.NBCOlympics.com.

3,500
Hours of coverage — including exclusive video packages — offered on the Web.
Source: TV Technology

Personally, I think all of the water sports should be on Oxygen. I'll keep searching for a programming guide and post here. Peace!

"Director Says!"

Greetings! Hey, by the way, you be the Director! I'm a cameraman I'm used to being told what to do...

If you have any comments, questions, have traveled to China/Beijing (suggestion anyone?), have photo requests (of Beijing) and/or for this space, send me an email:

golftvcommando@yahoo.com

I'll try to honor any and all 'reasonable' requests...

Testing...testing?

Greetings! In an effort to flatten my learning curve and to test the sharing capabilities between Photobucket and Blogger, I dropped in several brief 'slideshows' of past remote sports gigs as tests.

The first images are from the Olympics in Salt Lake City in Feb. of 2002. Unlike many of my colleagues who worked actual sporting events like skiing, or snowboarding, or ice skating... I worked at a venue called, The Medals Plaza, which was actually a really large concert hall built in the parking lot of the Morman Church. A small studio (we called it the Treehouse) was built on stilts some 35' in the air and I spent the month working two cameras; one inside the studio focused on our anchor, Pat O'Brien, and the other outside on the "porch," focused on the stage of our nightly medals ceremonies and then on a rock concert. The bands included Barenaked Ladies, Creed, Dave Matthews Band, Foo Fighters, Smash Mouth, Brooks & Dunn and Martina McBride to name a few... Indeed, while my friends froze their lens off up on the mountains, I chilled out with Mr. O'B everynight, passed out some heavy metal and shot a rock concert! You gotta love the craziness of TV!

The second slideshow has some pictures from golf's Ryder Cup when it was held at Oakland Hills just north of Detroit in 2004. I had started my teaching job by then but NBC was kind enough to invite me up for just the weekend coverage. And yes, that IS what camera operators (at least the older ones) do when they're waiting for golf to start!

And the last of the archive photos come from the US Open held at Shinnecock Hills GC on Long Island. My office for the week was the 10th green...

I plan to add several more to the archive in the coming days before I begin offering China pics. Stay tuned!

As always, thanks for stop’n in!

Olympics-Salt Lake '02

Ryder Cup 2004

US Open-2004