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__NOTOC__ Skycam is a computer-controlled, stabilized,
cable-suspended camera system A cable-suspended camera system is a system of cables above or along an area to be filmed or videoed, over or along which an attached camera head travels to achieve required camera angles. There are two broad types cable-suspended camera system ...
. The system is maneuvered through three dimensions in the open space over a playing area of a
stadium A stadium ( : stadiums or stadia) is a place or venue for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts, or other events and consists of a field or stage either partly or completely surrounded by a tiered structure designed to allow spectators to stand o ...
or
arena An arena is a large enclosed platform, often circular or oval-shaped, designed to showcase theatre, musical performances, or sporting events. It is composed of a large open space surrounded on most or all sides by tiered seating for spectator ...
by computer-controlled cable-drive system. It is responsible for bringing
video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This feedba ...
–like
camera A camera is an optical instrument that can capture an image. Most cameras can capture 2D images, with some more advanced models being able to capture 3D images. At a basic level, most cameras consist of sealed boxes (the camera body), with ...
angles to television sports coverage. The camera package weighs less than and can travel at .


History

Skycam was invented by Garrett Brown (also the inventor of the
Steadicam Steadicam is a brand of camera stabilizer mounts for motion picture cameras invented by Garrett Brown and introduced in 1975 by Cinema Products Corporation. It was designed to isolate the camera from the camera operator's movement, keeping th ...
) in the early 1980s. The patent for Skycam was assigned to Skycam, Inc. In 2004, Skycam, Inc. was acquired by Winnercomm, Inc. In 2009, Winnercomm was acquired by Outdoor Channel Holdings, Inc., parent company of the
Outdoor Channel Outdoor Channel is an American pay television channel focused on the outdoors, offering programming that includes hunting, fishing, Western lifestyle, off-road motorsports and adventure. The network can be viewed on multiple platforms including ...
. In 2013, Outdoor Channel was acquired by Kroenke Sports & Entertainment. In 2015, a federal lawsuit was filed by Nic Salomon, the former President of Skycam, claiming intentional interference with contractual relations related to the 2013 acquisition by Kroenke Sports & Entertainment. The case was allowed to proceed by the court in the Northern District of Texas in August 2017. It was then dismissed in February 2019, weeks before a jury trial. In March 2019, Salomon appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. In April 2021, the Court of Appeals ruled in Kroenke Sports' favor. Despite the dispute, Skycam remains an important technology for the presentation of football content.


Usage

While "Skycam" is a registered trademark the term "Skycam" is often used generically for
cable-suspended camera system A cable-suspended camera system is a system of cables above or along an area to be filmed or videoed, over or along which an attached camera head travels to achieve required camera angles. There are two broad types cable-suspended camera system ...
, and competing systems like CableCam (invented by Jim Rodnunsky but also a subsidiary of Kroenke Sports & Entertainment, LLC),
Spidercam The Spidercam is a cable-suspended camera system which enables film and television cameras to move both vertically and horizontally over a predetermined area, typically the playing field of a sporting event such as a cricket pitch, football fie ...
and Robycam 3D. Systems like it have been in limited use since the mid-1980s when the technology was first patented, but until the mid-1990s progress was slow due to limitations in computer and servo motor technology as well as cost (a 2001 estimate pegged the cost to use the Skycam at $30,000 per event). All of these systems began seeing more widespread use in the 21st century.


American football

Skycam was first publicly used in fall 1984, at a preseason
National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the majo ...
(NFL) game in San Diego between the Chargers and 49ers, televised by CBS.
NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...
debuted the first wire-flown remote-controlled camera used in sports coverage at the
1985 Orange Bowl The 1985 Orange Bowl was the 51st edition of the college football bowl game, played at the Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida, on Tuesday, January 1. Part of the 1984–85 bowl game season, it matched the fourth-ranked Washington Huskies of the ...
. The XFL was one of the first leagues to make extensive use of the Skycam as a primary camera angle for broadcasts when it debuted in spring 2001. Traditional camera angles were used more prominently after the first week of play; the "Xcam" (as it was known in that league's broadcasts) remained in regular use throughout the rest of the season.
ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...
first used Skycam in 2001 for an NFL pre-season telecast and then consistently in 2002 for ''
Sunday Night Football Sunday Night Football may refer to: * ''NBC Sunday Night Football'', the Sunday night broadcast of American NFL games by NBC since 2006 * ''ESPN Sunday Night Football'', the Sunday night broadcast of American NFL games from 1987 to 2005 by ESPN * ...
'' broadcasts. Since then, ESPN and sister-network ABC have made widespread use of Skycam for NCAA football, ''
Monday Night Football ''ESPN Monday Night Football'' (abbreviated as ''MNF'' and also known as ''ESPN Monday Night Football on ABC'' for simulcasts) is an American live television broadcast of weekly National Football League (NFL) games currently airing on ESPN, ...
'', and
Super Bowl XXXVII Super Bowl XXXVII was an American football game between the American Football Conference (AFC) champion Oakland Raiders and the National Football Conference (NFC) champion Tampa Bay Buccaneers to decide the National Football League (NFL) cha ...
. The networks have regularly offered a Skycam-only internet broadcast of many of its more important sportscasts under the Megacast brand. CBC used a CableCam in their broadcasts of the
2005 File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; " Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris was discover ...
and
2006 Grey Cup The 94th Grey Cup game took place on November 19, 2006, at Canad Inns Stadium in Winnipeg, Manitoba before 44,786 fans. Ticket prices ranged from $141 and $275. The game decided the championship of the 2006 Canadian Football League season. The BC ...
s. On October 22, 2017, NBC was required to broadcast the majority of a ''
Sunday Night Football Sunday Night Football may refer to: * ''NBC Sunday Night Football'', the Sunday night broadcast of American NFL games by NBC since 2006 * ''ESPN Sunday Night Football'', the Sunday night broadcast of American NFL games from 1987 to 2005 by ESPN * ...
'' game using Skycam angles, as their traditional sideline angles were obscured by a large amount of fog. Reception to the impromptu experiment was mostly positive (with some drawing comparisons to the default camera angle used in football video games, such as the ''
Madden NFL ''Madden NFL'' (known as ''John Madden Football'' until 1993) is an American football video game series developed by EA Tiburon for EA Sports. It is named after Pro Football Hall of Fame coach and commentator John Madden and sold more than 130 ...
'' franchise); NBC announced that it would experiment with intentionally using the Skycam as a primary angle during a subsequent
Thursday Thursday is the day of the week between Wednesday and Friday. According to the ISO 8601 international standard, it is the fourth day of the week. In countries which adopt the "Sunday-first" convention, it is the fifth day of the week. Name ''Se ...
-night game on November 16, 2017 and again for the December 14 game the same year. The Skycam's perspective, while making more effective use of the field of vision offered by a television screen (thus allowing viewers to see plays develop more clearly than the traditional sideline view), distorts vertical distances and makes it more difficult to assess yardages, which was part of the reason it has not been used more often. Consequently, in NBC's trial runs, they switched to a traditional sideline camera in short-yardage situations including the red zone, where the shorter distances negate some of the disadvantages of the sideline camera. To mitigate some of these disadvantages, NBC experimented with expanding the live on-field graphics to include a "green zone" that darkens the area between the line of scrimmage and the line to gain for a first down.


Other sports

Prior to the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, it was proposed that Skycam be used at the Opening Ceremonies and Track & Field events at the LA Coliseum. During test runs, the images were excellent, but on its last test, one of its four support wires snagged on the top of the steel football goal post at the peristyle end of the Coliseum and bent one of the arms. Skycam was unharmed, but was not used at the Olympics that year. Systems from Skycam and CableCam have also been used for the NBA and NHL final series and the beginning of the 2005 and 2006
NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and ...
season broadcast on Fox. CableCam was used on the famous 17th hole at the Tournament Players Club at Sawgrass for
NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...
's coverage of
The Players Championship The Players Championship (commonly known as simply The Players, stylized by the PGA Tour as The PLAYERS Championship) is an annual golf tournament on the PGA Tour. Originally known as the Tournament Players Championship, it began in 1974. The ...
in 2005. CBS used a SkyCam for their coverage of the
2010 File:2010 Events Collage New.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2010 Chile earthquake was one of the strongest recorded in history; The Eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland disrupts air travel in Europe; A scene from the opening ceremony of ...
NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges ...
Men's
Basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...
Final Four games in
Lucas Oil Stadium Lucas Oil Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium in downtown Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. It replaced the RCA Dome as the home field of the National Football League (NFL)'s Indianapolis Colts and opened on August 16, 2008. The stadium wa ...
. In
Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...
, the
Nine Network The Nine Network (stylised 9Network, commonly known as Channel Nine or simply Nine) is an Australian commercial free-to-air television network. It is owned by parent company Nine Entertainment and is one of five main free-to-air television netw ...
trialed Skycam for three of their '' Friday Night Football'' broadcasts of the
Australian Football League The Australian Football League (AFL) is the only fully professional sports, professional competition of Australian rules football. Through the AFL Commission, the AFL also serves as the sport's governing body and is responsible for controlling ...
for the 2004 season. It was also used in the
State of Origin A State of Origin competition is a type of sporting event between players representing their state or territory. State of Origin began in Australian rules football on 8 October 1977 between Western Australia (WA) and Victoria, at Subiaco Ov ...
series. The first use of Skycam for an MLS broadcast was on April 2, 2005, for an ESPN broadcast of a match between DC United and
Chivas USA Chivas USA (pronounced ''CHEE-vahs'') was an American professional soccer team based in the Los Angeles suburb of Carson, California. The club played from 2005 to 2014 in Major League Soccer (MLS) and was a subsidiary of Mexican club C.D. G ...
at the Home Depot Center in Carson, California. However, the use of Skycam proved to be controversial three weeks later on April 23, 2005 when the camera crashed to the field of the Home Depot Center during a match between the
LA Galaxy LA Galaxy, also known as the Los Angeles Galaxy, are an American professional soccer club based in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. The Galaxy competes in Major League Soccer (MLS), as a member of the Western Conference. The club began p ...
and Chivas USA. Skycam has been used infrequently for MLS broadcasts since then, including the
2015 MLS All-Star Game The 2015 Major League Soccer All-Star Game, the 20th annual Major League Soccer All-Star Game, took place on July 29, 2015 (9 p.m. Eastern Time Zone, EDT, 7 p.m. Mountain Time Zone, local time) at Dick's Sporting Goods Park in the Denver suburb ...
. On April 2, 2016,
Sporting Kansas City Sporting Kansas City, often shortened to Sporting KC, is an American men's professional soccer club based in the Kansas City metropolitan area. The administrative offices are located in Downtown Kansas City, Missouri, and the team clubhouse and ...
debuted the league's first semi-permanent Skycam installation at Children's Mercy Park, in a match against
Real Salt Lake Real Salt Lake, often shortened to RSL, is an American professional soccer franchise based in the Salt Lake City metropolitan area. The club competes as a member club of Major League Soccer (MLS) in the Western Conference. RSL began play in 20 ...
.


Technical overview

Skycam consists of three major components: the reel—the motor drive and cables, the spar—the counterbalanced pan and
tilt Tilt may refer to: Music * Tilt (American band), a punk rock group, formed in 1992 * Tilt (British band), an electronic music group, formed in 1993 * Tilt (Polish band), a rock band, formed in 1979 Albums * ''Tilt'' (Cozy Powell album), 1981 ...
video camera, and central control—the computer software used by the operator to fly the camera.


Reels

The system consists of four reels anchored at high fixed points at corners of the stadium or arena (the cables are attached to fixed spars formed by tall extensible lift platforms when permanent anchors are not available). Each reel is a cable spool with motor and disc brakes with its own computer capable of a .01" positioning resolution. The cable is a braided
Kevlar Kevlar (para-aramid) is a strong, heat-resistant synthetic fiber, related to other aramids such as Nomex and Technora. Developed by Stephanie Kwolek at DuPont in 1965, the high-strength material was first used commercially in the early 1970s a ...
jacketed single mode
optical fiber An optical fiber, or optical fibre in Commonwealth English, is a flexible, transparent fiber made by drawing glass ( silica) or plastic to a diameter slightly thicker than that of a human hair Hair is a protein filament that grows ...
with conductive copper elements and is capable of supporting on a single cable.


Mobile spar

The tall spar contains the
Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...
HD camera, the pan and tilt motor, and stabilization sensors. Weighing , the package also includes a power distribution module and electronics for fiber optic signaling.


Central control

Central control is an industrial grade, Linux computer workstation that provides camera flight and video control. Both a pilot (the one who flies the spar in 3D space) and the operator (the one who controls the camera pan, tilt, zoom and focus) use this system for controlling the overall video shot. The central computer system uses a custom software package to control each aspect of the camera system, including motion, video, and obstacle avoidance.


Incidents

* In the December 20, 2009
Las Vegas Bowl The Las Vegas Bowl is an NCAA Division I FBS annual post-season college football bowl game held in the Las Vegas area. First played in 1992, the bowl was originally held at the 40,000-seat Sam Boyd Stadium in Whitney, Nevada before moving to the ...
between the
Oregon State Beavers The Oregon State Beavers are the athletic teams that represent Oregon State University, located in Corvallis, Oregon. The Beavers compete at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I ( Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) for ...
and the
BYU Cougars The BYU Cougars are the intercollegiate athletic teams that represent Brigham Young University (BYU), located in Provo, Utah. BYU fields 21 National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) varsity athletic teams. They are a member of the West Co ...
, Skycam had to be taken down as a result of high winds. Gusts were reported at over 40 miles per hour. * In the 2011 Insight Bowl on December 30, 2011 between the
Iowa Hawkeyes The Iowa Hawkeyes are the athletic teams that represent the University of Iowa, located in Iowa City, Iowa. The Hawkeyes have varsity teams in 22 sports, 8 for men and 14 for women; a 15th women's sport will be added in 2023. The teams partici ...
and the
Oklahoma Sooners The Oklahoma Sooners are the sport, athletic teams that represent the University of Oklahoma, located in Norman, Oklahoma, Norman. The 19 men's and women's varsity teams are called the "Sooners", a reference to a nickname given to the early part ...
, Skycam crashed onto the field with 2:22 left to play, almost striking Iowa receiver Marvin McNutt. The game was delayed for about 5 minutes as a result, as the camera and its cables were removed from the field of play."No one hurt after camera falls at Insight Bowl"
''
Houston Chronicle The ''Houston Chronicle'' is the largest daily newspaper in Houston, Texas, United States. , it is the third-largest newspaper by Sunday circulation in the United States, behind only ''The New York Times'' and the ''Los Angeles Times''. With i ...
'' (December 31, 2011)
* During a Week 9 game between the Buffalo Bills and New York Jets at MetLife Stadium on November 6, 2022, one of the Skycam cables snapped with 8:27 remaining in the third quarter, causing a 12-minute delay. The camera and its cables were removed from the field of play.


See also

*
Spidercam The Spidercam is a cable-suspended camera system which enables film and television cameras to move both vertically and horizontally over a predetermined area, typically the playing field of a sporting event such as a cricket pitch, football fie ...


References


Notes


Bibliography

*Gwinn, Eric (November 11, 2004)
"Working the angles"
''
Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...
''.


External links

*
Official site

CableCam

Skycam Inventor Garrett Brown



Press release announcing LynxOS real-time operating system in Skycam (2003)

A cable camera platform used in the 1994 Winter Olympics and for filming Peter Pan's "Hook."

A DIY Skycam
{{Kroenke Sports & Entertainment Cameras Film and video technology Sports television technology Kroenke Sports & Entertainment