CBS, DirecTV Got Their Game On In 3D At Tennis’ U.S. Open

By Mike Reynolds , Todd Spangler and John Eggerton -- Multichannel News, 9/6/2010 12:01:00 AM

Flushing, N.Y. — CBS and DirecTV were set to play 3D doubles this Labor Day weekend at tennis’ U.S. Open, with a little sponsorship and technical assistance from Panasonic.

At a press conference in the main players interview room (graced by large photos of Jimmy Connors, now an analyst for Tennis Channel, Chris Evert and the ubiquitous John McEnroe) under Arthur Ashe Stadium last week, Panasonic executives talked about the expanding 3D world, including a new partnership with Bexel that will increase the pool of professional 3D equipment. Bexel now has six 3D camera rigs equipped with Panasonic cameras for rent.

In addition to pitching 3D camcorders and home-theater systems, the executives talked up a “3D Innovation Center” Panasonic will open this fall at its U.S. headquarters in Secaucus, N.J., where, working with other members of the product and content communities, they will look to establish best practices that can “optimize workflow, reduce costs and enhance business outcomes” in the burgeoning 3D “ecosystem.”

Eisuke Tsuyuzaki, chief technology officer of Panasonic Corp. of North America, said Panasonic’s 3D technology is now being used on a weekly basis to shoot new productions for DirecTV’s n3D channel, a point verified by DirecTV senior vice president Steven Roberts.

Tsuyuzaki also introduced CBS Sports executive vice president of engineering, operations and production services Ken Aagard, as “the James Cameron of sports.”

That prompted Aagaard, who will be leading CBS’s 3D production efforts from the Open, including the final weekend of the Grand Slam tournament, to quip: “Thank you Eisuke. The James Cameron of HD 3D … Now, I can tell my wife we can get a bigger house.”

Aagaard also talked up the importance of the opportunities for the TV sports community in general and CBS — which presented last year’s NCAA Men’s Basketbal Final Four in 3D to select movie theaters — in particular to continue to experiment with different competitions in the format.

He pointed out that previous 3D telecasts emanated from larger venues than the relatively “confined area” at center court in Arthur Ashe Stadium, where CBS and PACE will be shooting the enhanced tennis telecasts.

At the Open event last Wednesday, attendees got to check out Avatar and other 3D content, including shots from around the grounds at the National Tennis Center in Panasonic’s 3D Experience room, adjoining Louis Armstrong Stadium. Come the weekend, Panasonic plasmas therein were set to serve DirecTV n3D images of the Open.

Meadowlands Has an Acre of High-Definition
Feeling the need to totally immerse yourself in HD? Head over to the New Meadowlands Stadium — the $1.6 billion home to the National Football League’s New York Giants and Jets — which, by The Wire’s calculations, has more than an acre of high-def screens.

In each of the 82,500-seat stadium’s corners are four 118- by-30-foot HD video-display boards. Circling the interior is a 4- by-1810-foot “ribbon board.” The East Rutherford, N.J., venue also will be outfi tted with more than 2,200 HD video displays throughout the stadium, as well as 20 HD “video pylons” ranging in size from 20-by-40 feet to 20-by-60 feet. That all easily adds up to more than an acre (43,560 square feet), with the total depending on how big the 2,200 individual displays are.

“When fans enter New Meadowlands, they are going to feel like they’re stepping into the future,” New York Giants president and CEO John Mara said in a statement.

Either that or they’ll get temporarily blinded.

Daktronics supplied the four large scoreboards, the ribbon board and the pylons; Sony supplied the HD monitors and integrated the stadium’s video-replay room. Verizon, an official sponsor of New Meadowlands Stadium and provider of telecommunications services, teamed with Cisco Systems to bring 34 channels into the stadium (29 of them in HD), letting visitors in the luxury suites scan ESPN HD, TNT HD, YES Network HD, SNY HD, CNN HD, NFL Network HD and NFL Red Zone HD … and, if the kids are getting restless, Nickelodeon HD and Cartoon Network HD.

CNN’s Cooper Helps PEJ Quiz Retain Readers
Which sector of the national news media devoted the largest share of its news hole to covering that newsy hole at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico that spewed out millions of barrels of crude oil over the spring and summer?

Hint: it wasn’t the broadcast-network newscasts.

That is just one of the questions in a Project for Excellence in Journalism online quiz billed as a “test of your knowledge of how the media covered the disaster in the Gulf.” It is based on PEJ’s content analysis of almost 3,000 stories between April 20, when the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded, and the July 28 implosion of BP CEO Tony Hayward (he resigned that day).

One question strayed rather far from testing our knowledge of the coverage: “CNN’s Anderson Cooper, who reported extensively from the Gulf region during the oil spill, wasn’t always a cable news journalist. Which of these jobs has Cooper previously held?”

Options: Game show host, fashion model, ABC news anchor or all of the above. Without revealing the answer, The Wire notes the question seemed a dead giveaway that the quiz’s sensibility went beyond how the media covered the story to how they could keep folks clicking on more questions. (It was question number two.)

It worked: We kept on clicking to more serious questions, like which cable network provided the most coverage.

“The quiz is a way to extend knowledge about both the gulf coverage and the media generally,” PEJ director Tom Rosenstiel said. PEJ’s news index is a valuable tool in monitoring major media coverage trends.

“Certainly there is no shot intended at Cooper or desire to take anything away from his coverage or commitment to that story,” he said. “We hoped that mixing facts about people in the media with findings about coverage is another way to get people to pursue more knowledge about the press.”

Take the quiz yourself at http://features.journalism.org/quiz/the-media-quiz/.