2020 US Nationals Webcast Feedback!

[klindy]

Ok everyone, the National is over and the webcast is posted! There were some challenges and not everything went as perfectly as expected but all in all I think it was pretty awesome! We know there were some issues with the upload link where the webcast was offline for some time. There were concerns with the reliability coming into the event and every possible thing was done to prevent these issues but ultimately you're at the mercy of the provider. With only one option available was to use the best connection speed plan available and make sure none of the reliability issues were on our side of the connection.

 

We also know there are a few archive videos which are currently unavailable due to background music licensing. This is a YouTube thing. The background music likely came from the onsite PA system which we monitored all week to prevent the webcast mics from picking it up. I understand that TWBC will be fixing this issue next week.

 

TWBC did a great job on a tight budget with far fewer hands than they would have liked. I can't thank them and the crew at Tri-Lakes/Bennett's for working together to produce the bggest, most badass webcast of a waterski event I've seen! I haven't added it up but there are somewhere more than 100 HOURS of the webcast online. Each lake ran for about 11-13 hours a day for each of the 5 days! Vince, Tony, @Kelvin and each and everyone else on the TWBC crew really knocked it out of the park!!! And the volunteer announcers were stellar!! I'll let @JeffSurdej give a shoutout to the announcers since he coordinated them from beginning to end. Hours and hours of play by play and analysis mixed in with background info and skier data and a few "words from our sponsors"!

 

Last I heard there were over 50,000 views! A couple times I logged on to see there were as many as 500 viewers watching slalom and over 300 watching jump & tricks. The goal of reaching out to an audience that couldn't attend or typically doesn't attend was met.

 

In this thread we discussed the potential of a webcast for the Nationals. SO....never too early to plan for next year!!! How about some feedback!?!?! What did you like?? What do you want to see improved?? Any other interesting ideas!??

 

For those who kicked in a few bucks to make it happen, was it worth it to you??

[The_MS]

Skier bios

[MISkier]

I thought the webcast was awesome. The multiple cameras, replays, and solid commentary all added to the quality. I was able to see many of my friends and enjoy some exciting performances across the board.

 

About the only improvement I would add is for the skiers themselves to provide some backstory or fun facts that the announcers could use to help the viewers become more familiar with the competitors. There were a few stories and I heard @lpskier ask for viewers to email him with tidbits during his spots. With some background and individual skier history (PBs or notable performances), it would show the viewers a bit about their journey.

[klindy]

I'll start the list of some additional ideas

Additional camera views

A roving reporter with a mic for dockside interviews, a walk thru the exhibitor area, etc.

Additional graphics to help explain the sport to first time viewers (@Wish I know let's talk about rope lengths!)

Running orders - "who's next"

Coming next - some projected times for next events

 

 

What else!?

 

know @JeffSurdej will be putting some survey's together to get some feedback but how about you guy!? Good or bad, any feedback is needed.

[liquid d]

While I'm sure all the suggestions will only improve things....but I have to say, It was awesome to have people all over the country be able to watch live. I had relatives everywhere watching; all the feedback was very positive. The camera work was great; the slow motion took up the slack time, and announcing kept the drama high. Great Job! We definitely need to make sure it happens at all the future Nationals.

[kc]

I thought the webcast was great. I watched from the hotel Tuesday morning before heading to the site to ski. I listened during my 13 plus hours drive home Wednesday, then watched many hours of coverage Thursday though Saturday. @klindy All the ideas you mentioned would be nice additions, as well as bios, as @The_MS suggested. I definitely feel I got my money’s worth for the contribution I made.

[bobbulfer]

I thought the webcast was great. We did not attend this year but my kids loved being able to watch their friends ski. They were bummed we didn’t go but this made them still feel like they were part of it. Hopefully this will continue next year.

[ALPJr]

Awesome.

[brettmainer]

I thought it was great. I’m glad I kicked in my $20. I was happy with the production. Since suggestions were asked for, here is mine.

 

Post the leaderboard more often. Every pass, maybe not during live action, but during the replay or down time. I have always appreciated regional and national tournaments that gave announcing air time to the leaderboard, even when there were 20 skiers left and everyone knows that the current leaderboard is not going to finish in the top 5. Kind of a shout out for those who showed up knowing they wouldn’t place but still skied to or beyond their seed.

[cacman]

Enjoyed watching. Thank you.

[disland]

Now that we have it we will always want it, sign them for a long term deal. TWBC is awesome. It was like ESPN showed up. These guys are pro's!

 

Only suggestion would be to do some promotion and set up the open skier events so everyone knows when it is, and make it big!

 

Obviously TWBC will need to be on hand for Americas Cup next year too.

[harddock]

In 1964 Nationals first televised!

[harddock]

more from 64

[klindy]

@harddock That's just a proud dad filming his kid in junior boys with a handicam. :D

 

Actually it was cool that the need for content was so high a production team would setup all that equipment. The technology they had at the Nationals this year was impressive. Highspeed digital cameras, fiber optic cables, and high quality commercial quality transmitters/receivers. I think the quality of the video captured was incredible.

[skibackwards]

For the times we are in, I greatly appreciate the effort and production of this great webcast. 1st class. Thank you.

[MattP]

Anyone know where the M2 slalom video is? My family and friends couldn't watch cause the webcast apparently went down and does not appear to be in the archive... BIG bummer

 

- Would be nice to have 2 announcers per lake on the webcast so you have someone to bounce things off of and fill the dead time.

- Skier Bios. 1000+ pulls and it felt like the announcers had almost nothing to say about most of the skiers. Too much guessing and wrong info.

- Webcast announcers should be inside someplace as not to get copyright issues with youtube. The webcast should not dictate any aspect of the host site or tournament function. Period.

- Please don't announce in meters. We don't want to scare away any people. The sport is hard enough to follow as it is. Don't even bring it up unless there is a tie in jump.

 

If we want this yearly is this going to be a factor in the bidding process? or another requirement on the host site? You need x internet and 10k or is this all on AWSA. Who will pay for the webcast? Crowd funding 10k every year does not seem like a long term solution. I don't see a webcast being viable at a site like Okee. too many lakes..

 

Why does USAWS pay for the show ski nationals webcast? Which was $7,500-11,500 in the past. AWSA is the largest sport division. Should we be receiving money as well.

 

There is a budget line for USAWS for Nationals TV Production expense which is almost 10k. Where is this going?

[bikesrus]

Congrats on a job well done. The announcers were super knowledgeable and being able to see from several vantage points was amazing. Plus, Bennett’s look like a great place to go ski!

[jcamp]

The lack of bios is because skiers don't fill them out or barely do ... not the announcers' fault.

[BraceMaker]

Was great to watch - had it running at my office for most of it and had a lot of people ask about water skiing - great resource.

Something I think would be great would be resource to find the events:

 

A page like the running order but as skiers finished their passes could be linked.

[LeonL]

I thought it was great. What up!? USAWS pays for show ski nationals webcast? AWSA brings in the most membership and sanction fees and show ski gets webcast coverage for free? AWSA pays on it's own? What's wrong with this picture? Assuming @MattP is correct, and I don't doubt him. All the announcers are appreciated, but as usual Freddy Krueger was in a league of his own with regard to slalom analysis.

[MattP]

@LeonL agreed. Freddy is one of the best announcers in the country. Always loved watching the Cali ProAm because of it. @Sethski is really good too. Honestly I can only handle listening to Tony for about 30min. Only watched that lake when I had friends skiing.

 

2019 USAWS Meeting Report Page 46 & 51. Someone let me know if I am reading it wrong.

[LeonL]

@MattP , 30 minutes! You're a tough guy. Too many err, uhh. British normality I suppose.

[klindy]

@MattP You're reading that correctly. The money is/was from the USOC (one of the benefits of being part of the USOC). It has been there for several years and has been earmarked for the Show Ski Nationals every year. The recent change to the Team USA website format is another way the USOC supports the member sports. As was reported by USAWSWS at our AWSA Board meeting last Monday, switching to this web format comes with $60k in budget help. I do not know where or how that money is targeted to be spent nor do I know if there are any restrictions to use the money. That previous $10k may not be rolled up into the $60k. Again, those are details that need to be worked out and are on the radar screen.

 

To your larger question, we know that a crowd funded approach is unworkable every year. Jeff and I have already had some preliminary conversations, but we'll definitely have to figure out how to make this happen. Consider this year a proof-of-concept and I think we've proven it can be done well and is worthwhile.

 

Whether we find budget dollars (via USAWSWS/USOC) or in the Nationals budget itself or even some kind of pay per view/subscription approach (or some combination of that), we believe it makes sense to make it happen.

 

One clear thing we need to do a better job next year is determining up front who does what and is responsible for what. Man power is required (camera operators, announcers, etc.) and even if there are a lot of volunteers, they need to be coordinated and better managed. SOme will need to be housed and fed. I suspect we'll have a better idea how to budget for the webcast and hopefully we'll have more than a couple months to plan it. The hard work from every one was awesome and the patience and support from Tri-Lakes and Jay & Anne Bennett was amazing.

 

[ToddL]

My advice is to keep it simple and functional. More angles mean cameras which mean more operators and more production effort. Don't over complicate something that works well to the point that the simple things are diluted.

 

This team probably worked 10x harder than anyone realizes. They are often the first to arrive and last to leave. Kudos to all involved in any way!!!!

 

Quality is always limited by on-site internet bandwidth. If more money is thrown at this, I would set aside budget to augment/ensure dedicated upload bandwidth for the feed. (Not that there were issues this year, but future sites might pose a challenge.)

 

Things that worked:

1) Having a dedicated announcer per active lake.

2) Dock cam of next competitor getting ready - neat perspective

3) Not sure which I liked best on slalom (shore view vs. boat view). Either one is sufficient if constrained in the future.

4) Overlay of skier & current score

5) replays / slow-mo, etc. were a great way to fill time between live passes

 

Opportunities for improvement:

1) Add current division and skier seed # to the overlay so that at a moments glance the view can know where we are. Possibly keep the current division overlay in the corner and always on.

2) possibly keep the skier name overlay always on

 

Nit picky stuff, I hesitate to even mention:

1) announcers need to be careful to not over analyze or be critical. Maybe a summarized of the AWSA Announcer's Manual is due. I heard only a couple of slightly negative comments, which could be taken the wrong way vs the reality that the announcer was just innocently commenting. Always, keep it positive. Describe what is and not why might be. Hold off on judging uncertainties until the resolution is known, etc.

2) Avoid the temptation to comment about the other lake because the viewers can't "turn their head to see" what is going on.

 

Again, keep it simple enough that it can be done well. One thing done right is always better than 20 things done poorly.

[klindy]

Agreed @ToddL the crew worked 10x harder than most people realize. Most of them were rushing to pack up Saturday evening to start a road trip to Washington State for another event up there this weekend! They REALLY, REALLY worked hard.

 

As for video angles (and this relates to the other thread on judging/score changes), the rules require gate videos (2x), end course video and, depending on the judges tower locations (or for a R sanction), a video from the boat. The shore video's were super high quality with excellent camera operators and,, I think, are necessary to help the view feel like there were actually there - it's literally what you see from the shore.

 

Since we likely need a camera feed from the boat, the question is whether you install a camera that gets the job done in the boat (which is likely not the quality you want on the webcast) or you work on having a broadcast quality camera in the boat and tap into the video for any related judging requirements. We chose the latter for this event.

 

 

We started the event with a webcast camera and operator in the boat for slalom. There was a desire to limit the boat crew to only 2 people and we put a high quality camera on a SkiDoc and eliminated the person. The transmitter was a great commercial quality device that kept the signal quality up. What we lost was the ability for a human to point the camera at the skier between passes or other crowd/shore shots, etc you get with a human operator vs the rope pulling it back and forth behind the boat. You also naturally get additional vibration and jerky views that you wouldn't have with a good operator.

 

So there's a trade-off.

 

[BraceMaker]

"1) Add current division and skier seed # to the overlay so that at a moments glance the view can know where we are. Possibly keep the current division overlay in the corner and always on.

2) possibly keep the skier name overlay always on"

 

That's part of my issue on rewatching - when you're trying to skip through 8 hours of video on a touch screen device looking for the start of an event that can be hard.

[MrJones]

Just want to compliment all those involved. This is a great thing to be implementing and I hope it continues on. We had family members watching in multiple states. These weren't "skiers", just family who wanted to watch my daughter ski. I hadn't expected this but it was great for them and her.

 

As for improvement..

It's been mentioned, but bios mandatory for everyone. I admit to not filling one out in years. Figured we all know each other and it seems kind of silly. In the case of the webcast it should likely be something that has to be done as part of registration.

 

The roving reporter sounds like a good idea, as long as it's someone who know when not to talk to people.

 

Start lists and leader boards.

 

Again, this was great. Keep up the good work!!

[Cnewbert]

Outstanding job! Loved it, though wasn’t able to see it all. Tony Lightfoot is such a great and entertaining announcer! April Coble was also excellent as was Freddy Kruger. They all bring so much knowledge to their commentary it really enhances the experience.

[disland]

I feel like I need to pay a fee for the free slalom lesson from Freddie

[LeonL]

I was unable to watch MM live and I cant find it on Youtube archives. How?

[klindy]

Some of the archived events were removed by Facebook due to unlicensed music. Vince said he would clean that up and repost soon. I know that most of the webcast team was travelling to Washington State for an event this weekend so I suspect today is a road day.

[Andre]

Great webcast! Congrats to all involve.I like Tony.He's colorful and knows its stuff,maybe not as much as Freddy but plenty good for most of us and he did a lot of hours behind the mic last week. Filling up time between passes is not an easy task without skiers bio so again,congrats to all and specially to our own @lpskier !

[Boo]

Did the webcast announcers even have access to the skiers bio? I know that I completed mine. There were only three women 8 trick skiers (my division). The announcer did not provide any information other than the names of the skiers. It would have been nice if at least the state residence of the skiers had been announced. Also, would have been good to provide information that Women 8 included skiers ages 70-75. Again, not sure if bio was provided to webcast announcers. Regardless, great to have webcast.

[klindy]

@Boo agreed. Access to the bios was needed. Unfortunately we didn’t plan on that early enough. Definitely will be different next year.

[darinmontgomery]

Huge Thank you to Anne and Jay Bennett, Bennett’s staff, volunteers, sponsors, and all officials for making the 2020 Nationals possible.

 

TWBC did an outstanding job with the webcast and set the bar high for all future US Nationals.

 

I agree with the all suggestions for bios, roving interviews, leaderboard, skier data, etc to continuing improving the viewer experience. As SurePath becomes adopted, even more data can be easily linked making the announcers job easier.

 

I happen to agree that Freddy is one of the best announcers and ambassadors of our sport. Unfortunately, it’s not realistic that he can do more than what he did on Saturday given his family and sponsor commitments. However, if the TWBC and LOC can get Freddy, April, TFin, Rossi, Wade, MB, and others to cover some of the events we all will be in for a real treat - next level stuff!

 

Regarding costs, it is awesome if USAWS & USOC can cover the majority of the costs. Crowdfunding can certainly be a bonus. I’d like to see an option for all AWSA members to donate set amounts with the annual renewal. I would also like to see a $10 broadcast fee added to the National entry fees. There are always advertising fee options as well. Combining all sources will ensure we can adequately support TWBC at the US Nationals for the enjoyment of all members, families, and friends while expanding our audience to help grow our sport.

 

Looking forward to building on this years TWBC success and 2021 season with US Nationals in Chicago, IL

[unksskis]

Maybe we update the Bio sheet that is filled out. I never fill it out, but maybe an updated look, more streamlined questions will get more responses? I'm trying to find it on USAWS but can't.

[BigGerald3]

Seth Stisher, Tommy Newman, Chad Hunter, and Zane Nicholson all did a great job!

Not to take anything away from the others, but they showed enthusiasm were exciting and worked very well together!

Looking forward to next year!

[unksskis]

Just a comment, don't have the announcers advertise for non-sponsoring companies/brands. This paid for broadcast is not the place to plug or comment about one's favorite ski school, or company that didn't put any money down. I feel the announcers need to be cognizant of that, and if we hope to have the webcast paid for moving forward would be something that shouldn't happen.

[oneski]

The webcast was awesome! I wasn’t able to make it to Nationals this year, but watching the webcast was the next best thing. I really enjoyed Freddie’s commentary on Open Women and Open Men skiers. Maybe he should move from jumping to slalom!

[klindy]

@oneski Freddy can do the morning traffic report and I’d listen. Point is, he obviously understands all three events and is really good at communicating.

[klindy]

@unksskis you have to log on and it’ll show up under your account details. I know a bio review and verification is part of the registration process when you sign up online for any tournament. That bio is saved and available in the future.

[lakeside7455]

Something easy to do that would add to the broadcast, is post the skiers name, line length, state, and zero off setting. It is all easy to do and would be interesting to see what settings skiers are using. The zero off setting isn't discussed much, basically ignored, but I think would be interesting and worthwhile to add to the post.

[rayn]

It was a great webcast, I agree with most everything said here. One suggestion if possible would be to break up the webcast or atleast the replays into the divisions/grouped so you could quickly find MM or OM or M5 easily.

[ALPJr]

The floating/water-surface cam that TWBC used at some of last year’s events would be cool.

[klindy]

@ALPJr that was the plan this year but ultimately wasn’t used.

[richfoster]

The webcast was awesome. I hope we can have it at nationals from now on.

[The_MS]

Is there any way to put the boat path in a box on the screen so we can see boat path and skier at the same time?

[The_MS]

@Gloersen Looks great. That would be great to have that on all future web casts

[klindy]

@The_MS it would be a cool perspective. However the dozen plus page threads here arguing about whether one skier got around one buoy would suggest that @Horton doesn't have enough bandwidth for the inevitable arguments about boat paths!

[The_MS]

@klindy thats how he makes his money.