As I’m sure most of you are aware, Vex has a lives stream of the Worlds tournament for each division. This broadcast has been extremely nice for family and friends to watch my matches, however I believe a change to the current system is needed. As seen in broadcasts from previous years, the video feed usually switched between 2 or 3 different during the match itself. I have most commonly seen a full field view and an extra couple cameras which zoom in and focus on single robots for up to 15 seconds at a time, sometimes focusing on one robot for the entire autonomous period. I understand that this could be seen as more engaging to a certain audience who want to see the close workings of a robot and watch it shoot, pick up, or play defense, but I would much prefer to watch the whole field than a single robot. In my opinion the Vex community would agree with this statement because, for anyone who has a basic idea of the game, they would prefer to see the whole field, and perhaps choose on their own which robot to focus on. I also have used the archived video streams as a large portion of my scouting every night when we leave the convention center, and when I can only see robot A for part of the match, it is difficult to make a good judgment on it’s ability. I have created a poll to see what other people’s opinions on this are. Please also leave any additional thoughts or opinions regarding this matter as a reply, thanks.
As much as agree that it would help scouting if the entire of games were full field angles, I don’t blame them for getting the shots they do. It’s very rare for any other sport have more than 2 players that are always of interest so it does make some sense, as well, from a broadcast point of view, it’s kinda their job to switch angles.
I actually like how the stream doesn’t just keep one shot for the entire duration of the match. I find something like an overhead view really boring, and can only really be useful when scouting. The stream isn’t really designed for scouting purposes though, it’s for others outside of the competition to watch. Especially say, during a lift, the audience of the stream would much rather see the robot lifting up than an empty field. That being said, an overhead or single view of the entire field is probably better for archives because teams use these videos to look at match play rather than friends and family watching for entertainment. For a live competition stream though, I would much rather my friends and family see the matches from different perspectives around the field.
Another thing to keep in mind is that the live stream is usually the same as what is projected on the screen behind the fields for the audience to see. If you have a full field view shown there is pretty useless because it’s what you see anyways, close ups is what the audience wants to see. It’s probably not reasonable for them to make major changes this close to an event, but maybe in the future it could be possible to switch between a normal view with close ups and bird’s eye view in the stream.
I certainly agree that the current set up works great for the audience who is physically at the field. It would be nice if the livestream could have two options, but it is unlikely anything like that will happen.
The option for different camera angles would be nice in the stream, however it is to close to worlds now for any changes to happen.