masterstrack.com

I wanted to get the worlds opinion on this. I know that Masters Track & Field is for fun and we all love it. I think its time that we get more video coverage of our events. There are some great performances that are going on all over the world but are never seen just heard about in a news paper or a magazine.

This is what I propose. First let me say that know body is going to run pick this idea up and put it on ESPN classic.  With the invention of the internet and Youtube I think its time we record our own events and upload the video for the world to see. We create a single place that everyone can come and find the links to the video. That way everyone can enjoy what we all work hard for and enjoy. It would be free for us to store the video and hey if someone would host the links to the video we got. It could be the ESPN for Masters Track & Field on 24 hours a day.

I have personally started doing this by recording a few of my competitions from Boston. I hope you will all join in. Lets expose our sport to the world so that other generations can and enjoy what we do.

I'm interested in talking about this. I do this on a personal basis and for the high school kids I coach and for some of my vaulting buddies. I have my own web site and could consider hosting the web links and maybe even the video itself. There are obvious limitations as to how much video I could host, but even that is negotiable.

I will comment that I don't like YouTube because the video quality is often poor and you can't do things like freeze frame, single frame advance, slow motion etc. These are all of interest to me so I can study the technique of the vault. It may not be as important to some other events. (I realize "you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear" meaning the video quality may be as much a problem with the source video as it is with how YouTube processes it.)

Anyway, I'll follow this topic and see what transpires.

- master

Hey great I’m glad we got some interest. I agree with you that the You tube quality is not always the best but the space required to store video can be very costly along with the bandwidth. Since the space and bandwidth where free I figured it would be a great start. You know people like free. LOL. Maybe we can comment to the You tube folks about making slow-motion an option with there video’s . I will send a comment to them and see what I get back.

Another very significant benefit YouTube provides is it accepts for upload almost any video type and automatically converts it to what they display. If an individual hosted our video, there would likely need to be some video file processing which can be a lot of work. This reduces file size (at some cost to quality) so the video takes less space on the server, downloads faster and reduces bandwidth requirements. (I seem to be reminding myself why this hasn't been done by an individual before. ) When I prepare video for sharing on the web, I try to edit it down to just the portion of the video that is important for studying (the vault), with the exception of when someone sets a record, then I would give some extra 'footage' at the end.

Another issue for video quality when wanting to freeze frame is making sure the video is not interlaced. Video taken by still cameras with video capability don't usually interlace and that is good for computer display. Interlacing is used on TV playback and cameras that were meant primarily for showing their video on TVs use interlace. It can be removed, but it is another step that must be done in the post processing. I'm not sure just how many of us masters videographers know how to do these things. That is why I have been very selective about how much I commit to helping people get their video on line.

Enough for now. Let's see if anyone else has any comments or offers.

- master

tphit - what kind of page presentation did you have in mind? Would it just be a chronological listing order? Would you want it to be searchable, by event or individual? Maybe a page of record performances?

- master

Well what I was thinking is a very easy to use interface for the average Joe. In my spare time from running and making big pennies as a masters athlete I work as a software engineer. I do the web page thing all the time. So I think with a little help from the Master community I could try and put together something very useful. I am not sure exactly how it would all work yet but I am open for ideas.

I went to you tube and they have a API which allows you to integrate there stuff directly into you web page. So I am looking at that to see how to get the video information.

I defiantly want to make it searchable. The You Tube uploads have something called tags. I was thinking that could be used as a key for al videos that belong to masters Track and Field. I am not sure what key word to use yet but I am working on it.

Ok here is the first step to getting this working.

#1 You tube has a attribute called TAG. In this tag place MTF_TV . This will allow the software I am writing to easily find the video.

#2 Give it a good title.

#3 Give a good description.

#4 Fill in the location of the meet. (like Boston Mass)

#5 Select the country.(US)

#6 Enter the zip code. (The zip code will be used to place it on a map.) Like (35801)


That’s all we need is for everyone to start uploading there videos to you tube. I am going to record some stuff in Birmingham Al this weekend. I hope everyone will join in. Lets see what we can create.

I have been posting video from Alabama, and the indoor national meets for everyone to see. I have not seen anyone try and post there own videos. To make this work we need to start posting our videos so people can see our hard work. I know you guys video meets for your own glory don’t be scared to show it off to the world. Nobody is looking for professional video.


Here is a link to what I have recorded so far.

Well, I just posted a sample video. I'm curious to see how it looks.

- master

Hey great it was very easy to find you added it just like I stated above. The video is very clear. I will work on the page that displays the videos. Give me a day or so and I wil post the link.

Here is an add on to my information that will be needed in the youtube tag section. Becasue Youtube location of the video does not work we need to add geocoding. All that is is the location of the event. This site will give what you need. http://www.blockrocker.com/service_youtube.php#

Just place the results into the tag section so that the video can be found.

Here is an example>

Address is what you enter: 650 Hughes Rd Madison, AL 35758

This is what you get: geotagged geo:lat=34.719836 geo:lon=-86.741654 geo:tool=blockrocker.com


Paste that into you tag section. Thats it.

OK. I updated my sample video with the generated info. How is this going to be used?

This link should display, using Google Maps, where the video was taken.

- master

It looks like someone heard my yelling from a distance. Even thought they had issues I got a chance to see many of the events live on the net. Good job USATF! I am glad that we as a master group where respected enough to have this privilege.

I could not make it this year to the meet but I am sure glad that I could at least watch it from home. Hope this type of work continues into the indoor season.