The LMC Antelope Pico Point-of-View camera is particularly
suitable for live sports production, and has been used for the German
Bundesliga and Winter sports – a Pico was used on a white Polecam (to disappear
into the background) at the start gates at the Alpine Skiing World Championship
in Schladming. Polecam’s Founder, Steffan Hewitt (pictured above at BVE), also recently used the Pico
in China, to cover the Rory McIlroy/Tiger Woods Duel at the Jinsha Lake Golf
Club in Hengzhou.
“We had a full-size Polecam, with the Pico, and a Telecast
Fiber PoV system – because the distance between the holes and the truck was
kilometres, so we had to use fibre,” he explained.
The camera was primarily used above the players as they
tee’d off, for slow-motion shots showing how their swings differed, for replay
analysis. Because the system was so light, Hewitt, who was on his own, was able
to just jump in a golf buggy between holes.
The Pico, which can deliver up to 340 frames per second from
its 2/3-inch sensor, “worked great. It looked really good,” said Hewitt. “It’s
the only really small high-speed camera that I know of.”
As it was on the Polecam, he could drop it right to the
level of the green, where it was possible to see all the undulations that
aren’t evident at normal camera height.
The current version of the Pico works with a pair of cables,
but the next one will just require a single coax cable between the camera head
and the CCU. “This will allow us to have much greater distances between the
two, and use a longer Polecam,” he explained.
It will also be able to do live broadcast HD as well as
slo-mo at the same time, so you can continue shooting HD while the high-speed
shots are being cached for replay (which the current version can’t do), making
it a much more practical proposition. “The new Pico will genuinely be live
friendly.”
Given these developments, which should emerge at NAB in
April, “I’m really excited about doing the high-speed stuff,” he added.
The slightly larger Phantom Miro slo-mo camera, from Vision Research, can also work on the Polecam (Vision Research were showing just such
a package at BVE - pictured above), but it can’t be used as a direct feed for live production,
although it does go up to 1,500fps.
Using the Polecam, operators can position the camera in
places it wouldn’t normally be easy to go, such as over water, into a bird’s
nest or in dangerous areas, to get close to the action.
One Polecam, being used with a Pico to cover a Bundesliga
match, got closer to the action than it should have. During the warm up, the
operator was rehearsing a shot above the goal, when one of the players used it
for target practice, hitting it straight at the camera in beautiful slow
motion.
“It completely bent the head in half. It cost £2,500 to
completely rebuild the head, mainly with new parts,” said Hewitt.
By David Fox
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