Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Carolina Tar Heels win NCAA basketball championship 2009 - Technology and Photography Impact


Having grown up in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, I was pretty excited to see the Tar Heels beat that other team! Reminds me of the days when Michael Jordan helped Carolina win the NCAA championship back in '83 when I was in Chapel Hill (Jordan DID play basketball before the Bulls and Nike endorsements unknown to some people). Back the we watched the game on cable and a 27" TV. Pretty low tech compared to today. (the image linked from the News and Observer site, Staff Photo by Chuck Liddy, Copyright, News and Observer).

It is interesting to note the video and photography technology changes of how we got to see the game. I watched it on my Sony 55" HDTV from an over the air broadcast HD signal, captured on my dual HD tuner DirectTV HD DVR (an HR-21 with over the air AM20 HD tuner for those who care). I started the show an hour after it started and was able to start and stop it whenever I wanted (I made sure not to answer the phone, surf the web to see facebook or twitter updates in case someone might 'share the good news' with me). I think another show was being recorded in the background. I skipped through most of half time except to see the new Star Trek movie preview that is coming out in May. My how times have changed!

A few notes from the photojournalism front... a friend posted on her facebook page the local paper's photographer did a couple of great captures of the after party. One is a panorama , the other is a time lapse video of the melee complete with bonfire. I also saw quite a few cell phone images tweeted about. Nothing like real time reporting. While watching the game, I was working on new photographs on my Mac Book Pro (which has more computing power than the supercomputer's in 1983 probably had).

Has technology changed the way you have viewed or captured a major event like the NCAA tournament? Drop comments here and share.

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