Some miscellaneous thoughts: 1] I thought drivers were no longer allowed to 'embrace' team members after a race before the final weigh-in as LH did in Monaco. Something about the possiblity of someone depositing a weight in the driver's suit. Anyone know? 2] Watching the Indy 500 it struck me how nice it would be to have PIP during commercial breaks in F1 so as not to miss a critical moment. Anyone agree? 3] Wouldn't mind seeing that infra red camera used in various ways at each GP. Anyone agree?
I'm not sure if it's expressly forbidden, I know there was a bit of a flap because someone once handed JPM his watch after winning a race which could have added weight for the final weight in so there is some sort of rule, I think. The PIP was cool for Indy, I'm not sure if Bernie would let SpeedTV do anything like that for the F1 races however. There are some many rules that apply to the FIA broadcasts, I think SpeedTV can't even put them on demand. Which infra red camera? Not sure i follow you.
I think commercial breaks during the F1 race have got nothing to do with Bernie. I remember last year for the British GP Formula 1 Management set up a large screening area for the race without commercial breaks. Also, a lot of the rips of F1 races out there don't take commercial breaks, so there's a feed somewhere out there without commercial breaks.
There is I was in Malta year or so back, and blow me watching ITV feed with no AD BREAKS, I couldn't believe it, just strange because the commentary cut to nothing when they knew Ads were being shown, but alas the BBC are taking over here next year I think,they have no ADs!! so no worries here, not sure how that will pan out for the rest of the world though..
That's the thing, I think all the feeds come from the same place then go to all the other contries. When the USGP was in town it was SpeedTV's feed. i guess by that logic a broadcaster can run the feed with or without ads. It's possible that a broadcaster could run it PIP like ABC did. Now will they do it for a race other than the Indy 500 is another question. It would be cool though.
PIP is done here (RTL channel in Germany) during ad breaks. So it's not that Bernie doesn't allow it...
It was mounted above the pitlane for the Spanish (?) GP - It provided very, very cool (and hot!) shots of the cars as they pitted. Yeah, I'd like to see it again.
I was amazed at how hot the new tires were. They glowed red hot in the infrared. Even still, they need a lap to get them up to temperature.
The shots were actually cool to look at, but a bit confusing as the camera wasn't really calibrated for the purpose of making pictures of race cars. There's a certain lowest temperature which will appear black on the image, and everything below that temperature will appear black, too. Then there's a highest temperature, above which everything will be white. They set that highest temperature far too low, so it looked as if the tires were equally hot as the exhaust, as both appeared white.. only that the tires were just around the "white temperature" and the exhaust were WAY hotter, but displayed white.
Ya know, I'm not a big fan of PIP. It's distracting and annoying. The real solution is TIVO and the FF button. I still use it when there are broadcasts with PIP. As long as Speed TV can generate enough money broadcasting F-1 to keep showing it on the air, I'm happy. My fear is that someone like CBS will jump in with some big bucks someday and start giving us "condensed" versions like the old "ABC Wide World of Sports presents the Monaco Grand Prix" broadcasts. There were more pictures and interviews of hollywood stars and girls on the boats than racing going on. That's what we USED to get before Speedvision -- aka Speed TV. ABC did the broadcast for years. I think that when Andretti won his world championship race with Lotus, ABC broadcasted it (delayed, of course) and the entire thing was one hour long including "commentaries" from their "Wide World of Sports" team that didn't know a Cosworth DFV from a hole in the ground. Let's hope we never have to suffer through that again.
To each their own I suppose. I do like the PIP just so you can keep track of the action even during commercials. CBS did broadcast a couple of races last year(I think) Not the greatest coverage but not the wide world of sports garbage I remember either.
I won't disagree with you about "each to their own". My point is this. I feel F-1 broadcasts in the US must barely eek out a profit for Speed TV. Anything that would cause them a loss of ad revenue might just stop the entire thing. Then, if we are left with whoever picks up the pieces, the alternative could be much, much worse. If Speed TV can do PIP and get more viewers while not losing ad dollars, it's fine with me. I thought the CBS delayed broadcasts last year were pretty weak. I'm sure the ratings were poor as they dropped out of trying again this year.
I think everything is on Fox or Speed this year. I'm sure the ratings were crap but so was the coverage. it's basically a no win situation. Either get the coverage on SpeedTV, or get it on a network but the coverage is crap. The networks like ABC, CBS, etc could do a PIP type thing while I doubt Speed can or would.
well, um, uh....... after a local race here, I handed a guy a can of Pop before he crossed the scale with his car, the official didn't think anything of it, and I have no idea how that can of pop was filled with lead shot.... LOL prior to that we had a real popular nice-guy driver who had not won a race in 20+ years win, crossed the scale 4 lbs light and was DQ'd. THAT was awful.... that can of 'pop' had to be 8+ lbs...
Fox owns Speed. The "broadcast" races in past years were on Fox channels. They stopped that, this year: all the races are on Speed. (I'd guess that, with the demise of analog broadcast, pretty much anyone who can get Fox channels can get Speed.) The only race that the main "networks" would have the slightest interest in would be Monaco, and they wouldn't be interested in the race -- just the setting. The television industry isn't interested in the fringe market. Nobody is interested in finding fringe advertisers for a specific event (such as rallye). They only want to "matrix" ads across all the programming. So if you don't want to run ads against "america's next coke-addict star" or "abusing average people for amusement" or "pimping down a classic car", you can't run ads against F1 either.
yeah, commercial break has nothing to do with Bernie. Here I am in Poland, the F1 broadcast starts from warmup lap til after podium ceremony commercial free. it's nice, but too bad, I dont really understand polish. But then again, when a bunch of F1 fans get together, who needs that.. yup, no commercial for the entire duration of race, not even sponsor subtitles....
I also liked the Indy feature where they superimpose teamates cars to show their driving lines, very cool. F1/Speed TV could learn alot about broadcasting from the Indy race. The access to drivers for interviews, winners and losers. It's just frustrating to go on and on. It's all been said before, but to no avail.I'm definitely going to start watching Indy races again.
