Newsletter 13: December 2007

Welcome | Technical Support | Coaches Corner | Case Study

SportsCode Version 7 is receiving very positive feedback with all the new features available. The release came at the same time as Leopard and a change to Quicktime which caused a few headaches. As you will know from the version numbers as soon as any problems are advised to us we are sorting the problems. Please keep looking at the Support Website for the latest version.

 

The Sportstec Mercury and Sportstec Exchange systems underwent a baptism of fire. 42 teams of the French Volleyball League all at once coming on board tested the training and support capacity of our European office. I am proud to say that these customers are now over the massive learning curve and starting to get real benefits from the systems.

 

We are now planning a year ahead for the next versions of the products and would welcome your ideas. Let me know what you would like to see in the products. Just email Philip.jackson@sportstec.com

 

This will be the last Newsletter this year so I would like to take this opportunity to wish every one of you a very happy Christmas and holiday period. Thanks for all your support during 2007.
 

Philip Jackson, Managing Director

In this months issue:

Technical Support

Swimming Up Stream - all you need to know to start using our video browser Stream.

Coaches Corner

In the Coaches corner, learn how to create a powerful movie presentation to motivate your team.

Case Study

The University of Louisville first became a Sportstec customer in 2003 when the Women’s Soccer program bought a SportsCode GameBreaker Software License. Since then the relationship between the University of Louisville and Sportstec has continued to thrive and grow over the years. Read more

Technical Support

 

Swimming Up Stream

Sportstec Stream is a great Web-based way of distributing your video information. Since it is Web based your members and fans can access the information from all across the planet.

Stream works in two modes – browser mode and search mode. Browser mode will be familiar to you since it works like the Macintosh Finder. You can quickly find and play an entire video. Search mode will also be familiar since like in SportsCode, you can search on your categories and instance descriptors to find the exact video clip you want. All you need to do is set up a streaming site and drop in your videos and timelines, and you can search across your whole library of videos.

In browser mode, if you select a video, it will start playing, but your users will not be able to copy the video for themselves. However, if you want to allow users to copy videos, Stream allows that. All you need to do is place an empty file called <movie>.mov.candl in the same directory as the movie (candl stands for “can download”). For instance, if you have a movie called Dive.mov, all you need is to place an empty text file Dive.mov.candl into the same directory. We provide you with a Dummy.mov.candl file, so all you need to do is make a copy of this file and rename “Dummy” to your movie name. So your Finder directory will look like:

 

 

Now in Stream this will show Dive.mov is downloadable with a little folder icon on the right:


Click on this little icon and the movie will be downloaded for you.

We have also identified that you might like to download other sorts of files through Stream, such as match notes and other analysis documents about the videos. We have an upcoming release of Stream that will allow you to do this.

We have big plans for Stream in 2008. Many new Web-development technologies have become widely used in the last few years, most notably development techniques that go by the name of AJAX. AJAX gives web pages a much nicer look and feel as well as better responsiveness. We plan to use AJAX where it makes sense in Stream. We are also moving much of the formatting information about Stream into CSS files so that each site can give Stream its own look and feel.

Stream is built on Apple’s WebObjects technology (but it works on Windows and Linux as well), and Apple have put a lot of effort with a new WebObjects release with Leopard. This is both a blessing and a curse for us. A curse because we now have to maintain a Stream version that works on OS X 10.4 (Tiger) with WebObjects 5.3 and a new version for OS X 10.5 (Leopard) with WebObjects 5.4. But it is great to see things moving forward and that we can now plan for the best of the Web.

We also plan new search methods, since we have identified that large sites come with their own sets of problems (information overload) and we hope to improve Stream for larger sites. AJAX will also help here, saving you on effort and repetitive tasks.

While we are talking about Leopard, you have probably heard of the latest version of the Macintosh’s operating system, which was released in October. We have been tracking this all year – in fact, I attended Apple’s Worldwide Developers’ Conference (WWDC) in June to find out about the many new developments in Leopard and WebObjects, so that Sportstec is well aware of these developments and how we can best bring them to our customers. (I’ve also read about ten books to keep up with and evaluate current trends.)

It has never been a better time to be in the Apple world – Tiger was a great operating system, but Leopard is even better and brings many enhancements for users as well as great technologies so that we can bring more useful and robust products to you faster than ever. Apple’s market share is also growing at faster and faster rates, particularly in developer communities such as Java and Ruby who prefer the tools on the Apple platform. (Did you know that Sir Tim Berners-Lee developed the World Wide Web on a NeXT machine, which is now the heart of Apple’s OS X? Microsoft products such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint were also first developed on a Mac.) Apple’s hardware offerings also continue to leap ahead of the pack. So it is a good time for us to have Apple as our preference.

So 2007 has been an exciting year, but also a frustrating year. This is due to the shifting sands of technology. Leopard came out later than first anticipated (Apple shifted critical development resources to the iPhone). We identified early that we wanted our new products to take advantage of Leopard, but the prerelease versions of Leopard had several problems (that Sportstec reported and got fixed for the eventual release). So it is worth it that Sportstec is at the front of this technology so that we can make sure that our existing and future products work faultlessly.

The Internet is also changing and these improvements are working their way into WebObjects. Developing for WebObjects has also improved, but we have had to adopt a new development platform for WebObjects and that has meant quite a learning curve has been involved for not only WebObjects, but Leopard, and many other up-and-coming technologies.

We expect 2008 to be a very exciting year for Sports and video analysis technology making what you do better and easier than ever – that is what all these improvements in technology are ultimately about – we will be swimming up stream together.

Coaches Corner

 

 

 

MOTIVATION VIDEOS AND IMAGES

We’ve seen it all before, the Hollywood movie with the coach giving his team a 5 minute “we are titans” style pre-game or half time speech that talks about “fighting for every inch” or “winning the individual battles” but in real coaching and in real changing rooms there is no music in the background, no pre-rehearsed scripted message to give the your athletes before a game. So let’s leave it up to the Al Pacino’s and Mel Gibson’s to provide the cheese factor. Here’s how to incorporate Hollywood clips into your video presentation.

When putting together a video presentation, short and to the point is always the preferred method. Sometimes a little more effort is required to motivate your players.
This has been done many times before and it really is simple, so here is how you do it for your own team:
Capture the scene from a dvd through a converter and into SportsCode.
Now you export the scene along with your selected SportsCode instances to iMovie or Final Cut Pro. Take the audio out of the Hollywood clip and play it over the top of your Photos and movies. Add transitions to make your presentation look more professional. If you spend the time to get it right the players will be inspired and motivated to do things on the field/court that will make the next “Coaches Highlights Package”. Here are some examples:

http://www.youtube.com

iMovie has good video tutorials to show you the basic functions of Movie editing.

Images can also have a great motivational effect on Athletes, an image of Muhammad Ali or Michael Jordan can inspire and invoke athletes to go harder and faster. An image of Mt Everest is owe inspiring and can make an athlete think about the courage and determination required to get to the top. The internet is a fantastic tool for coaches.
Youtube has hundreds of coaching videos ranging from Strength and conditioning to motivational pieces. The net is a great place to share ideas and new concepts for coaching...

 

Case Study

 

Louisville University

 

The University of Louisville first became a Sportstec customer in 2003 when the Women’s Soccer program bought a SportsCode GameBreaker Software License. Since then the relationship between the University of Louisville and Sportstec has continued to thrive and grow over the years. SportsCode software, including GameBreaker, Pro, and Elite, has been used by many sports at Louisville, including: Men’s Basketball, Women’s Basketball, Men’s Soccer, Women’s Soccer, Women’s Volleyball, Women’s Lacrosse, Field Hockey, and Softball.

As more sports have joined the Sportstec family the opportunity to enhance the video analysis capability for each sport became apparent. In the summer of 2007 the University of Louisville became a Sportstec Elite Partner. As a Sportstec Elite Partner each sport at the University (except Football) has access to the SportsCode Elite video analysis software for each NCAA certified coach on staff. In addition, by maintaining a customized annual support agreement, each sport has access to Sportstec’s software support system any time they need it.

Becoming a Sportstec Elite Partner has improved the video analysis capabilities of many of the sports at Louisville. The Men’s Basketball team, who already utilized SportsCode Elite and Elite Review software, has seen the many benefits of becoming a Sportstec Elite Partner. Matt Morris, Video Coordinator for the Louisville Men’s Basketball team, says, “The Sportstec Elite Site License has allowed us to utilize the many features in Elite throughout the entire scouting process. We watch a lot of video on every opponent, and having the capabilities in all of our coaches hands has made our scouting process much more efficient. Sportstec is a huge asset to our program”.

The Women’s Volleyball team, who utilized the SportsCode Pro software, now is able to break down more video live during a match due to the code button linking ability in Elite. Craig Bere, Assistant Coach for the Louisville Women’s Volleyball team, says, “SportsCode Elite has been an extreme asset to our program from a player development and scouting standpoint. Being able to utilize the Movie Organizer while making our final edits has saved us a lot of time. The code button linking has allowed us to get a lot more information without having to do much more work. The ease of use of the software has simplified things within our program and we are excited to use more of the Elite features in the coming years”.

The Men’s Soccer team, who utilized the SportsCode GameBreaker software, utilizes the text coding ability and code matrix now available to them in the SportsCode Elite software. “SportsCode is a very crucial part of our game preparation. The ability to single out key ‘pictures’ throughout a soccer game and replay them in team conferences has made our use of video more effective. With so many forms and style of play in soccer, the flexibility of SportsCode covers the need to tailor fit every game breakdown to specific games and even players”, says Caleb White of the Men’s Soccer team. “These features, coupled with outstanding technical support, have added another dimension to our coaching ability”.

The University of Louisville is seeing the positive impact SportsCode Elite can have on a program’s preparation and development. As more sports at Louisville take advantage of being a Sportstec Elite Partner and integrate SportsCode Elite into their daily video preparation, the more powerful this relationship will become. Sportstec and the University of Louisville will continue to work together to keep all of the athletic programs on the cutting edge of technology.
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