Sports broadcasting is always trying new things. Sometimes these things work, such as the NFL’s Skycam. Other times, it takes a while for things to catch on, such as Fox‘s Cletus the Football Robot. There has also been the revelation of spring football leagues, where new tech is often trialed. The USFL has previously introduced innovations like helmet cams.
Basketball is a difficult sport to film, given the much smaller court and the need for quick and frequent transitions. In the past, broadcasters such as ABC have utilized a high-angle, track-mounted cam to be able to follow the action. But in Game 2 of the Sixers-Celtics series, TNT debuted a quadcopter drone to fly over the game at various points. Safe to say, people do not like this.
TNT Drone Cam Is Not A Hit
The drone cam footage, which obviously can only do so much given it’s about 10 feet off the ground and can’t get too close to the action, is just kind of weird. It gives the game an uncanny valley, NBA 2K-esque look. It doesn’t feel like you’re actually watching a basketball game. Even worse, you don’t even get to play the fake video game you’re watching. Furthermore, the footage is not of the same quality as the HD TV broadcast, making it jarring to switch between the two. While it’s kind of neat to see drone technology like this, what’s it really adding to the experience?
The general consensus on social media was that everyone hates the drone. This is mostly because it doesn’t add anything to the experience, and also looks bad. One Twitter user posted a picture of Hitchbot with the comment “When they try that drone came in Philly”. Hitchbot was a hitchhiking robot that successfully hitchhiked coast-to-coast in Canada. They tried the same experiment in the US, and Hitchbot was brutally murdered as soon as he reached Philadelphia. Another user expressed their sympathy for the media team, who presumably had the drone cam forced upon them. Again, drone cam sounds fun in theory but in practice, is a superfluous novelty that doesn’t actually add anything to the viewing experience.
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