Here in San Francisco, we are passionate about sports. Just check the TV ratings. That passion has merged with our fascination with technology to produce a growing list of applications that make sports safer and more fun to watch.
Technology has become an integral part of sports, both for participants and viewers. Athletes are using technology to play smarter or safer, and viewers are getting an increasingly immersive experience, both at the stadium and in the home.
This often creates a conundrum for sports leagues: How much should they embrace technology? Instant replay, for example, is an accepted part of American football, while baseball holds it at arm's length.
Greater proliferation, adoption
One of the earliest uses of technology was in horse racing, where thoroughbreds often crossed the finish line simultaneously and were moving so fast the human eye often couldn't distinguish winner from runner-up.
Assuming gambling had as much as influence on technology adoption as it has other sports, stop-motion cameras were rolled out at racetracks around the world.
What follows are nine of the most amazing technologies that sports and athletes have adopted. Click on the image below to check them out.
HeroCam took the world by storm when it was introduced. The tiny HD camera was quickly lashed to helmets, parachutes, racecars, motorcycles, and anything else from which a cool image could be captured. Enter Contour, which takes the technology up a notch. Contour's HD cameras have built-in GPS for trip, elevation, and distance tracking and Bluetooth capability to control a camera remotely. Apps are available to create multimedia stories that include video, data and maps.
For calling strikes and balls in baseball it would be most entertaining to let the umpire call the play first, and then report what the computer saw. Then the instant replays could be presented to solve the argument. The current problem is that the umps have 25 foot tall egos, which sort of outweighs everybody else.
But I don't watch baseball on television because of all of the commercials. The same for football. Seeing any gave live is fine, but with the delays for commercials it is not so much fun any more. High school games run much faster and they are a much better entertainment value.
With all this tech, it surely makes sense to call ALL balls and strikes via sensing camera. Bad calls in baseball burn me to no end because they are not necessary.
Prior to HD TV, the technology to track hockey pucks was a huge step forward, largely because many people couldn't see the puck in hockey's TV broadcasts.
Nice slide show, Brian. I particularly liked the BodyMedia and the horse racing camera. I know the horse racing media is older technology, but when you have a horse that's close in the photo, the technology seems amazing. One thing I didn't see was the Kissing Cam. But maybe that's covered by the Sky Cam.
By experimenting with the photovoltaic reaction in solar cells, researchers at MIT have made a breakthrough in energy efficiency that significantly pushes the boundaries of current commercial cells on the market.
We looked at a number of sources to determine this year's greenest cars, from KBB to automotive trade magazines to environmental organizations. These 14 cars emerged as being great at either stretching fuel or reducing carbon footprint.
From Dell / Intel® New Paradigms in Design Work Scott Hamilton, vertical market strategist for Dell Precision workstations, 5/2/2013 3
Early in my career, I worked as a draftsman and remember the days of drawing on vellum with numbered pencils and Mylar with plastic lead. This was a fun experience in the sense that I ...
I've been using workstations for more than 10 years and love finding ways to get more performance from my system. With demanding professional applications that require more power each ...
A lasting memory from my first job as an engineer in an auto assembly plant is standing on hard concrete at six in the morning, vending-machine coffee clutched in hand, listening to ...
A quick look into the merger of two powerhouse 3D printing OEMs and the new leader in rapid prototyping solutions, Stratasys. The industrial revolution is now led by 3D printing and engineers are given the opportunity to fully maximize their design capabilities, reduce their time-to-market and functionally test prototypes cheaper, faster and easier. Bruce Bradshaw, Director of Marketing in North America, will explore the large product offering and variety of materials that will help CAD designers articulate their product design with actual, physical prototypes. This broadcast will dive deep into technical information including application specific stories from real world customers and their experiences with 3D printing. 3D Printing is
To save this item to your list of favorite Design News content so you can find it later in your Profile page, click the "Save It" button next to the item.
If you found this interesting or useful, please use the links to the services below to share it with other readers. You will need a free account with each service to share an item via that service.
Tweet This
2 
