Court tennis just joined the Internet Age.
For the first time, the United States Open is live on the web. Last year, the final eliminator at Tuxedo was live, with Tiger Riviere putting together the feed. But now, the firty-ninth annual national championship, hosted by the Racquet Club of Philadelphia, is finally accessible to people all around the world. Jon Crowell has placed two cameras in the left corner of the dedans and a microphone that can pick up the marker’s calls. It is pretty good stuff. The finals of the singles is at 12:30 on Sunday the 3rd and the finals of the doubles is at 5:30 on Monday the 4th.
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/us-open-2011
An even richer experience is being offered by RealTennis.tv. The brainchild of Frederika Adams and Paul Brown, they launched in October of last year. Their first major tennis event was the European Open early last month. It was a wonderful production, with expert live commentary, post-match interviews, and a multitude of camera angles.
They also just shot the world racquets doubles championship, complete with an overhead camera, so not just court tennis is getting the live streaming treatment.
Freddy, a transplanted American photographer, is excited about the future of RealTennis.TV. “Our plan now is to see if we can get five events in the schedule so that we can help to raise money to fund the streaming through banner ads and donations from loyal viewers,” she told me. “We are also keen to buy our own kit so we don’t have to keep renting it which is a substantial part of the cost.”
http://frederikaadam.blogspot.com/