The 2008 Summer Olympics is here !!

[vhelp]

So, who is watching it ??

I just caught it while watching something else and then channel surfing around when I cought the tail end of the opening cerimony where the fireworks was about to start. I was planning for them this whole week and couldn't wait till it arrived, and now that its here, I forget they are on ?? come on.. what's wrong me with, hehe..

I'm looking forward to watching many of the sports. I'm also going to record them to vhs tape and in EP mode I'm recording the opening as we speak..

and much more to come ...

-vhelp 4803

[vhelp]

oops, more to come..

-vhelp 4804

[Epicurus8a]

The Opening Ceremonies are starting right now! C-YA!!!!!

[Midzuki]

I intend to see only the women's gymnastics,
women's volleyball, and women's soccer of course.

[budz]

Whoas! They had 2008 guys doing that drumming!

[yoda313]

I intend to see only the women's gymnastics,
women's volleyball, and women's soccer of course.

Ditto Glad I already bought my hdtv last year

Now where is that tv guide???

[MeDiCo_BrUjO]

Whoas! They had 2008 guys doing that drumming!

Even more impressing was the fact that they used real people to do the moving-square-coordinated-choreography.... I really thought those were hydraulics at work!.

I was thinking... wow... the programming had to be really complex... and BOOM... a gazillion Chinese popped from inside the squares!.

And the fireworks footsteps that went from the city border to the Stadium..... AWESOME!!!

I really feel sorry for the planning committee for the next Olympics....

[vhelp]

I was particuarly impressed by the usage of the video layout work across the stadium. I thought that was pretty original.. I didn't see the complete opening ceremony. So, I missed out on the very colorful scenes. I only got glimps of it during the coverage, but hardly enjoyable -- not enough time for my brain to compute.

I'm enjoying the games!! Go U.S.A. !! .. Dream Team !!

-vhelp 4811

[Conquest10]

Am I the only one bothered by the coverage by NBC? Seems they are only broadcasting events where the US is guaranteed or likely to win the gold. Also, when the US wins the gold, coverage continues to the medals being handed out and the national anthem is played. But, if the US does not win the gold, they switch to another sport. What the hell? Why can't they show that? China has the most gold medals but I have no idea what the Chinese national anthem sounds like yet I have heard the American anthem at least 5 times already.

[guns1inger]

Our broadcasts are similar in focus (obviously no so US centric), and the reason given in the past is simply that there are too many events running simultaneously to spend time on medal ceremonies that most of the audience don't want to watch. Of course this argument suffers somewhat when they happily ignore many events to replay the same medal awards over and over again.

How do people feel about the insertion of CGI into the opening broadcast because the organisers didn't feel the real thing would look good enough on TV ? Approx 55 seconds of fireworks were computer generated and inserted into the 'live' feed (the giant footsteps sequence). Now those fireworks were set off, but that wasn't the vision we saw.

Does this mean that the next Olympics will forgo the live event in favour of partial or full CG ?

[Conquest10]

OK, now I got to rant here. How many "different" swimming events are there? NBC just cut away from the Chinese women's gymnastics to show yet another of these swims that looks exactly like all the others. And big surprise Michael Phelps has won another gold just like every single other "different" swim event. I get it that its historic what he's doing but there is only one women's gymnastics final and they just cut away from it like its time filler in between Phelps's gold medals.

[Conquest10]

Our broadcasts are similar in focus (obviously no so US centric), and the reason given in the past is simply that there are too many events running simultaneously to spend time on medal ceremonies that most of the audience don't want to watch. Of course this argument suffers somewhat when they happily ignore many events to replay the same medal awards over and over again.

That's something that would laughable if NBC tried it. Apart from swimming and gymnastics almost all events are tape delayed here (on the west coast of the US all events are tape delayed). It was funny reading the news stories about NBC frantically trying to shut down websites that had the opening ceremonies because NBC did not air them in the US until at least 12 hours later (west coast was probably up to 15 hours). Additionally, the swimming events are replayed again afterwards when they could be showing live events like beach volleyball and boxing that they show all day the next day on tape delay.

How do people feel about the insertion of CGI into the opening broadcast because the organisers didn't feel the real thing would look good enough on TV ? Approx 55 seconds of fireworks were computer generated and inserted into the 'live' feed (the giant footsteps sequence). Now those fireworks were set off, but that wasn't the vision we saw.

Does this mean that the next Olympics will forgo the live event in favour of partial or full CG ?

I don't think it was that much of a big deal. Because they did actually set those fireworks off. Just that they probably knew it wasn't going to look as good on tv so they probably just changed it up a bit. I mean the fireworks weren't really the main thing. Its not like all those thai chi masters or that movable type performance or any of the others were computer generated.

[budz]

Yuh, our olympics is delayed as well. Hell some of the best stuff shown is during the freaking weee.......hours of the night. WTF! Who's gonna be up at those hours! Cable company here in Honolulu has more than one channel showing the olympics.

[MeDiCo_BrUjO]

I quit trying to watch the Olympics for those reasons, I switched to http://www.nbcolympics.com/
It's still NBC, but at least they won't cut me off from what I am watching right now to show me something else.

[stiltman]

I'm catching the highlights on the news...that's good enough.

Like the pictures of the BSOD during the opening
Like the little girl lipsyncing during the opening
Like the China gym team being too young
Like some dude who can swim real fast using some NASA suite
Like the Hungarian weight lifter

[MeDiCo_BrUjO]

Like the Hungarian weight lifter

I won't be able to lift a weight in my life ever again.....

[vhelp]

And what about that guy that threw his medal down (after accepting it) and then walked away, vowing that a Bronze medal is not enough and that only GOLD is, and walks away in the middle of the ceremony. I couldn't believe it! And, on another note..

. . .

re: HD high quality..

Its all a conspericy. It is. hint, hint, take a look at the commericals. And if you are not satisfied, then after reading below, aftewards, I'll point it out in letters..

. . .

Well, I'm mostly upset at their choice of pre-processed bitrate distribution before handing off the masses or consortiums. There is so much pixelation in the scenes and even in the low motion areas, as in someone casually walking, etc.

The following I did notice a lot of pixelation in low-to-high motion scenes:

diving: womens / mens
volleyball: womens / mens
gymnastics: womens / mens

You know running is going to be worse, (though I haven't seen any of those events yet) and also many more events where fast motion prevails and worse even when water is envolved. Oh well.

. . .

Commercials. That's where all the quality (hiding ? ) was given to. Actaully, it seems that we are being soo fooled. When program content come on the air, these sources are purposely given tainted-ly. Then they broadcast it over low-bitrate bandwidth strategies which add to the problem. And its just making it worse for HD, all the while they are pumping out ads of high quality hype. If you look at commercials they don't have any pixelation (or very little) than those of program content. Its a shame .. how they are pumping out the change (from analog to digital) in the name of promised quality and in the end, its not.. its worse.

Its bad enough that the majority of people (with hdtv sets) are soo fooled in this HD quality. Its not there. Its not. I've been watching a lot of it on some of HDTV sets in our facilities at work and I can't believe how *bad* it really is. From 32" to 60" 's these sets are promising nothing. The picture is bigger but that's all.

Anyway. I'm making the best of the games are they are broadcasted and overlooking the issues with quality and instead am trying to consentrate on the events.

. . .

Still, there's some good that came out of all this (beside the games) I mean, have you seen many of the commercials ?? There's a few that are great. I've been recording them for keep-sakes. Maybe later on, I'll post some up. And, they don't suffer from bitrate-starvation. Go figure.

-vhelp 4825

[Baldrick]

And what about that guy that threw his medal down (after accepting it) and then walked away, vowing that a Bronze medal is not enough and that only GOLD is, and walks away in the middle of the ceremony. I couldn't believe it! And, on another note.

He is from Sweden and it was a protest against the judges in his semifinal(The judges couldn't explain why he got a warning which made him lose). Probably not the best way to protest though and he has now lost the medal officially.

I watch everything even though Sweden sucks as usual...only 3 silver medals so far.

[yoda313]

even though Sweden sucks as usual...only 3 silver medals so far

Hey cheer up the winter olympics aren't far away and you guys rock in ICE HOCKEY!!! (read Lidstrom and a few other NHL greats )

[Conquest10]

Wow. NBC is not hiding their bias one bit right now. While Kexin He was receiving her gold medal the commentators are questioning whether she should think that she actually won her medal? Give me a break. Then they go on saying her routine was inferior and should not have deserved a medal and the American should have gotten the gold.

And don't get me started on their (NBCs) "expert" Bela Karolyi. He's coming on with Bob Costas bad mouthing the rules. This guy cannot be impartial. His wife is the American coach for f**ks sake. Of course he should think his wife's team should win. He had no problem with the judges before as long as the Americans won. Now all of a sudden theres a huge problem with the judging. They could have left it at that since it is just Bela. But no, the commentators then continued bashing the judging then bringing up something from last week saying how another American Alicia Sacramone should have gotten a medal.

The rules are very, very clear. When there is a tie, the highest and lowest scores are dropped and that is your score. That's it. There is nothing complicated about that AT ALL.

They complained throughout the award ceremony and reluctantly showed the Chinese national anthem. But they did not end the broadcast at that. That was the last event shown but the broadcast ended with the American national anthem for Stephanie Brown Trafton's gold medal.

[Baldrick]

even though Sweden sucks as usual...only 3 silver medals so far

Hey cheer up the winter olympics aren't far away and you guys rock in ICE HOCKEY!!! (read Lidstrom and a few other NHL greats )

I'm already waiting....:P

I don't think we will take any more medals...so this will be the worst olympics since 1904 for Sweden. .

[Tundra Trout]

I'm not watching it :P

[vhelp]

I love womens diving. Go Laura WILKINSON!!

-vhelp 4836

[Conquest10]

I'm just watching the online videos now. No commentaries.

Congratulations Guillermo Pérez!!

[vhelp]

Beach Volleyball.. Go May and Walsh. USA ahead.. 2nd set..

-vhelp 4837

[vhelp]

USA. Yeah. we won!!

-vhelp 4838

[Tundra Trout]

I hope we whomp China.Every time we beat them at something,20 minutes later we want to beat them again.

[Conquest10]

Wow, that was a great game! US basketball wins gold.

[vhelp]

I knew they would. They sure were, redeamed!

Yeah, the other night, US mens beach volleyball won gold, too.. over Brazil. It was a great game!

And, who would have thought that Canada would win gold on Mens Diving when China leading
the way, till the end. If I'm not mistaken, Laura WILKINSON won gold this same in 2000, Sidney, I think.

Laura WILKINSON, we still love you.. always. I first saw you in Sidney when you were a nobody, and won the gold.

I'm glad I was able to record the games in HD. It was a lot fun though tiring at time. Anyway. A lot of great and memorable things happend during the 2008 Summer Olympics. So there's lots of keep-sakes to cherish !!

-vhelp 4841

[vhelp]

USA won against Brazil in mens indoor volleyball -- Go USA!!

Well, the closing ceremony is here.. I hope you are recording them..

-vhelp 4842