Tag Archive for university

When Will You See Your Videos?

April 26, 2012 / The_Teach / No comments

I get asked quite often via Facebook and Twitter when certain videos or even whole series of videos are going to be available for viewing.

So I thought I would post some sort of guide in the blog to give you a rough idea of when you can start to see things coming through, plus I thought I would also describe the process here at Cuesport TV.

‘The Process’

Pretty much everything that is shown on the TV table at a given live event will also be recorded ‘as live’ directly to our system’s hard drive. I say ‘pretty much’ simply because on occasions matches do not get recorded.

After this recording the video files are then imported into our editing suite and most of the time shortened to cut out all the re-racking and boring bits! This in itself can take a fair amount of time for each match, sometimes up to 2 hours.

From here the video file is then exported into a suitable digital format to give us a decent quality file for use on the web. It is this file that is then used to create other multiple file formats. The export process takes between 20 and 60 minutes dependent on the file size.

The files are then ready for upload to our system, this is the bit that takes a lot of time, a 1GB video file takes around 4 hours to upload as we are constrained by the connection speed we have here.

The records are then created on the website that the video’s slot into (or nothing would play) and the files are transcoded, this makes them available in a variety of formats for when we create an app or change video player.

That’s pretty much the whole process and you can see that one video file takes around 10 hours to complete (most of that done by a computer in fairness).

Release Dates

UPC-BUCS 8-Ball Championships 2012 -10 videos from this event have already been released in the 8-Ball Pool Video category. You will need to go to around page 16 to find the videos until the search feature is enabled.

The rest of the UPC content will be available by: Wednesday May 2nd

EBPF County Finals 2012 – I have brought in an extra editor to complete this series of matches to try and speed up the process a little bit and to clear a bit of the backlog.

Available by: Monday May 14th

European Blackball Championships 2012 - This is a popular series of videos as so many players got to play in front of the Cuesport TV camera’s, this series will be edited straight after the completion of the UPC-BUCS videos and will start to come through the system by mid-May.

Available by: Thursday May 31st

GB9 Paul Medati Trophy – Two matches have already been made available from this tournament but in un-edited form, these are the final and semi-final of the Pro Cup event. The rest of the matches from the Pro Cup and the main event will be edited and made available by mid-June.

Available by: Friday June 15th

Any other videos from other events will be after this date. I know we are still due to complete some GB9 content from last year plus we have another live event set for 20th May as well so please bear with us.

I hope this post gives you an indication of what and when you can expect certain things from Cuesport TV, and please do hold me accountable for the dates!

Category: 9-ball Pool, English/UK Pool, General, Live Event News / Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

University 8-Ball Championships

February 22, 2012 / The_Teach / No comments

This weekend we are showing live coverage of the 2012 UPC BUCS 8-Ball Pool Championships from Great Yarmouth.

This event has featured on Cuesport TV for the last 3 years and has grown once again with over 450 players taking part this year.

At this moment in time the event will be on pay-per-view for the small price of just £2.99, if we manage to sign a last minute coverage sponsorship deal then we will try our best to make this a free event.

In the current business climate it is becoming more and more difficult to find sponsors and advertisers for what we do so we have to charge for the live events. If the University event happens to be on PPV then you can get a 50% discount by joining our mailing list (you will see a banner link to this on the right hand side of Cuesport TV.)

The coverage that we are showing starts on Friday morning at 10:00am (24th February) and concludes on Sunday 26th February at around 3:00pm. The first two days will conclude at around 7:00pm but please check the live event page or Facebook for updates.

If you are a Twitter user then you can follow us during this live event on the following account @cuesporttv we will be using hashtag #upcbucs2012.

Category: English/UK Pool, Live Event News / Tags: , , , , , ,

On our Travels

February 16, 2011 / The_Teach / 2 comments

Money Match TV 9 is on this weekend (19th Feb) – the 9th time we have done the trip up to Wakefield in Yorkshire. I am sure the city is amazing but I have only ever seen one road in, a hotel and a club when I have been up there and they have all been OK.

For some reason we are not getting major high profile matches on MMTV, not sure if the top players want to play for money when there are so many decent International tournament now. What this has done though is open the door for some of the ‘second tier’ – these are players that no doubt have talent, and the ability to win tournaments, but in some cases perform better in the longer, highly pressurised arena of Money Match TV.

Why this is I don’t know, but Money Matches seem to suit some players more than others. Just because we are not getting the so-called ‘top players’ doesn’t mean that the quality lacks. In fact, far from it, we have seen some amazingly close matches as the opponents in most cases have been very well matched.

Arfan Dad and Mike Gibney will both be going for 6 consecutive wins this weekend, Arfan is playing Adam Shaw who won a GB9 Challenge Cup event last year. Mike is playing a relative unknown on the 9-ball circuit in Rich Wharton.

I always feel like we have to remain impartial at Cuesport TV but it is clear to me that these matches will be relatively close. Both of the matches I have mentioned will be live online at Cuesport TV. For details on the other matches visit here.

What is Great about Yarmouth?

Well for one the amount of pool tournament held at the Vauxhall Holiday Park. For a number of years it has hosted EPA events and more recently the UPC (University Pool Council) 8-ball events have been held there. That is where we come in, from the 23rd-27th February Cuesport TV will be on site at the biggest event in University pool.

We are not advertising this as a live event simply because we have had issues with connection in the past, if it can be broadcast live it will be, if not we will do our usual recordings and broadcast later.

Anyway, that’s enough for now, join us if you can!

Category: 9-ball Pool, English/UK Pool, Live Event News / Tags: , , , , , ,

University Pool 2011

February 2, 2011 / The_Teach / No comments

Off to Great Yarmouth again this month for the UPC BUCS 8-Ball Pool Championships.

Cuesport TV have covered this event for the last two years with recorded coverage, on both occasions the event was supposed be live but due to issues with the on site network this was not possible.

I will be trying everything possible this year to get this event some live coverage but if we can’t then the recorded videos will be made available as soon as possible after the event.

It is actually one of the better events for us as we have an unlimited supply of keen students wanting to get on the commentary mic, this however can be fraught with danger!

Last year we had a couple of students that got a bit ‘over-zealous’ with their use of the English language and a video file had to be taken down because of it. Hopefully nothing of this nature will occur this year!

If it is live then you can watch the action unfold from the 25th-27th February

Category: English/UK Pool / Tags: , , ,

Thoughts on a Weekend in Yarmouth

March 4, 2010 / The_Teach / One comment

Well for the second year running we have covered the UPC-BUCS 8-ball pool championships. An event that this time around had just under 500 attendees. The best that the universities in the UK have to offer.

The standard of pool seems to have improved on last year especially in the singles. I must say a big well done to Warwick’s Jay Murphy here for his win over reigning champion Lee Morris in the final.

From my point of view, with the amount of events I have attended over the last two years, I would say that the tournaments promoted by the UPC are well organised, although I think the players in the singles would probably prefer longer matches. (Just an observation, time constraints are massive on an event of this size).

It was a good decision to move the UPC’s main event to Great Yarmouth at the Vauxhall Holiday Park, the park is well equipped for pool events, it already hosts EPA Inter-county, Interleague and other tournaments throughout the year. From what I understand the accommodation is also good value, although perhaps a little cold!

The only thing that seemed to be lacking in my opinion was provisions for food, unless you want fast food there is not a lot else available. It was a shame to see that the restaurant was closed all weekend as I feel it may have done some good trade. You then have to look at not only what the outlets are serving but also the price.

I understand business is about profit, but this has to be coupled with value. I don’t think any of the outlets particularly offered value. My eagle eye also spotted that with 500 people in the room the bar was rarely, if-at-all, busy. The main reason for this being the high beer prices, an average of about £3.40 per pint. Surely a good idea for the park to cut prices when they know students are around as town offers more choice and is far cheaper.

I don’t want to detract too much from the pool, the park does an excellent job of maintaining the tables which were lightning quick throughout the event. I did not hear one complaint about the quality of the tables, a rarity in pool tournament terms. In fact the majority of players I spoke to were singing the praises of the tables throughout.

Great Yarmouth as a town seems to have an excellent night life, and the town itself is far bigger than I actually thought, I imagine it is even better in the summer when it is somewhat warmer! Yarmouth must benefit greatly from pool tournaments as it brings an influx of people in off-season to spend money in bars. clubs and restaurants.

Roll on next year!

Category: English/UK Pool / Tags: , , , ,
 
Wordpress Theme by ThemeZee