YES Network Expands Coverage For Weekend’s Yankees 3D Telecasts
YES Network has added seven distributors to the list of those showing the first Major League Baseball games to be televised in 3D, between the New York Yankees and the Seattle Mariners this weekend. Joining in the telecast with DirecTV, a co-sponsor of the event along with Panasonic, are Blue Ridge Communications, Cablevision, Comcast, Cox, Service Electric, Time Warner Cable and Verizon FiOS. The game is being played in Seattle, but the feed is being offered only to current YES Network affiliates in the Yankee’s home-team TV viewing territory.
Seven 3D cameras will be used to capture the games, “for the most part” in the same camera positioning as the 12 HD cameras that will also be used for the games, said Eric Handler, vice president of communications at YES Network. Five 3D cameras will be in the center field, lower first base, lower third base, low home plate and high home plate positions, Handler told us. A handheld 3D camera will be used for shooting live video, using six fiber drops placed around the stadium. And a locked, unstaffed 3D camera will be mounted in the announcers’ booth, focused “on the talent,” he said. In a typical telecast, YES uses 12-20 or more HD cameras depending on whether it’s a home or high-profile game, he said.
"The million-dollar question” is how many viewers the 3D broadcast will reach, Handler said. “There’s no way of trying to come up with any kind of ballpark figure because it hasn’t been done before, and I haven’t seen any figures in terms of number of 3D-compatible TVs in our footprint.” Regardless of the outcome, no additional 3D games are planned this summer, Handler said. “This is very much a test,” he said. “3D is in its infancy, and as we've done with a lot of digital technologies such as HD, in-market streaming, broadband, and interactive television, we take it upon ourselves to take the lead in experimenting with new platforms. But having said that, we have no plans to go beyond this test this year."
Saturday’s telecast begins at 10 p.m. EDT and Sunday’s at 4 p.m. The 3D games will be on channels within the Yankee’s network affiliates covering all of New York state and Connecticut and parts of New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Locations include channel 333 for Blue Ridge Communications, channel 1300 for Cablevision, 981 for Comcast in New Jersey, 333 for Comcast in Connecticut, 784 for Cox, 103 for DirecTV, 831 for Service Electric Broadband Cable, 1333 for Time Warner Cable in New York state, 483 for Time Warner Cable in New York City and 575 for Verizon FiOS.