VIDEO
@MargiesPro
THE 2013 MARGARET RIVER PRO WEBSITE VIDEO STREAM WAS VIEWED BY OVER TWO MILLION PEOPLE GLOBALLY. AN IMPRESSIVE FEAT FOR PROMOTERS SURFING WA, WHO ACHIEVED THIS DESPITE A HOST OF TECHNICAL AND LOGISTICAL CHALLENGES THAT COME WITH THE TERRITORY WHEN YOU HOST AN EVENT IN ONE OF THE MOST ISOLATED CORNERS OF THE WORLD. The SportXchange Project tracked down several of the key movers and shakers behind the scenes to get a better understanding of just what it takes to achieve these kind of numbers. From capturing the footage on and off event, to the production process and the technical requirements of keeping the website video stream humming.
DARREN HARVEY EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Darren ‘Harvs’ Harvey of Beyond Action was the Executive Producer of the Margaret River Pro video footage. Harvs’ has extensive experience shooting sports and action footage having previously worked on events such as the Santos Tour Down Under, World Indoor Track Cycling events, Mountain Bike World Cup and several other surfing events including the Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast and Ripcurl Pro Bells Beach. While it was his first year as Executive Producer he has worked on the Margaret River Pro on one previous occasion. Fifteen years ago he filmed several stories for Chilli Factor, an action sports TV show with the most recent experience highlighting just how much has changed in the broadcasting of surfing events.
Photo (L to R): Susanne Morrison, Production Manager (Beyond Action), Mark Lane CEO (Surfing WA), Adam Howarth, Channel Manager (Fuel TV), Tim Thirsk (Surfing WA), Darren ‘Harv’s’ Harvey, Executive Producer (Beyond Action) and Matt Percy, Managing Director (Pacific Broadcast) scoping out the location one month prior to the 2013 Margies Pro.
What was your role and responsibilities with regards to the 2013 Margaret River Pro? I was hired by Beyond Action to be the Executive Producer of the Margaret River Pro video footage. So I was responsible for the production of the live footage, the breakfast show held each morning as well as the heat highlight mini-clips. My duties included putting together a game plan of how the whole event would be produced. This included what would be filmed, where the cameras would go, what storylines would be highlighted, how the event would be covered, things like that. I was also responsible for hiring the people involved, including the camera crew, editors, graphics designer, director and liaising with the broadcast provider Pacific Broadcast as to how the footage would make it out into the world. The first step was to do a recce’ of the location, so I went down to the event site about a month before the event with Susanne Morrison, the Production Manager
and the Pacific Broadcast crew where we made some judgement calls on where the cameras should go and what equipment would be needed. Based on past experience I put together a production schedule, which includes information such as what days we’d set up, how long it would take and how many people were needed to get the job done. On top of this we made some calls as to what surfing areas we needed to cover, how many and what types of cameras would be needed, how many cameramen we’d need, how many editors and also how we’d cut and edit the footage. The final stage of the planning process involved coming up with a budget for the production and presenting it to the event manager (Surfing WA CEO Mark Lane) for approval.
THE FIRST STEP TO PREPPING A GAME PLAN FOR THE EVENT WAS TO DO A RECCE’ OF THE LOCATION
IN TOTAL, THERE ARE EIGHT CAMERAS... TO ENSURE WE COULD CAPTURE AS MUCH OF THE EVENT ACTION AS POSSIBLE. FINDING THE FOOTAGE
How do you determine where and what to film? First we get the event schedule so we know when and where the competitors will be surfing, and then we organise a bank of cameras. This year we had three manned cameras on the beach, all pointing at different angles. We also had one camera out in the water, either on a boat or a jet ski, as well as one big boom camera on the beach which we used to get panning shots of the beach and water. Plus one wide shot camera looking out over the beach which we used to see when the waves were coming in. There was also one roaming camera, which was used to get interviews with competitors after their heats and shoot the crowd, as well as a stationary camera locked into the surfer’s lounge area so we could show footage of the surfers chilling out. In total, there are eight cameras and this was all planned out to ensure we could capture as much of the event action as possible.
EDITING THE FOOTAGE
What’s the process for deciding which footage makes it to the live stream and heat highlights? I sit in the Pacific Broadcast truck along with the Director, and together we watch all eight cameras. Having two people really helps as, say the Director is focused on one screen, there’s an extra pair of eyes that can keep watch on the other seven. If the Director is watching the moves being pulled by a surfer at a given point in time, I can keep an eye on the wide shot to see if there’s a wave coming. If it looks like the other surfer is preparing to take that wave I’ll advise the Director to switch the cameras so the next surfer’s moves are captured as well. Besides myself and the Director in the broadcast truck, we also have a graphics operator who posts up all the scores and captions you see on the screen, as well as someone working the replays. The replay operator is responsible for keeping an eye on the action during each heat and choosing which parts are going to be worthy of a repeat.
He’s got a pretty full on job because he also has to keep an eye on the scores so he can tell which waves are going to need to be replayed (the big-scoring ones). I also work with the replay operator and together we look at the wide-shot footage to see when there are going to be lulls in live action so we can slot in the replays. It’s crucial to strike a balance between showing the replays everyone wants to see while at the same time not missing out on any major live action because we misjudged a set and played a replay during an important live moment.
HIGHLIGHTING THE HEATS
Who is responsible for the heat highlights clips and how are they put together? The replay operator is responsible for compiling and editing the heat highlights videos. Basically he would look over the final scores and what replays were used during the heat before mashing the high-scoring footage with the replays into a short video. We also tried to tell the story of each heat, so it’s not just a stock-standard mash-up of the best waves. For example if one of the surfers fell off early and struggled to return to the waves while the opponent was off scoring two really good waves, we’ll try to include that footage as well. The aim is to make it a well-rounded summary of what went down during the heat.
BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS
How does the breakfast show work? The breakfast show was broadcast live on the website around 6am each morning. To ensure we didn’t have to be on-site any earlier than necessary we were prepared and ready to go before leaving the night before. Ideally, I wanted it so that all we’d have to do the next morning was bring in the cameras, crew and hosts. To prep for this, each night I’d sit down and write out a rundown of the previous day and take a look at the schedule for the upcoming day and see who would be surfing - if the surf was on. From there I’d decide if there were any significant events from the previous day worth mentioning, and then decide what important storylines would be needed to be shown, what possible highlights for that upcoming day would be, that kind of thing. Once the content of the breakfast show is sorted, I’d then talk to the hosts and let them know what topics, storylines or events would be on the show the next day.
On the morning of the show, each of the hosts is given a run-sheet of what is to be included, discussed or asked and then I let the hosts go for it. I always have a microphone in each of their ears though so I can talk to them at any time and ask them to say or ask something specific or tell them what is coming up next.
FOR THE MARGARET RIVER PRO THERE WAS PLENTY OF DRAMA. YOU’VE GOT THE BIG SURF, BOARDS BEING SNAPPED, TYLER WRIGHT GETTING WASHED OVER ROCKS, LOTS OF ACTION AND LOTS OF GREAT SURFING.
MARGIES MAGIC
What are some of the challenges that make this event unique? The Margaret River Pro was a great event to work on, the crew, the staff, everyone was working super long days so you’d think there’d be some tension or stress but everyone has a real enthusiasm for the sport and the event, so it’s a pretty fun and exciting event to be involved with. There is one challenge that is fairly specific to this event and that is the Western-setting sun. At the end of the really long days, the sun setting over the water creates reflections which can be blinding to a camera operator (and the viewer). As the competition continues into the afternoon and evening, it definitely became a lot harder to shoot, even though it’s really a beautiful site, it’s kind of a production team’s worst nightmare. If we were still filming as the sun began to set that would mean it had been a 14 hour day, since we start at about 4 or 5am, so everyone is tired. Trying to stay focused in these conditions was definitely one of the hardest parts of working the event. But even though the camera operators were lucky to get a toilet break, let alone have lunch and they worked
really long hours for five days in a row, everyone still had a smile on their face and was pumped to be there. I definitely saw a real enthusiasm and love for the sport of surfing and the Margaret River Pro. The fact that the actual competition itself went really well made things easier. If this goes well, it’s easy to make great television out of it. Shooting action sports is a pure thing, we aren’t trying to make anything up, we can’t make up a story or make up excitement, we can only cover and show what is actually happening. For the Margaret River Pro there was plenty of drama. You’ve got the big surf, boards being snapped, Tyler Wright getting washed over rocks, lots of action and lots of great surfing. That helps keep not only the audience entertained but also the directors and the crew entertained and if you’re keeping people interested and excited, that makes the job a whole lot easier. We don’t want to be having to make storylines out of something boring, so the fact that the Margies Pro is an amazing and exciting competition held amongst such a beautiful and cinema-ready setting really is the icing on the cake.
Is the surfing culture similar to other sports you’ve worked with? Surfing is totally different. You’re working on a beach… it doesn’t get much better than that! I’ve worked on a lot of different sporting events, some with hundreds of staff and crew. It sometimes feels like you are just a number, you sort of blend into the crowd a bit in the enormity of the production. At the Margaret River Pro everyone knows everyone. It’s a small event run by a small team but when it comes to reach around the world - I think the Pro is really punching above its weight as our little outfit was able to reach a massive global audience. Everyone around the world loves surfing and the global audience that it captures really sets the Margies Pro apart. It’s really a one-of-a-kind in Australia.
THE IDEA WAS TO CAPTURE A MORE PERSONAL, BEHIND THE SCENE’S STORY OF THE EVENT FROM A TOTALLY DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE. DARREN MCCAGH MARGIES MOMENTS
As well as the on-event footage, the Surfing WA team has for the past two years shot a series of small ‘viral’ style clips featuring personal, behind-the-scenes journeys. The man behind these Margies Extraordinary Moments clips is Darren McCagh, a talented videographer, editor and producer who got his start shooting local Surfing WA events on a voluntary basis.
MARGIES MOMENTS MOTIVATION When was your first year at the Margaret River Pro? This year was my fourth year at the Margies Pro, so the first one would’ve been 2010. The first two years my brief was just to produce something for Surfing WA to show their sponsors. It was a little vague, but there was enough guidance to get on with the job, things like include this, include that, we need footage of whoever. Then Mark Lane (Surfing WA CEO) came to me last year with the idea of shooting the Margie’s Moments, instead of shooting the contest. You’ve obviously got your production companies responsible for the on-thewater action for web streaming so to be off-site doing something different represented a fresh challenge. The idea for Margies Moments was to capture, a more personal, behind the scene’s story of the event from a totally different perspective. That first year we took Occy’, Tom Carroll and a few other guys through the Margaret River region and filmed them enjoying the environment away from the competition. That turned out really well, so this year we were given a little bit more budget and we dived straight into it. Are you just shooting the footage for the Margies Moments or are you responsible for storylines and editing as well? I am involved in the whole ‘Margies Moments’ process along with Mark Lane and Ryan Moss, another videographer. We all work together to come up with the storylines as part of a collaborative effort.
MAKING MARGIES MOMENTS
How do the storylines for the Margies Moments evolve? We were hoping to get hold of Tom Carroll again this year so a lot of our ideas were based around storylines with him. Then he pulled out about a week or two before the event, so we had to go back to the drawing board. Mark Lane pulled some strings and was able to organise for us to have Mark Richards for a day, and we hoped to line up Occy and possibly a few others. The underlying theme with the Margies Moments is about interacting with some of the legends of the sport and being able to see the area through their eyes. Most of the guys we’ve shot (especially Tom Carroll), have a significant tie to the Margaret River region, so the purpose of these clips is to bring that personal connection out and show them experiencing the region again. The clips are used as part of the partnership with Tourism WA so we want to really connect to the SouthWest region. Is there ever a concern that you’ll run out of ideas? Absolutely. You’re always kind of hoping that things come together and they always seem to. But there’s always that worry about who we have to film tomorrow. Mark Lane is on top of that, trying to make sure we have someone to shoot, something to run with, because in this sport these guys have work commitments throughout the event, or they might be surfing in it, so you’ve got to work around their schedules. Luckily this year we had three lay-days, so that made it easier to get the guys on board, but sometimes things just don’t work out and you’re stuck. That’s why when I
Margies Extraordinary Moments: Taj Burrow
come up with the idea or theme for a Margies Moment the night or two before filming I’ll always have a backup plan as well in case things don’t turn out the way you want. If you get stuck there’s always another option which you can run with. With most of the ideas we come up with I want to include surf footage, but this year in particular was hard because with those lay-days and no surf, what do you do? Luckily, the backup plan this year was the Taj Burrow video we did. This was Taj talking about a day a few years ago which was just mental, and I happened to be sitting on some footage that I hadn’t released. So the end product with that was Taj talking about one of the best days he’d ever had down south in West Oz. It looked like the waves were breaking on the beach? Yeah it was like literally 3-4 metres off the shoreline. It was that shallow, and solid. Everyone came from the Taj Small Fries event, there would have been 40 cars on the top sitting there with their kids watching and seeing what’s going down. I had been sitting on that footage for two or three years. Is there more classic footage tucked up your sleeve? There’s a lot of stuff I’m sitting on. If I see a session but I’m not specifically filming for that surfer, I’m not going to go to their sponsor with my footage when they have their own videographer shooting for them. I probably would these days, because it could just be another angle of that day of surf, but I’d talk to that surfer’s videographer first.
This particular Taj Burrow footage was just a freak opportunity that came up. I happened to be there and shot some footage, along with a bunch of other people. So when everyone else had their videos out within the next week, I held onto mine, because I didn’t want to promote my footage when I wasn’t out there with that surfer on that particular day. It’s about having respect for the filmer that is working with the surfer at the time.
WHERE THE MAGIC HAPPENS
Once you’ve got the footage you want for a Margies Moment how does it come together? What’s the process? We have accommodation at Gnarabar - Margaret River Beach Resort, so Ryan and I set up the editing suite there. Then we’ll just come back and get the footage off the camera and onto the computer. We make sure we have a selection of music ready to go that we’ve got the rights to, so once the footage is on the computer we just bang it out so it’s done that night.
Margies Extraordinary Moments: Mark Richardson
HOW THE MOMENTS CAME TO BE
Aside from the Taj video how did the other three Margies Moments come together? Mark Richards was lined up in advance and we had access to him for a full day. He hadn’t been back since 1985 so we took him back through the region and he was as keen as. It was pretty special. There was no surf that day so what do you do? The day before he was in the SurfAid charity event, so we shot some of that, we also lined up a chef, and just went to his house and sat around the back surrounded by trees. That was a bit more personal. It was shot during the day and edited that night. Then there was the Martin Potter ‘moment’. That one came about after I met Damon Eastaugh at the SurfAid event, Laney (Mark Lane) introduced us and it turned out he’s a winemaker. Pottz put together a crew that included some commentators and other surfers and we all went to Damon’s winery for a day-out. Damo’ showed us around the winery, which they were all ecstatic about,
Margies Extraordinary Moments: Martin Potter
because it was more intimate, a personal touch that you wouldn’t normally get. That again, was edited that night. The last Margies Moment was the Characters of Margs. We shot that when the competition was up and running again. That one was easy in a way - all we did was set up a camera out the back of the contest area and get people around the event to say one word about Margs and then we went out and did the same with some locals in the area. I knew some people at Vasse Felix so that’s how we were able to get them on the video, and then I knew one of the dairy farmers down there from work I did on the Cape to Cape so we got him on the clip as well. Bahen and Co chocolate were on it too, all things that are specific to the area. We tried to include those local personalities and businesses as well as the guys at the competition site, the workers and the surfers, to make a video with a real kind of community feel to it.
Margies Extraordinary Moments: Faces of Margs
TAKING IT TO THE WORLD
From an editing standpoint, do you have control over the finished product? I have creative control over the final video. Over the years I’ve built up that trust with the team at Surfing WA. They understand the effort and energy I put into it and they know I work hard to make a good product for them. With the deadlines we are working to, there’s not really a lot of room to make any changes, we have to shoot it and edit it in a day to have it out on the internet within 24 hours. If they really don’t like something in the video they’ll review it and say we can’t put it out that day and I’ll go back and edit it, but typically I have full control. With a Margies Moment in the can what’s next? It’s literally a case of handing over the finished video on a disc to Susanne Morrison, the Production Manager and she would take it away and upload it to the Surfing WA Vimeo channel.
I WANT TO GET TO KNOW THEM AND I WANT THE AUDIENCE TO GET TO KNOW THEM.
OUT AND ABOUT
Outside of the Margies Pro, what else are you upto? What does the rest of this year look like? Busy! I do a lot of shooting for a kite surfing brand called BWS, over on the gold Coast. We do regular trips with them, which led to me going to the States earlier this year. I’ve also done a mini-documentary on one of their riders. I’m also shooting some little clips with Tourism WA around their Extraordinary Experiences campaign. We shot in Exmouth recently, and I’m off to Kununurra for another clip, so hopefully more things with Tourism WA are on the horizon. I’m also working on my own documentary with a photographer from down south, Russell Ord. We’ve sorted some crowd-funding that’s made the whole project possible, which is great. It’s called One Shot.
INSIDER PERSPECTIVE
Is there anything on your bucket-list for the Pro? Ideally what I want to be shooting is character-based short documentaries. So in terms of the Pro, I would love to be given the opportunity to do real personal stories on some of the guys who will be competing next year. I’d like to go to their homes, their hometowns, spend some time with them, go surfing, find out what makes them tick, get a real perspective on who they are and what they are striving to achieve. It’s about a more intimate look at them as people and as athletes so fans can relate to them, instead of just seeing their amazing performances and thinking “oh he’s a rock star” which they all are. I think there’s a real lack of an inside perspective on some of the surfers. I want to get to know them and I want the audience to get to know them.
KIM RICHARDSON WEBMASTER
While Darren, Harvs and his production team are on-event, filming, editing and making it all web-ready, Kim Richardson the Margaret River Pro webmaster is on the other side of the country managing the website that acts as a hub for all the event footage. While not responsible for the actual web streaming process (this is managed by the ASP - Association of Surfing Professionals), Kim and his team at Viewdale IT were responsible for keeping the website that hosts the live streaming and Margies Moments clips operating and ensuring it didn’t crash when millions of people across the globe were logging-on for the latest action.
STREAMING AS STANDARD
What is your professional background and how did you get involved in the Margaret River Pro? I am a web developer and Managing Director of Viewdale IT. I’ve been working in the industry for 13 years having studied Computer Science at Curtin University. My involvement came about as a result of previous projects with Surfing Australia and this is my second year working with the Margaret River Pro. What were your roles and responsibilities in 2013? My job was to project manage the website and manage the hosting server cluster that houses the site for the duration of the event.
Where is event web streaming heading? Viewdale IT didn’t handle the web streaming for the event, this is managed by a third party that has people on the ground at the event as part of a global streaming network. Saying that though, I have seen the demand to have quality streaming readily available, increase dramatically over the last couple of years. It’s not just a cool feature anymore - it’s virtually a standard requirement for any surfing event, or any sport’s website.
Why do you think web streaming has become so popular with surfing fans? Web streaming and websites are important mediums for surfing fans especially, because it is a global sport and the locations are remote and the distance between each event is significant. So having the opportunity to watch the event from the comfort of your own lounge room, office or even streaming it on your phone while on a beach is very attractive.
IT’S NOT JUST A COOL FEATURE ANYMORE (WEB STREAMING) - IT’S VIRTUALLY A STANDARD REQUIREMENT FOR ANY SURFING EVENT
SETTING THE STAGE
Talk us through the roll out of the website for this year’s event? What are the server set-up and bandwidth considerations? We ran an origin web server in Australia with redundancy that served content to the Amazon CloudFront (Origin Pull) Caching Network, which comprised 40 Caching Clusters over 28 major cities all around the globe. We chose a Content Delivery Network (CDN) because it provides the fastest distributed experience for the surfing fan. When they hit the website they get the site in a very fast manner as the content is being served from within their own country’s internet network.
In terms of bandwidth, by utilising a CDN we were able to spread the bandwidth needs across the caching network. Saying that, we had Gigabit interconnects from the Australian Data Centre to the nearest POP (Point of Presence) in the Caching Network. On top of that, we also had the Margaret River Pro website running on a custom designed CMS (Content Management System) with its own caching engine, which meant that the origin server had more than enough capacity to serve the caching network.
SOCIAL INTEGRATION
2013 was the first year the Margies Pro installed Facebook commenting on the website. What’s involved and what were the outcomes? Facebook has made it easier and easier each year to integrate its widgets into existing websites, and the Facebook Comment widget is a fine example of that. After a few tweaks to the integration with the Margaret River Pro Facebook page, we were able to have Margies Pro Facebook admins’ moderate the comments in order to remove any unsuitable content. Having people comment directly on the site has its pro’s and con’s. It can promote good clean conversation and debate on the event, but it can also attract negative activity if a set of eyes aren’t on it all the time. So this year we had a dedicated team of social media community managers monitoring the comments, answering questions where needed and also moderating where required. We believe it worked well and overall I would class it as a success. Communicating with the fans ‘live’ and keeping them up to date through a ‘real’ person made a big difference. If there were technical problems, we were able to communicate them effectively and efficiently to the fans. This is important.
DEALING WITH GLITCHES
Technical glitches must be a common headache? Are glitches today more or less common than say five years ago or are they just different? These days, hardware glitches in server environments are rarer than in the ‘old’ days where servers could go down in the blink of an eye for no particular reason. Apart from network problems, we never used to have some of the challenges we see today. These days we have more powerful redundant systems, but the problem we are always battling with are online attacks from hackers or co-ordinated distributed attacks on servers. These are usually not focussed on the Margaret River Pro website solely, it just happens naturally to every website, large or small, though it’s still something we have to be monitoring pretty much every waking moment of the event. Denial of Service attacks and brute force are the two most common attacks we have to monitor. So answering your question, I think that technical glitches are as common as five years ago, but they are different and they require new strategies to deal with them.
Talk us through your experiences with the web streaming going down on the first weekend and disrupted broadband to Spain on the second weekend? I can’t speak for the streaming team, as that wasn’t our area. One has to appreciate how remote Margaret River is in relation to the rest of the world, and naturally, bandwidth is a finite resource in these locations. I do know that the outage was short lived and quite early in the event. The problem for Spanish fans was brought about by a sub-sea cable in the Mediterranean that supplied a fair chunk of bandwidth to Western Europe being cut accidently. As a result, an outage was cached by our Caching Network in that region. Once the problem was identified and engineers in that network were able to re-route traffic, we had to invalidate the cache objects in that regions cache, effectively wiping the cache and telling it to start all over again. How do you ensure the website is working for all users? We run monitoring software that tells us by email and SMS alert if certain services aren’t running. Our rostered technician gets an alert, identifies the problem and gets to work on resolving the issue.
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WHAT’S NEXT
THE PACE OF CHANGE IN THE DIGITAL SPACE IS ACCELERATING, MAKING ANY PREDICTIONS ON HOW THIS WILL INFLUENCE THE MARGARET RIVER PRO FROM A VIDEO AND STREAMING PERSPECTIVE NIGH ON IMPOSSIBLE. UP FOR THE CHALLENGE THOUGH, KIM, HARV’S AND DARREN LOOKED INTO THEIR CRYSTAL BALLS TO GIVE US SOME INSIGHT AS TO WHAT THEY THINK IS AROUND THE CORNER.
THE CHANGE IN TECHNOLOGY FROM THE LATE 1990’S TO TODAY HAS JUST BEEN ENORMOUS AND I THINK IT’S ONLY GOING TO CONTINUE TO ADVANCE.
FUTURE FOR THE WEB
How has the work you’ve done for the Pro changed over the years as a result of technology changes and shifting audience demands? Kim: This is the second year we have done the MRP website and we have seen a dramatic shift towards social networking and streaming, these are the two key drivers of change. Technology has allowed us to “mash up” a range of social networking tools that allows instant interaction between the event and the fans. Harvs: The production side is a lot cheaper nowadays. Cameras are cheaper, facilities are cheaper, pretty much everything to do with video production is cheaper. With the internet as well, the footage we record and edit is much more widespread, the ability to watch live footage is almost a given. In years past you’d struggle to watch live events online because your modem just couldn’t keep up.
FUTURE FOR ‘LIVE’ PRODUCTION
Nowadays with high speed internet, it’s so much easier and the quality can be as good as TV. This means for us, as an action sports production team, that the demand for live event footage is a lot higher. The advent of the internet means more people are demanding live footage, technology also makes our job easier as it is cheaper and easier to create that footage and post it. Fifteen years ago when I came down to Margaret River to shoot for the TV show Chilli Factor, we spent 3-4 days of the competition just shooting highlights with one camera, which was edited into a 5-10 minute story on the entire event. We weren’t filming the whole event because there was nowhere to put it, there was no website to host a live stream, no Vimeo. This year however, we didn’t miss a single wave because of our eight-camera set up. The live streaming captured every single wave so that people in Spain or
Brazil or Germany could watch friends, family or their favourite surfer competing in the event. They could see every wave just by going online. The change in technology from the late 1990’s to today has just been enormous and I think it’s only going to continue to advance. What impact, if any, have smartphones and tablets had on the work you do for the Pro? Kim: We have had to make sure that the website is compatible with smartphones and tablets. For future events, we would like to provide true mobile and tablet only versions of the site for a sleeker interface with these devices.
FUTURE FOR ONE-MAN-BANDS
On the technology side, over the next 2-3 years, where do you see your style of video production heading? Darren: I think everything’s going to the internet- the days of TV are numbered, other than them being an internet device. I think everyone will have their own individual channels on the internet where they’ll be able to sell products and market and network and connect. In terms of production, you still need the big outfits to manage major productions. There are times when you need everyone in the same room, like the graphics operator, editor etc. But then also I think people are pretty clever and since the regular, solo videographer can now afford the equipment, I think it’s getting to that point where a single person can produce something almost as good as a full scale production company.
It seems every pro surfer has a video production team permanently attached to them, is this the future? Darren: Yeah I think so because the technology is so accessible. You know I could go out and buy a broadcastquality camera for $15,000 where back in the day it would’ve been a heck of a lot more. It’s more affordable now, so those guys who are making proper money, they can afford it. If they have the session of their life or they’re going somewhere, it’s a wasted opportunity to not have someone filming it. I think more photographers will get into filming, the same as they have with photojournalism. A lot of those guys have had to move into film as well. As people are watching little 2-3 minute clips, it is the quick content, fast delivery, on-demand stuff that people want, whatever the industry.
www.margaretriverpro.com www.surfingaustralia.com/wa/
www.sportxchange.com.au www.imagexchange.com.au Video@MargiesPro is published by the SportXchange Project in partnership with Surfing WA, promoters of the Drug Aware Margaret River Pro. Written by Jordan Slight and Stu Williams. All images by ImageXchange and Relentless Sports. (June 2013)