Did anyone else notice the dramatically improved picture from skycam in the Tennessee-Baltimore game on ABC? I guess they must have finally gotten an HD camera for the skycam.

Balto vs Tenn was the FIRST NFL game I've seen in HD. The Skycam image looked fantastic... just as good as any other camera. Hats off to ABC for a job well done. Kevin

Compare the skycam picture in the Cowboys game to the skycam you saw earlier and you'll see a big difference.

You are so right. The camera crew in the Panthers game(MNF Crew) is so much better than those of the earlier games.

Mark

The Baltimore game had better HD all the way around then the game filmed by the MNF crew in my opinion. It seemed that the Baltimore game had more HD cameras than the Cowboys-Panther game. The skycam in the Cowboys-Panther game produced the same horrible picture it has on MNF all season long but the skycam in the Ravens-Titans game appeard to be an HD camera.

I noticed the better SKY-CAMa few weeks ago on the ESPN Sunday night game (Commented on this site...)..... ABC Used the Sunday NFL ESPN eqipment(NW Mobile truck) ... for the FIRST NFL Saturday GAME


....The second game.... with the INFERIOR Sky-Cam... is the REGULAR ABC-MNF truck!!!!

The skycam might have been better in the earlier game(but who cares, I'm watching for the game not the aerial views), but the HD in the late game blew away the earlier game. They use their best crew on MNF, and the final results in video or film are most affected by the expertise of the crew not by which production truck they are using.

Mark

Mark and I watched the two games via the same source and I will have to say that the first game had a better HD picture in my opinion. For some reason the picture quality looked better. However, the presentation of the second game was better due to the quality of the crew. MNF crew is just the best at presenting a football game in my opinion. The early game was done with the ESPN truck if that makes any difference.......I don't know.

I think the first game looked better because it was a day game, played outdoors. The second was also outdoors, but at night. I think lighting has a lot to do with the look of the picture. I liked the look of the earlier game, including the SkyCam, but the second had better shots of the game itself.

Many here have said that CBS looks better than ABC.

Based on the last couple of posts though you all are saying that ABC does a better job of directing the shots? Better production?

In my opinion the CBS games have better HD picture and sound. It may be that the sunlight is what makes the difference but I would definitely say that the color is much more vivid in the CBS games than any abc game I've seen yet. The DD 5.1 is infinitely better on CBS too.

Unfortunately I don't have ESPN-HD available so I've never seen one of their broadcasts but if the first game yesterday was done by the ESPN crew it seems that they have better equipment than the MNF crew.

Some of the aspects of the earlier game were better, and probably due to natural light. But the actual camera work, and focus was better in my opinion on the later game.

Mark

I remember posting about this before. Richard brings up my point exactly about production. CBS used the "Bonnie and Clyde" truck/ crew during the SEC college games this year and I though was far better than their NFL games in HD. Between ESPN and ABC I think it is a toss-up.
Another point could be made that College games look better because they seem to have more color. Think of all the SEC team and the bright colors they have in the uniforms and majority of the fans where their team colors at the game.

I'm now watching the Indiannapolis-Denver game on CBS. The game is being played in a dome so sunlight is not a factor. This picture is in a different league than the ABC picture. One factor that might affect my view of the ABC picture is that the local ABC affiliate in Austin upconverts the 720P signal to 1080i before broadcasting. From where I sit, the ABC picture is an upgrade from FOX's widescreen but doesn't come close to CBS'.

I am in complete agreement. The CBS picture for the Indy-Denver game is spectacular. It is miles better than the ABC pictures, either one of the games, that I saw yesterday. I'm not even going into what I saw this morning on Fox....

Ah, the Super Bowl is on CBS this year!!!!

On my set-up the CBS productions do seem to look better....but in all fairness it is a 1080i signal into a 1080i display. I've never watched an ABC or ESPN production into a display with a matching native scan rate.

Mark

Yes, I agree that the Colts/Broncos game has better picture quality but the motion problems are bad. With little or no motion the picture is better on CBS than ABC but as soon as everyone starts to run around and the picture is up close the pixilation is bad. Funny, but when the camera is showing a long shot of the field the motion doesn't cause a problem with the picture.

But this is all nit picking as I am loving every moment of all this great HD. The game tonight will be on ABC so another comparison.

I didn't watch every minute of the game but one thing I can say for this broadcast is that I didn't see any camera shots that were shot with an SD camera. This is the first game I've seen yet that used all HD cameras.

What everyone is seeing is the 1080i is far superior to 720P. Slowly the rest of the gang will start to catch on. CBS wants to be the best.....ABC and ESPN...they just want the money. And for what it's worth...the ESPN broadcasting crew is impossible to listen to. They are the worst group of any I have heard on any football broadcasts this year.