DCI Fan Network

[corps fan]

i paid for just the broadcast yesterday, spent $20...just to find out they now have lowered the price to $39 for the network. makes me wish i had waited a day and i could have just paid double and gotten the on demand and everything else...still thinking about it.

the vid quality was about as great as you could expect for a streaming video. it was high quality, just not quite as clear as the theater events, but i would definitely purchase it for future if i'm not out on the tour.

Edited July 27, 2008 by corps fan

[Phillygwm]

Hi,

I had difficulty with the steaming video from Orlando (paid to view just that event), and wonder what the Fan Network membership and the "On Demand" feature is like. How easy is it to watch a video of a past performance? I imagine the files are large and take a long time to download.

Thanks!

I took the plunge this year for the first time. I was very pleasantly surprised at the quality. It helps if you have a fast Internet pipe...dial-up simply won't cut it. And the multi-camera views are jumpy on the live feeds. Still, a lot better than I expected and worth the $69. Or $39.

[Peel Paint]

It seems I can only view past performances in high-camera. Is there a way to see the multi-camera recording?

Thanks!

You're not doing anything wrong. High-cam is the only mode FN made available on On Demand playbacks at this time.

[Peel Paint]

Just out of curiousity how much were they charging last year?

Not sure, but wasn't it $89? Or maybe that was two years ago and it was $79 last year? The price has been dropping. And most live webcasts were not later available On Demand. Two or three were, but not generally. And there was less bonus content and less stuff added each day. And the live webcasts were less reliable overall last year with many more user complaints than I've seen this year, saying I couldn't get on, or I got on but it dropped me with three corps to go and I couldn't get back in, or It kept freezing and Nobody was there when I tried to contact DCI during the webcast. This year, there have been no major disruptions and very few user complaints. I'm sure they would love to webcast Allentown but apparently there remain serious technical obstacles. The stadium or Allentown's telecom capacity is not to the task for uploading. They tried it the first year and it bombed out, if I recall correctly, and whatever was not working must still be an issue.

Edited July 27, 2008 by Peel Paint

[FLBuzcut]

Howdy,

Like a few others of you, I've stomped and moaned for years about the Fan Network, dabating whether or not to join, thinking that I wouldn't use it enough over the summer to get my money's worth...then this year they keep lowering the price! Now, at $39 I figure I may as well. My big question is about the quality of the both the On Demand Video and the Streaming Broadcasts? I contacted DCI's office and got a very detailed explanation from a guy there about speed and resolution of the various video formats. The one that really bothered me was the streaming one, since that's primarily what we're paying for. 500kbs speed and resolution of 480x360 is not the highest quality for streaming media. However, a lot depends on the quality of the raw video and how it is encoded in WMV for streaming. Most of those people who mention it say that the picture & sound quality are excellent. Anyone think differently? I don't need it to be HD quality, but I have a pretty nice system with a 24" widescreen LCD display that will magnify the good, bad or ugly of the video. And I don't want to sit hear and be annoyed for 3 or 4 hours because of a blurry picture.

So, let's hear it fans!

Thanks!

Jim

[kaplac]

Howdy,

Like a few others of you, I've stomped and moaned for years about the Fan Network, dabating whether or not to join, thinking that I wouldn't use it enough over the summer to get my money's worth...then this year they keep lowering the price! Now, at $39 I figure I may as well. My big question is about the quality of the both the On Demand Video and the Streaming Broadcasts? I contacted DCI's office and got a very detailed explanation from a guy there about speed and resolution of the various video formats. The one that really bothered me was the streaming one, since that's primarily what we're paying for. 500kbs speed and resolution of 480x360 is not the highest quality for streaming media. However, a lot depends on the quality of the raw video and how it is encoded in WMV for streaming. Most of those people who mention it say that the picture & sound quality are excellent. Anyone think differently? I don't need it to be HD quality, but I have a pretty nice system with a 24" widescreen LCD display that will magnify the good, bad or ugly of the video. And I don't want to sit hear and be annoyed for 3 or 4 hours because of a blurry picture.

So, let's hear it fans!

Thanks!

Jim

Well really, the video and sound IS very good to previous years. However compared to other streams, the quality is rather poor.

I don't know if DCI doesn't have the finances to enable higher quality or if the group they work with doesn't have the capabilities of higher quality video, but I would really enjoy a better picture. The sound is great, but the videos are so highly compressed, I tried watching the Cavaliers from Atlanta's show and all I saw were blurry white blobs.

I hope that in the near future DCI will be able to host higher quality videos and streams. The only real problem that I can see from it is that slower internet users would find that higher resolutions make their streams very choppy and have to buffer very often. However more people moving over to 1.5+mbps I think the issue will be a minimal one with time.

I guess another thing about the resolutions is that DCI still has to make money, and I'm willing to bet they get a big chunk from dvd sales. The lower resolution videos are probably just a way to make sure that people will buy the finals dvds rather then save over 100 dollars and watch the same shows from a week earlier with high quality video that rivals the dvd.

Btw, try watching on a 50" LCD screen, it was so bad I switched over to a multi-cam on my 17" computer lcd.

Edited July 30, 2008 by kaplac

[FLBuzcut]

After I spoke with the guy from DCI's office, I did some research and the reason they streams are not more robust is because of the Brightcove Services company, who is coordinating DCI's whole video effort. The 500kbs and 480x360 resolution is the standard for their streaming and on-demand video set up. They give their clients very good guidelines and tools to help with the quality of the video before it makes it onto their network, in an effort to maximize what little bandwidth they're using; and based on most of the reports, this must be helping a bit. But even a streaming standard of 640x480 at about 1200kbs would be a big improvement. I also read on Brightcove's website that they're changing their media players to accommodate higher quality and newer encoding technology. They have an example of a HD source, encoded in widescreen at 720p at a low enough bitrate that it still streams over any broadband connection and it was absolutely BEAUTIFUL. If only they had that in place now I'd have no reason to complain. Maybe next year...

And I'm sure the DVD sales angle is an issue. Oh, and even with membership in the Fan Network, you know you can purchase better quality video, encoded with h.264 with bitrate of 2100kbs and resolution of 640x480 for $4.49 per corps (which I find ludicrous). So for an entire year's top-twelve, it would cost $53.88 to download individual videos...or you can buy the Legacy Collection DVD for $39. Um, okay....

Edited July 30, 2008 by FLBuzcut

[skajerk]

Didn't know where else to post this but...

I was watching some old shows on FN tonight and something caught my eye. Can someone take a look at '88 BD and tell me what that is running around on the ground on the front sideline between the 6:48 and 6:53 mark. Is it what I think it is?

[LHBTrombone]

Didn't know where else to post this but...

I was watching some old shows on FN tonight and something caught my eye. Can someone take a look at '88 BD and tell me what that is running around on the ground on the front sideline between the 6:48 and 6:53 mark. Is it what I think it is?

A cockroach?...or a remote control car?

[perc2100]

Hi,

I had difficulty with the steaming video from Orlando (paid to view just that event), and wonder what the Fan Network membership and the "On Demand" feature is like. How easy is it to watch a video of a past performance? I imagine the files are large and take a long time to download.

Thanks!

Lots of replies already, but wanted to respond 'for the record.'

I've been a subscriber since the beginning, first because I wanted to stream APD's, and then because of the live video streams of regionals. Every year coming into this season, the streams, IMO, have been mediocre at best. I had _NEVER_ had a 'smooth' running stream. The live streams either froze up mid-performance during or a corps, or logged me out for no reason. Logging back in was difficult because there didn't seem to be enough band width to support everyone trying to get on. It was a MAJOR frustration, and this year my wife practically begged me to not get it (because I started the 'tradition' of having people over for parties, and they always ended in cursing and anger at streaming issues). I have an amazing computer, so I know that was never a problem. When I heard about the On Demand thing, I thought that was pretty cool, and if DCI had streaming issues I could at least watch the shows after the fact (not an option for the most part previously). I had always thought that DCI was a tiny operation trying to charge big time money on a service they weren't quite ready to charge big money for (for example, last year the price for the subscription was comparable to MLB's live game streaming, with infinitely better tech support from MLB, better quality streams, and more games). I felt DCI was severely lagging in the live streaming world, but still trying to charge professional quality money.

This year, I was hyped that DCI dropped the charge for the subscription: it went down by $10. Plus, they added A TON of extra content (the corps uploaded video, On Demand videos of both live streamed shows and other non-streamed shows, Top 12 video from past years, etc). I got the subscription, and decided to give DCI's service one last try, thinking if things weren't together this year I would be done until they could prove that they had their act together. This year has been a night and day difference.

I have not had any issues with streaming live shows that were related to DCI (I had to reinstall some software to make things run as smooth as possible, but that's obviously not DCI's fault). The On Demand thing for shows has been great, and most of the time DCI has put up the video well ahead of their posted schedule. The corps uploaded video has been icing on the cake (LOVE the catwalk video of the Georgia show). In short, DCI has over achieved with their service this year. When they announced last Saturday that they were cutting the price further for the last few weeks of the season, I thought it was another great step; I think if you're considering getting the service, it is more than worth the money at this point.

To answer your question/concern (maybe others have, and if so i apologize), the videos don't download: you merely stream them. It only takes seconds on my computer, and you can still watch them full screen easily.

If you're thinking about getting the Fan Network now, it's a no-lose situation IMO: you get the last couple of streams, all of the shows on On Demand (go back and see how some of the shows evolved during the season), ad all of the other great audio and video on the Network. It's such a cheap price, it'll pay for itself after Semi-Finals and watching a few On Demand shows.