Media village key ring

My keyring for the media village - Room M4U18 (Magenta 4, Unit 18)

Velodrome roof. One of the Austrian wirecam crew is pulling the wirecam cable over the roof.

This was for the longest wirecam rigged to date, just over 1km, with a few minor obsticles - this roof, a swimming pool, two roads, the main entrance to the complex and a couple of grandstands!

One of the two towers which the wirecam was rigged between. They are based on tower cranes, and are 85m high.

Originally, the ladder didn't have any landings, and they were only fitted a couple of weeks before we rigged the wirecam.

A normal crane was used to get the cable over a road and grandstand.

A couple of digilink recievers were next door at another pool

Looking up at the wirecam tower from the base.

Roof of the main stadium from the base of the wirecam tower.

How many moving heads?!

The security airship payed a visit during the afternoon.

Main olympic stadium from the mountain overlooking Athens.

We had the data transmitters for the helicopters up here, and it was also where the link recievers were. From here we were above the smog, and you could see it roll away as it got dark.

View from the mountain

More mountain pictures.

We were at a telecoms tower owned by OTE (the Greek telephone company), which can be seen from miles around.

Mountain view of the olympic complex. From this view you can see how big the entire complex is.

Links hut for the sailing.

All the radio links (2x helicopters, 3x chase boats, 4x on board) were monitored from here.

Main stadium.

I went past the main stadium every day while in Athens. This is taken from the road which runs past. The flame is at the opposite end.

The camera used on the wirecam had several faults. It's being dropped to the ground here to try and fix it.

Olympic marathon test run.

In order to check all the technical facilities used on the marathon, we had to ride the entire course. I was there incase we had any difficulties with the data links.

Marathon test. We built up quite a queue of traffic behind us. We were travelling no faster than 20km/h, on one of the main roads into Athens.

Marathon test - Ooops... its stopped working! We had to fix it while on the move.

Marathon test. Shame they wouldn't let us take the truck through the drive through...

Marathon test.

Roads around Athens were marked up as "Olympic" lanes. Only vehicles with accreditation (passes) were allowed in those lanes, enabling them to get around faster.

Marathon test - It's deceptive how flat the course seemed on TV. From here you can see the massive hills the atheletes has to contend with.

Marathon test.

Our data transmitter was on top of that mountain. Thats also where the earlier photos were from. Athens is on the other side.

The telecom tower we had kit on is visible here, just beside the little tree, in the lowest part of the mountain.

Marathon test. One of the motobike cams broke down, so we had to get it fired up again , all done on open streets while moving!

The solution - reboot!

Marathon test. This would always cause the director to panic - radio cameras dont work in tunnels!

Marathon test.

Umm... Dominos

Marathon test.

Another view of our tower, this time from the other side of the mountain.

Marathon test. One of the new architectural features built in athens for the olympics.

The Blimp.

We had a tethered blimp to cover the beach volleyball.

The Blimp.

Softball - where I spent a couple of days. The monitor on the floor was my only way of watching the pictures coming back from the wireless camera used on the umpire.

Softball. Proper camera behind the umpire / batter.

Softball. My view onto the pitch.

Softball. Despite it not being a particularly popular sport outside America, the teams got good support.

Softball. USA vs China (I think!)

Softball.

The umpires mask, which we had to attach the camera to for every game.

Softball.

The camera was contained in the plastic box on top, secured with velcro(!), and then a battery pack and transmit antenna was strapped to the back of the mask.

Sailing.

Vision control. I had 5 data controlled cameras to look after here, so it became my main venue.

Sailing

VT were right behind vision.

Sailing. "Race Postpoment. Insufficent Wind." Time for an ice cream then!

Sailing.

Gigawave data control rack and OCP, installed in the scanner.

Sailing

The truck looked quite new, but the systems were running on MS-DOS and Windows 3.1!

Sailing. Links tower.

We ended up with three different antennas on this tower, in an attempt to get enough gain to control the boats 3 miles away.

Sailing. Links Tower.

Lots of antennas!

Sailing. Sun falling after a long day.

Sailing. Last chase boat back after a late finish.

Sailing.

Once we had solved most of our data problems, I spent a few days on the boats, literally in the middle of the action. (No zoom here!)

Sailing

This is as close as you get without participating! Even the photographers were behind us.

Sailing.

Of the three boats we had, one had a brand new HiDef camera on board. The Gyron is a stabilised mount on pan, tilt and roll. This means the viewers have a steady shot, even if the boat is being thrown around.

Sailing. Ready for a start.

Sailing. Round a buoy.

Each buoy had a radio mic on, and each of the chase boats had recievers for these, meaning we needed a sound man and mixer on board.

Cycling.

We had a wireless camera here too, attached to the side of the track.

Cycling. Digilink reciever for the minicam.

Cycling. Winners ceremony.

Cycling. Won by Sarah Ulmer from New Zealand.

Cycling. This place is massive.

Swimming. Photo of the grandstand taken from the velodrome.

Olympic Complex. This is the main entrance to the site for the public.

Olympic Complex. I had some time to kill because of this - the Womens Marathon. My accomodation was on the route, so I had to wait until it was over before travelling home.

Olympic Complex.

This was the poshest studio I saw while out here, for one of the American networks.

Olympic Complex.

Olympic Complex. The stadium from outside.

IBC.

The International Broadcast Centre - second largest building in Greece (after the international airport). Home to the worlds broadcasters. Every image from the olympics passed through this building.

Olympic Stadium.

It's big!

Olympic Stadium.

You're taking the michael! How many lights!?!

I like the plastic bowls used to protect the electronics.

Olympic Stadium. Track camera

Olympic stadium. 100m hurdles.

Olympic stadium. After the race.

Olympic stadium - BIG!

Olympic Stadium

IBC

Teletext. We had access to 50 odd channels in our rooms. However, BBC ceefax seems to have got a bit confused!

Sailing. These boats could fly!

Sailing. Whoops!

Sailing. GB beaten by France!

Sailing. At least we beat the Americans!

Sailing. The boats you don't see on the TV! These are for the press and public.

Sailing. We leave the press in the dust as we accellerate off in chase of the cometitors.

Sailing. We were told off a couple of times by the officials... We were creating two big a wake!

Sailing.

Sailing. Even with a tight corner like this, the Gyron remains absolutely still.

Now, thats a good idea for branding!

Beach volleyball

Helleniko Complex. Based on the former international airport. We were based in the big blue hanger on the far right.

Helleniko Complex. Hockey pitches.

Helleniko Complex. Baseball pitches.

Helleniko Complex. Softball Pitch.

Sailing.

Each chase boat had a sound mixer to enable the four mic recievers to be passed back on a mono audio feed over the radio link.

Sailing. Gyron HiDef controller.

Sailing. Lots of gaffer tape held the olympics together!

Sailing. Link transmitter, and GPS reciever.

Sailing. Cameramans operating position.

Sailing. One of the other two chase boats.

Sailing. Another delayed start, so time for a swim!

Sailing.

Don't even bother trying to sail when there is no wind!

The Acropolis

Athens is a big city, over 40% of the Greek population live here.

Athens

It stretches as far as the eye can see

Acropolis close up.

Acropolis

One of the perks of being Olympic staff, was that our passes would get us into all historical areas and museums for free.

Athens has several tall mountains in the middle of it. This one has a monastary on top

The Greek flag flies over the acroplis hill.

The Greeks are still working on the restoration of the Acropolis.

The area around the Acropolis is littered with ancient ruins. In the background can be seen the original olympic stadium.

This amphitheatre nestles at the bottom of the Acropolis hill.

Sailing. The last race has finished, and every horn was blasting.

Sailing. Even the helicopters wanted to join in the celebration.

Sailing. The officials boat.

Sailing. Nice touch from the Swatch team who run the clocks.

This truck was used to recieve all the radio links from the city based helicopters and motorbikes

Mens marathon. From a different mountain this time, you can just see the marathon course

Links trucks.

Links trucks. The big TV style antenna is for the data transmission to the helicopters.

On the rowing we had two tracking vehicles, this was one of them.

Magenta 4U, my home for a month.

Media villages were high security areas, which meant you woke up and saw barbed wire everywhere.

Hellinko Complex. We were based in this hanger.

A case of wrong place wrong time befell this crew car (not one of ours). Apparently it was caught up in the G8 rioting one evening in Athens city centre.

Sabbas. The best donner kebabs in Greece! (and thats from our Greek boat driver!)

Several buildings were covered in these massive pictures.

Do the atheletes need help in getting doped?

IBC.

MPC - Main press centre.

IBC main foyer.

IBC - This is where the incoming signals from each venue / sport were sent onto each broadcaster. Every monitor in here was a panasonic flat panel.

The Med. Our media village backed up onto it, and there was a small boat with a machine gun just out to see for our protection.

The media village was once part of an air base.