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Post by Eduardo Lorente on Feb 11, 2015 3:18:31 GMT
Hello gents, I've made some inquiries with Racespot.tv into the possibility of having them broadcast our second season (2015 S-2). If you're not familiar with Racespot, they currently host several well established series including the NEO Endurance championship and Targa Endurance series to name a few. For your reference, I've included an example of one of their broadcasts for the NEO GT Series below so you can have a sense of what their finished work looks like: After reviewing their fee structure, I estimate that based on a 5 race season from March through May (e.g. 13 weeks) we could have our races produced and broadcast for a total of $120. Given our attendance for the first three races (17-21 drivers), if we sought to raise the funds through donations, we would be looking at roughly $6-7 per driver. For the $120 fee, we would receive the following: - 5 Minute pre-race to review the grid
- 10 Minute post-race for analysis and driver interviews
- 5 Races totaling 450 minutes of video (specific race length and format TBD)
- High Qualify, informative broadcast overlays
- Hosting on their site, plus YouTube HD stream, and embed code
- Facebook/Twitter sharing (exposure and advertising for us!)
If necessary, we could purchase an additional 60 minutes of video for $10, but based on my emails with the broadcaster, my estimate above is a sufficient to start with. So the survey question is: Given that we're not suggesting a race fee, but instead a voluntary donation, how many of you would be interested in donating towards this cause? (Please feel free to post any comments or thoughts below.)(The survey will be open until Feb 13, Friday 12am EST.) |
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Post by Matt Gelder on Feb 11, 2015 5:57:08 GMT
Would be cool if they would do the GV8 races as well
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Post by Eduardo Lorente on Feb 12, 2015 1:29:59 GMT
Matt - I agree - it would be great if we could work out a "volume discount" or some deal to get both championships broadcast.
Paul, Glenn, Tony and I tossed around a few ideas including stuff like t-shirts and mugs. But in the end, it felt like we were asking guys to contribute towards prizes that would benefit a few members.
So Plan B, was to pitch the idea of a broadcast. As we see it, everyone gets some benefit out of this - not just by being in a video - but also since we could use it to promote our league/championship and potentially attract more drivers. And simply put, more drivers in the league = more fun.
I've also gotten a few other suggestion re broadcasting partners (such as Checkered Flag Interactive). I'll take a look at the pricing and quality of the broadcasts in case there are better options out there.
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Post by Eduardo Lorente on Feb 13, 2015 0:50:58 GMT
Hi guys thanks to the 10 of you that have voted so far, but I now we have many more than 10 views. If you haven't voted yet, please take moment and let me know your thoughts on this.
For now, I'm interpreting this like a "sample" of our population ... in other words ... 8 out of 10 drivers (80%) support the idea of setting up a Paypal donation site to accept funds in support of our league broadcasting it's races.
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Post by Greg on Feb 13, 2015 1:04:40 GMT
I will contribute to a broadcast. I know that hosting races costs money, and this will cost money as well. I haven't financially helped this league yet but as much time as I spend here I better start  |
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Post by Eduardo Lorente on Feb 14, 2015 14:00:57 GMT
Thanks to everyone who provided us with your opinion on this. I think we got enough of a positive vote to continue to explore this. I also want to follow up on one of my earlier posts about searching for alternate broadcasters. I received a quote from www.checkeredflaginteractive.net/ of $30 per race (with up to 2 hours of video per race). Their fee structure is different compared to Racespot.tv, but based on the quote I received earlier from Racespot (calculated by hours of video), their price is $24 per race -- that's about $30 better over 5 races. Maybe if we had longer races, the balance might tip in favor of CFI, but for now it still looks like Racespot is the better option. I've also requested a quote from globalsimracingchannel.com/ and will update the post here when I have some more information from them. |
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Post by Eduardo Lorente on Feb 24, 2015 2:27:02 GMT
Just a quick update...
After a small delay, I heard back from GSRC (global sim racing channel) about the quote I requested. They charge about $67 per race, which would put our total $337 to do five, 1.5 hour races. That's the most expensive estimate we've recieved so far.
So I feel pretty good that we got 3 estimates, and Racespot.tv comes in the lowest. I'm going to pursue this further and get the Paypal donation site setup so we can start working on this for next season. Stay tuned for more information soon ...
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Post by mikeerter on Mar 13, 2015 1:06:57 GMT
Count me in.
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Post by Eduardo Lorente on Mar 13, 2015 13:52:54 GMT
Hi Mike - your post is very timely ... After finalizing the calendar and the car selection I wrote back to Racespot.tv last week and requested a price quote from them. I had asked for this before but they just referred me to the fee schedule online. Long story short ... the price quote they gave me this week was more than twice ($325) than what I had calculated using their price sheet ($120). I asked about the difference, and it was an honest misunderstanding, they would like our business and suggested they could offer us a discount but they couldn't go down the full price to $120. IMO, even if I could get them to knock off $100 from their quote, I think $225 is still too expensive - especially since it's our first time doing this. So I'm going to check back with the vendor that came in with the next lowest price of $150: Checkered Flag Interactive and see if they're still available. If they're are - I'll see if Racespot.tv is interested in matching their price. If Racespot.tv can't do it, then we'll just go with Checkered Flag - does that sound like plan? PS - here's a sample of Checkered Flag's Work:
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Post by rhinonelson on Mar 13, 2015 22:27:58 GMT
It sounds like a plan - well it looks like a plan since it is in print but that would be quibbling....lol
Ed, thanks for working on this
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Post by mikeerter on Mar 17, 2015 0:11:43 GMT
The guys at Checkered Flag seem to be pretty good. They took an hour and a half long race and stayed with it even though from a fan's perspective, the racing action was pretty uneventful, and bordering on boring. The two guys seem to work well together, and kept up with the race very well. I know when watching a race, it can be very confusing to sort out all the strategies and hard just to put all the drivers positions in perspective. They did a pretty good job in my opinion. The only bad part was the first 2 min of their logo playing over and over like a DVD player waiting for someone to hit the PLAY button. If this is a good representation of the overall quality of all their broadcasts, I think they would work out very well.
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Post by Tim Rieberger(aka lonewolf) on Mar 17, 2015 0:27:44 GMT
CFI seems to look pretty good, I'd be more than happy to contribute for broadcasts. I echo Mike's sentiment on the first 2 minutes but overall the broadcast team does a good job.
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Post by Eduardo Lorente on Mar 20, 2015 18:47:46 GMT
Bad news gents ...
I contacted CFI and heard back from this week that they had fully booked their Saturdays since we last emailed (I'm not surprised based on their great price).
I then tried to reach a compromise with Racespot to see if they would be willing to match CFI's price, but I received a kind response that they're fully booked too (I suspect they were gently telling me "no").
I've got one last request for proposal out, and I'll let you know how it goes. Not to be pessimistic, but it appears that this season we won't be able to find a partner to host our Saturday night races. I'll re-post if something changes...
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Post by Matt Gelder on Mar 31, 2015 21:25:07 GMT
Someone thought of GripTV in one of the other threads
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