5.0. SWCSR 11-04-2010 III Sherburne Wright Cable Commission
4th Quarter 2010 Report
Movie Attendance
During 2010 we presented 15 Movies in the Parks events with an estimated attendance of
over 4000 people.
Our first movie was May 22"d in Big Lake and our last was September 25th in Monticello
were we screened the movie"Ghostbusters". The event was held in the downtown area
and merchants provided free food and drink. We even had a replica of the famous
Ghostbusters Ambulance along with actors in authentic costumes.
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IIIAnother big highlight was at Watertown's city festival, where we played host to a movie
night which featured teen musicians performing for the audience before the movie.
Our largest movie attendance was in Big Lake for the movie Monsters vs. Aliens where
we counted over 700 people! Last year, Big Lake set our commission attendance record
with 1000 people!
This year we did something new in Rockford when we setup a screen inside the Rockford
High School auditorium for a showing of"The Princess and the Frog". The outside winds
prevented us from setting up in the park, so we used the indoor theater to keep everyone
happy. This event turned out great and we would like to thank Rockford Councilperson
Rick Martinson for his help.
Indoor Screen Purchase Request
We have had several other inquiries from our member cities to see if we could
accommodate their requests for future indoor screenings. To this end we would like to
purchase an indoor screen that has both front and rear projection surfaces.
The screen needed to work with our projector and lens is a"Draper Ultimate Folding
Screen Kit" in a 16' x 9' format. The front projection surface and stand is 106 %2"x 190
1/2"and sells for$1628. The rear projection surface is $986. The complete skirt kit is
• $1575. The total for all pieces is $4189 plus shipping and tax.
III Candidate Forums
We were involved with producing 7 forums in our member cities, including the Big Lake
forum were we used the production trailer to cover the event at the High School
auditorium. We used 3 cameras, and had camera assistance from Big Lake City Clerk
Gina Wolbeck. Big Lake Commissioner Don Orrock also helped us inside the trailer.
In Buffalo we used the TriCaster to insert a candidate into the forum who wasn't there.
We taped his response to questions before hand and using the tools in the TriCaster we
inserted his responses every time the moderator called his name.
Friday Night Football!
The Sherburne Wright Cable Commission has blazed another trail with its coverage of
the Monticello Magic's homecoming game vs. the Buffalo Bison. We over came
obstacles caused by poor electrical connections at the field to produce an exciting game.
It was a total commission effort in that we had Jake Pace from Elk River operating our 50
yard line camera and Kitty Baltos from Monticello assisting Mark and I in the trailer.
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Monticello Homecoming Highlights
Working with Monticello's Athletic Director, we located our trailer right behind the
home bleachers and ran cables up into the press box where we were able to setup two of
our camera locations for a great view of all the action. The AD estimated that there were
over 3000 people in attendance. We actually had our trailer rocked by excited fans during
the game!
It was a breakthrough event for us as many people complimented the commission for its
IIIcoverage of this event.
• Glencoe vs. Dassel/Cokato playoff game
Friday night football coverage continues tomorrow night when we will be covering the
Glencoe vs. Dassel/Cokato playoff game! This should be a great game and will be a real
feather in our commission cap! The residents and councils in both Dassel and Cokato are
really excited to have us providing this coverage.
We cannot cover the game live due to league rules, but we will be replaying it on Cokato
Channel 12 immediately after the event. We would love to have any commission member
join us if they are interested.
Ultra Nexus Hard Drive upgrades
We are about half way through with our change to faster raid drive systems on our Ultra
Nexus playback equipment. In the cities where this has been completed playback is more
stable and the transfer times to PEG Central are faster. We expect to finish this in all
cities by the middle of December.
Area Wide Channel setup
We started work this quarter on designing the networking system for our area wide
channel. I would like to acknowledge Chris Shinnick, Buffalo's IT superstar. He has been
invaluable in providing access to the City of Buffalo's network which will act as an entry
point to this channel.
• Rick Todd of Leightronix has flown out twice this summer to assist us in setting up and
testing equipment at our cities and in the trailer. Our goal, which is an aggressive one, is
to have access to every city and the area wide channel by next summer's parade season so
that we may send programming live from the trailer to each channel via the internet.
2011 Equipment Upgrade Assessment
We are in the process of putting together a detailed overview of all the expected
equipment upgrades in each city for 2011 plus equipment upgrades that we would like to
request for the production trailer. This also includes our plans for an upgrade path in all
cities as the industry is transitioning to high definition equipment.
I am working with our Commission Chair Phil Kern and Treasurer Mert Auger on this
assessment.
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