Ball-cam puts new spin on lineouts

Some might say the All Blacks have been less than inspiring this season, but Peter Brook would not be among them.

The head of Otago Polytechnic's information technology and electrotechnology department was involved in a discussion of the team's performance when inspiration struck.

"We got talking about Anton Oliver throwing the ball in crooked, and we thought 'wouldn't it be good to see on the screen what the ball sees as it goes into the line-out?'," he said.

The result was ball-cam, a rugby ball with a camera inside it which transmits images to the sideline.

Work started on the ball about a month ago, and Mr Brook, third-year information technology student Mark Smith and school programme director Dr Samuel Mann have already developed a prototype.

"People want to be more than couch potatoes now. They want to experience what it's like on the field," Mr Brook said.

The prototype ball-cam holds only one camera, although two are planned for the final product.

Its image is a little grainy, but Mr Smith was confident the picture could be improved.

He did not anticipate problems with the ball's balance, because the cameras would be at each end with batteries in the centre, and he thought it could easily be made shock-resistant.

The big problem so far was weight.

Although the tiny television-quality camera weighs just 14 grams, the nine-volt battery powering it weighs 60g, which bumps the ball's total weight well over the maximum allowed.

But Mr Smith thought the ball-cam could be brought within the rules by using lightweight batteries developed for mini-disc players.

Mr Brook has no doubt the polytechnic is on to something: "We'll knock the socks off the rest of the world if we can get this out."

The ball-cam went hand-in-hand with the polytechnic's smart-top development, in which pressure sensors were inserted in protective shoulder guards to measure tackle impact.

The polytechnic hoped to test its ball-cam, smart-top and a soon-to-be-developed helmet-cam in a televised rugby game in about a year.

Spectators at the ground and at home would be able to get more information about the game with the developments, like the force of a tackle on a one-to-10 scale.

The polytechnic hoped to interest the American gridiron market in its inventions, and there was little concern about keeping the size of the equipment down.

"You could put a microwave in some of the pads they have," he said.

Mr Brook said there had been some overseas interest in ball-cam.

- NZPA