I got to the field early for the Sunday Night Football game on December 20th, 2008 and had a moment to quickly snap some pregame photos. I finally stitched them together and here's the composite panoramic photo. Very symmetrical.


This image was created from 14 separate photos (7x2) taken with my little point-and-shoot Kodak EasyShare C613 and composited automatically using Microsoft ICE. Nothing high-tech, or time-consuming. It took less than a minute to quickly snap the shots and less than a minute (weeks later) to simply drag and drop the images into an application. Viola. Can't get any easier.

I've created many stitched panoramic photos before using ICE but this is the first time I've made one from multiple rows or had the angle go past 180-degrees before (this one covers 188-degrees). I still like a different Panthers pre-game panoramic I took in 2008 more, but click here to see all my panoramics on Flickr.

I also snapped this photo of Brett Favre being interviewed before the Panthers put a 26-7 whoopin' on the Vikes.


Last game of the season is tomorrow.

Labels: football, photos

Last night ----------------- (redacted story) -----------------

Another interesting thing from last night was the new NFL logo. It was actually unveiled during the April draft but I missed the announcement and didn't know about it until last night when we had to apply new logos on the IR equipment. The changes are subtle but nice. The number of stars decreased from 25 down to 8. The eight stars represent each of the eight NFL divisions, but it also looks a lot better on small items. The typeface was modernized (check out that psychedelic "L" on the old logo). The blue was darkened and the football is now more consistent with the design of the Lombardi trophy. Subtle changes but all good ones.

The game itself was a total blowout. The Panthers scored an unreal 31 points in just the 2nd quarter alone. I swear it was like playing Madden on my X-Box.

Labels: football, work

I try to avoid making posts about the Panthers, but I must mention this sad fact:

The last time the Carolina Panthers won a game at Bank of America Stadium was on November 19th, 2006. Since their next home game won't be until after Thanksgiving, they will have gone over an entire year since their last win at home.

P.S. I was on the sidelines on Sunday (as always) when somebody starting pulling my winter cap down over my eyes from behind me. I turned around to be surprised that it was Sir Purr.

Labels: football

The NFL season kicked off last night and the Panthers' first home game is this Sunday. After a few years working as the backup, this will be my first full season on the sidelines as an NFL Instant Replay Official. (No, I'm not a referee.) It's great to be on the field for every Panthers home game (except when it's cold or raining) but the hardest part of my job is remaining neutral and not cheering for the Panthers.

The start of the NFL season also marks the beginning of Fantasy Football season. Every year I join at least two reoccurring leagues. One is a league of alumni from my old college television station, PSTV. But the big money is in a highly-competitive league amongst my old fraternity brothers. Good smack talk in there. This is the fifth year for our league but our first as a keeper league, so of course now that this is a keeper league, I ended up with the 14th pick in the draft (out of 14). After going to the championship game each of the previous three years I suffered an abysmal 2-11-0 self-destruction last season. Can only go up from there.

P.S. By the way, there's also that other football stuff on Saturdays too. ;-)

Labels: fantasy_football, football

"NFL Official" sounds impressive, but I wasn't a referee making any game decisions. But I did get the opportunity to work as an NFL Instant Replay Field Attendant for two preseason games at Bank Of America Stadium. Unfortunately there were no challenges on my side of the field during those two games.

I'm now the backup to the regular crew so during the regular season I'll be on-call just incase I'm needed to fill in. Hopefully I'll be able to work myself up to the regular crew soon.

Labels: football