Dave and Brian's Excellent Adventures: Super Bowl Day 9

Thursday, February 01, 2007

Super Bowl Day 9

The "oh by the ways" seem to be done and it is very calm today. I am now in firefighting mode and just fixing things as they come up. And tomorrow will be the start of our broadcasts. Brian and I just found out we are coming in at 4:00a to start our day doing the "Early Show" for CBS. So we are very excited about dragging our butts out of bed at 2:45a and working 16 hour day.

We are continually asked, "what are we doing here". I know both Brian and I have discussed this in the past but here goes again.

We start each day so far leaving the hotel at 7:10a each morning. We are 18 miles away from Dolphin Stadium (use to be called Joe Robbie Stadium). We arrive at the parking lot and go thru a security gate and do the "mag and bag" which is where we walk thru an airport type sweep of ourselves and inspection of our bags. We then walk half way around the stadium as this is where media parks compared to where our compound is. Usually Brian heads out to check his feeds and I turn on all of the monitors and make sure that everything is working. Then we go for the same old stick in the throat bagels and bad coffee. We both meet up for the 8:30a tech meeting to get status reports or find out what is expected for the day. So far, we have seen meeting last 30 seconds to 30 minutes. Brian and I then seperate and attend to our particualar projects. Brian is in charge of all transmission out of the compound so if you stop seeing the Super Bowl, that is Brian's fault. I had the responsibility of building the pre-game graphics trailer. Normally I will have a 48 foot production truck to generate the graphics and lower third supers for each week's show. In this case, I had to build all of that equipment plus more in an office trailer. So, during the day, I fix little issues and answer questions while they prepare for the shows we are doing. Brian and I ususally meet for lunch and then dash back to take care of our own worlds. We usually work until 6:00p but last few nights it has been getting longer. We have enough restaurants around the hotel we go to the same places for supper. And then back to the hotel for bed.

Today, I will be sharing pictures of the field, the pre-game studio, and the compounds with the people. I am sure that we will start sharing more information tomorrow with the start of the broadcasts.