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FoxTrax (colloquially also called the glow puck, smart puck, laser puck, Fox Puck, or super puck) was a specialized ice hockey puck with internal electronics that allowed its position to be tracked designed for National Hockey League telecasts on the Fox television network. Primarily, it was used to visually highlight the puck on-screen and display a trail when the puck was moving rapidly. In 1994, Fox won a contract to broadcast NHL games in the United States. A common complaint among viewers was that the puck was difficult to follow on the ice. Thus, FoxTrax was created to remedy this problem. The FoxTrax puck was first used during the 1996 NHL All-Star Game. It was last used during the first game of the 1998 Stanley Cup Finals. Fox was scheduled to televise Games 5 and 7, but the series ended in four games. In August 1998, the NHL broadcast rights went to ABC, and FoxTrax was not brought back for the final season. Fox has since used "FoxTrax" as a branding for other on-screen tracking graphics in other sports properties, such as a virtual strike zone during baseball games, and statistics displays during NASCAR events. They are related to the puck in name only. == Construction and operation == To create the FoxTrax puck, a standard NHL puck was cut in half, and a tiny circuit board with a battery was placed inside. The circuit board contained a shock sensor and infrared emitters that were located on the flat surfaces and perimeter of the puck. The enhanced puck was engineered to have the same weight, balance, and rebound as the original puck. The two halves were then bonded with a proprietary epoxy compound and the puck could be used for gameplay. The FoxTrax was developed with assistance from News Corp's Etak navigation subsidiary. While the batteries were designed to last for 30 minutes, and some were successfully used in tests for more than 60 minutes, a typical puck lasted only about 10 minutes on the ice. For that reason 30 FoxTrax pucks were provided for each game. The puck was activated when it was dropped by the ref or struck by a hockey stick. During a Fox NHL broadcast, the puck emitted infrared pulses that were detected by both the 20 pulse detectors and the 10 modified IR cameras that were located in the rafters. The shuttering of the IR cameras was synchronized to the pulses. Each infrared camera had an associated 66 MHz Intel 80486 computer to process the video locally and transmit the coordinates of candidate targets to the "Puck Truck" (a 55' production trailer). The truck contained computers that superimposed computer graphics on the puck coordinates, which could be seen by viewers at home. The visual result was a bluish glow around the puck. Unfortunately, blue does not show up very well against the white of the rink. Passes were indicated with the bluish glow plus a comet tail indicating its path. When the puck moved faster than 70 miles per hour, a red comet tail was added. Despite rumors that Fox employees would sometimes go into the stands to retrieve a puck that left the playing area, the pucks were not re-usable. Like any other puck that left the ice, the FoxTrax pucks became souvenirs. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「FoxTrax」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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