It's Big and It's Colorful

March 3, 2005

• 2005 Capital One Bowl: The Game Story
• 2005 Capital One Bowl: Photos from the Game
• 2005 Capital One Bowl: Notes from the Game
• 2005 Capital One Bowl: Statistics from the game
• 2005 Capital One Bowl: Video Highlights from the Game
• 2005 Capital One Bowl: Listen to the Game
• 2005 Capital One Bowl: Watch Mediacom’s Pre-Game Special
• The Schedule: 2005 and Beyond
• Order your 2004 Iowa Football Instant Replay DVD
• 2005 FanFest: Photo Gallery

Editor’s Note: Schematics of the new scoreboard system to be installed this summer at historic Kinnick Stadium are located in the photo gallery of kinnickrenovation.com under the category “Artist Renderings and Schematics.”

It’s big – When completely assembled and installed, it will measure 132-feet wide, 47-feet tall, and 12-feet deep.

It’s colorful – A little black. A little gray. A little Hawkeye gold. And a color palette that includes 4.3 trillion shades of dazzling color that will delight those who will gaze upon it time and time again during sun-drenched Saturday afternoons.

It’s also hungry – On game days it will gobble up 189,300 watts of electrical power.

What is it? It is the new scoreboard system to be installed at the sound end of Kinnick Stadium prior to the 2005 Iowa Hawkeyes’ season opener Sept. 3 against Ball State.

The south endzone scoreboard system will be one of three structures manufactured for the University of Iowa by Daktronics, Inc., of Brookings, S.D. Arguably one of the world’s leaders in the business of sports scoring and display systems, Daktronics currently boasts installations at 22 facilities used by teams in the National Football League and literally hundreds of facilities on college campuses across the country including the University of Iowa.

The main scoreboard to be located at the south end of renovated Kinnick Stadium is the centerpiece of the system Daktronics is in the process of manufacturing for the UI. As previously noted, the structure is slightly more than 132-feet wide, a little more than 42-feet tall from its base to the top of the oval that surrounds the Tigerhawk and just less than 12-feet wide at its widest point — which is the very top of the structure.

The scoreboard will permanently display all the data required for the participants in the game itself: Iowa’s score, the score for the visiting team, the quarter, time remaining to play in the quarter, which team has possession of the ball, down, yards to go for a first down, and timeouts left for each team.

The dominant feature of the scoreboard is the display area. Daktronics will install its “ProStar VideoPlus Display” system in a space that measures approximately 68-feet wide and 22-feet tall located in the center of the structure. For comparison, the videowall that was in operation at Kinnick Stadium in Iowa’s 2004 Big Ten Conference championship season measured approximately 20-feet tall by 26-feet wide.

The ProStar VideoPlus system will provide “dynamic live video and much more,” according to Tony Mulder of Daktronics. “The system being installed in Kinnick Stadium will provide the University of Iowa the opportunity to offer fans of the Hawkeyes live video, video replays, full-color graphics and logos, up-to-the-minutes game and player statistics,” said Mulder.

When video is displayed from corner to corner of the display area, it will be in “aspect ratio” similar to that now available on wide-screen televisions. Video will fill the space at times on game day. At other times, the space may be two-thirds video, one-third game data like rushing yards, passing yards and total first downs.

“I have no doubt that are fans will be absolutely delighted with the system. Frankly, the staff responsible for game-day operation of the system has a pretty steep learning curve in terms of being ready to roll on Sept. 3, but that’s fine. Everyone involved in the renovation project is working overtime to make certain all systems are go when all systems need to be ready to go,” said Jane Meyer, the UI’s senior associate athletics director and the person in charge of the project on a day-to-day basis.

Flanking each side of the video display area is space reserved for advertising. Three different opportunities are planned, the top two being “tri-vision” or three-sided signs measuring approximately 11-feet tall by 24-feet wide.

The third opportunity located at the bottom of each set of three is an 8-foot tall by 24-feet wide space that has the same technology as the video display area. These spaces will be used to provide additional game data – player statistics, for example – in addition to scores of other college football games being played on any given game day, other similar data like schedules of events on the UI campus, and advertising messages in a video format.

Two auxiliary systems will be installed at the north end of Kinnick Stadium as part of the renovation project. In the northeast corner, Daktronics will manufacture a scoreboard that will display the same game data – score, time remaining, etc. – available on the south scoreboard that will be flanked by advertising opportunities. That structure will measure 52-feet wide by 16-feet tall.

In the northwest corner, Daktronics will install a video display unit that will measure 28-feet wide by 16-feet tall. It, too, will be flanked by advertising opportunities resulting in a structure than will be 52-feet wide. The video displayed on this display will be the same video displayed on the system at the south end of the stadium.

The installation of the new scoreboard system will be a very visible benefit of the renovation project.

“All fans in Kinnick Stadium will now have state-of-the-art video, graphics, data, and sound that are delivered at the very highest quality regardless of their seat location. When we introduced the renovation project, we talked about how it would impact all 70,000 fans in the facility. This is one of the most plain-to-see and plain-to-hear benefits of the project,” said Klatt.

Plans call for installation to begin in earnest in early May and completed in early August.

Editor’s Note: Schematics of the new scoreboard system to be installed this summer at historic Kinnick Stadium are located in the photo gallery of kinnickrenovation.com under the category “Artist Renderings and Schematics.”