Live streaming the Podještědské Driftobraní drift race

Podještědské Driftobraní is the closing race of the DRIFT Corporation main season. It runs across the levels of the P1 car park in Liberec, a city in northern Czechia - concrete, load-bearing pillars, graffiti, and tyre smoke with nowhere to go. We streamed the final day, the TOP 32 knockout bracket.

What makes it hard. The track winds between pillars and the cars run in pairs, so there is nowhere on the ground to put a camera operator - and wherever there’s room, a spectator is already standing in it. A run lasts a few seconds and happens all at once. On top of that there’s concrete overhead and all around: there’s no signal on the levels, so a connection out isn’t something you take for granted, it’s item one on the list.

What we build for it. Cameras hung straight from the ceiling beams, where they can see into the corner and get in nobody’s way. PTZ cameras outside in the pits, where the racing starts and finishes. And an FPV drone that gets where no camera operator could and stays with the car for the whole run - flown by Jan Fydrych. The picture carries graphics with the drivers’ names and their cars, so you can tell who is up against whom.

How it went. The stream went out live on YouTube and, at the same time, onto a big LED wall at the venue, so even the people in the pits could watch the runs on the level below them. TV Nova, one of Czechia’s main TV channels, then used footage straight from the stream in its report on the race.

With the same organiser we also streamed a drift event around the Nisa shopping centre in Liberec in June. The calendar of upcoming races is at driftcorporation.cz.