Found this yesterday. Seriously considering a retro fit. This is much more affordable, although much less automated, than the RFID table from Australia. I already have some of the materials needed.
Well, I decided to do this as a COVID project. I ordered the cameras and some of the wiring needs from AliExpress. Basically got them half-price than from Amazon, just had to wait for the slow-boat-from-China to get here. No biggie since I don't have a timeframe yet on being able to resume my tournaments.
The construction of the table is complete. Here are some pics.
Original table:
Laying out camera placement:
Initial wiring:
Initial video test:
Raising the rail - due to the design of the original table, this proved to be one of the most difficult parts. Cutting out these blocks was a PITA. I needed about 25 of them and using a jigsaw on something that was basically 2"x3" was a non-starter. I asked a couple locals if anyone had a band saw but no luck. My step bro and Quads both suggested using the table saw, but it took a while to sink in what they both meant by it (using it dado style rather than as a rip cut). After that, it was pretty simple. So a shout out to Quads for getting my brain to engage.
Added weather stripping to fill in the gaps due to minor variances in the block size and the rail (yes, the blocks are numbered to ensure they stayed where they were fit to):
This is where I deviated from the original plans. I have a wifey that dabbles in scrapbooking and has an entire bedroom filled with that crap. So I decided to make use of it and add graphics to my raised railing.
Now I need to finish wiring up the DVR and determine how I want to mount/store that. I also have a couple of overhead cameras I will mount to my drop ceiling to pick up the action on the table/board cards/etc.
It ended up running me more than estimated. $50 of the overrun was due to the supplies for the graphics and another $50+ for the plastic and additional hardware after my first thought didn't pan out. Total came to $500 all-in.
Once I am able to resume my regular (or semi-regular) tournaments, I plan to record the final table (remember - my regular tourneys average 45 players each - so I have no intention on turning on the cams until the final table, just don't need that much video to go through) then produce a video of the best hands. We'll see how time consuming that is and that will determine how long the video actually is. Then post on youtube or burn to DVD for the players to view.
Otherwise, the cool factor is the primary driver, once I was able to determine it could be done for reasonable cost.
DVR in place, storage shelf for manuals, cables, power supply, etc.
Hole specifically placed to show the lights from the DVR when the power is on, and to use to slide open the door. There are holes on the side of the box where the fan and vents are for the DVR as well.
I had to use a dome cam for the overhead, the little cameras I used for the hole card cams didn't have enough resolution to be able to pick up the card values clearly enough on the video. This one is really clear.
I used the other 3 small cams I had and placed them on the ceiling around the table to get views of the players to use. So all the cameras are in place and wired up (a total of 14 cameras). Now to have a game on it...
Finally hosted an event with the new table. See the link below for the results!
A few things learned:
I'm guessing I spent about 40 hours producing a 27 minute video.
Several hours of that were spent troubleshooting one-time issues such as driver updates and the like
I'm no commentator, Lon and Norman have nothing to worry about
You'll notice date/time stamps in the video. This proved to be a life saver! Without them, it would have been nearly impossible to sync up all the videos (14 cameras) to get the right info at the right times. At least not without expensive hardware and software capable of running and editing 14 feeds all at the same time.
I expect the process to get a little faster with more experience. The learning curve for the video editing software, while not outrageous, was still significant. And there is far more I can still learn about it.
Overall, it wasn't difficult, just a little time consuming. Hopefully the players enjoy it.
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