Incredible opening ceremonies

[Mitchell Andrus]

Very nicely done, on a 52" HD set anyway.

Bob said they had 15,000 people involved in that !?! Well, when you've got 1.3 BILLION to choose from.

I'm just hoping the guys with the drums don't ever become the guys with the guns - we'd hold out for about 3 days. That's a scary thought.

[Jim Becker]

Looked great in HiDef on my 52" screen, too! And yes, the 15K folks involved is amazing, but more incredible was the wonderful work they each did to make the most impressive opening ceremonies every be what it was. China has a lot to be proud of relative to the wonderful presentation they kicked things off with.

[Pat Germain]

I also liked the opening ceremony. Although, I pooped out and went to bed before they lit the torch. How did they do it? It would be hard to beat Spain's flaming arrow.

I liked that China made things more traditional rather than trying to be ultra-modern and edgey. They used technology to present history and culture, which I thinked worked well.

I still can't forget that stupid "flying saucer" in the LA ceremony years ago.

[Mitchell Andrus]

I also liked the opening ceremony. Although, I pooped out and went to bed before they lit the torch. How did they do it?

They picked up a fellow from the middle of the stadium on wires and he ran around the huge screen at the top of the stadium with the familiar scroll graphic unrolling before him as he went. Stunning. He lit the torch which appeared from a hidden place in the rafters.

Youtube (German, but - eh...)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMzFE1EtaBs

[Lee DeRaud]

Was I the only one who thought it looked like they had outsourced the whole thing to the Cirque de Soleil people?

[Anthony Scira]

With all the commercials I could not tell if it was good or not.

There should have been a way to watch it commercial free.

[Peter Quadarella]

I also wasn't too happy with NBC's coverage. We kept missing big chunks due to all the commercials, and the camera work wasn't great either - they kept zooming in and out back and forth. I just wanted them to leave it in one spot for a few minutes.

[Mitchell Andrus]

Was I the only one who thought it looked like they had outsourced the whole thing to the Cirque de Soleil people?

Wow, I hadn't thought of that til now.

I wonder what we'd have seen if Speilberg had stayed with it.
.

[Pat Germain]

I also wasn't too happy with NBC's coverage. We kept missing big chunks due to all the commercials, and the camera work wasn't great either - they kept zooming in and out back and forth. I just wanted them to leave it in one spot for a few minutes.

Since the ceremony was "tape delay", I don't think we missed much. They did just quickly mentioned the smaller teams who walked by during commercials, which is too bad.

I thought it was funny the government of Cayman Islands emailed NBC specifically asking them not to cut to commercials when their team walked by. I'm guessing that's been a problem in the past when they were right behind Canada. Not the case this time with the strange order of events based on the "number of strokes in the Chinese character".

[Marjorie Saws]

I thought it was nice.

[Jason Whelehon]

The fireworks, unfortunately, were NOT real but CGI.

http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/bei...?urn=oly,99745

[John Schreiber]

The fireworks, unfortunately, were NOT real but CGI.

http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/bei...?urn=oly,99745

As I read it, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/oth...nts-faked.html, the footprints segment was partly CGI, because it couldn't have been filmed safely from a helicopter with fireworks going off around it, but the rest was real.

[Glenn Clabo]

The fireworks, unfortunately, were NOT real but CGI.

Why "unfortunately"?

It's like people saying...that picture was digital...like it's less of a picture.