Technological innovation has always played a crucial role in the field of sports news reporting, especially in Olympic photography reporting.

　　The 2024 Paris Olympics witnessed a major breakthrough in Chinese media in this field: Xinhua News Agency used underwater robot cameras in the Olympic stadium for the first time, marking a critical step in the field of top international sports photography. As the head of the swimming project, I was lucky enough to be responsible for the underwater robot shooting mission with two colleagues, Du Yu and Wang Yuguo, and started a novel and challenging Olympic reporting journey.

Xinhua News Agency's Paris Olympic swimming photography team Wang Peng, Wang Yuguo, Xue Yuge (front row from left to right), Xia Yifang, Du Yu, and Luo Yuan (back row from left to right).
　　Underwater photography is no stranger to Xinhua News Agency. As early as the 2008 Beijing Olympics, Xinhua News Agency reporter Ding Xu achieved a breakthrough in China's professional sports underwater photography from scratch. She used the modification plan of a handheld underwater camera shell and a domestic technology company to create a complete set of fixed remote-control underwater cameras.

　　However, fixed underwater cameras have their own limitations: they cannot adjust the direction through remote control. This makes every shot become a big gamble - swimmers often extend their hands and feet out of the frame at the most stretched moments, or because the offset center of the lane affects composition, synchronized swimming will become a nightmare for fixed underwater cameras due to random arrangement trajectory.

　　In order to solve this series of problems, AFP took the lead in using exclusive customized underwater robot cameras at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. This revolutionary technology set off a wave of craze. Getty, Reuters, and the United Nations have successively come up with their respective solutions.

　　Since becoming a member of the International Olympic Photography Team (IOPP), Xinhua News Agency's Olympic Photography Report is comparable to several other foreign media outlets in many aspects, but there is no underwater robot camera, which has a shortcoming.

　　After long-term market research and communication with manufacturers, Xinhua News Agency purchased the most mature Nikon MRMC underwater robot for the 2024 Paris Olympics. It has a built-in Z9 camera, and the shell is powered and data transmission through a 50-meter-long umbilical cord cable. The shell is driven by 4 sets of stepper motors, which are responsible for rolling, pitching, rolling and zooming. The control terminal uses an iPad and Nikon software and game controller to realize real-time monitoring and operation of multiple robots in the arena.

Nikon staff and Xinhua News Agency reporters debugged underwater robots in the media center.

The divers deployed Xinhua News Agency's remote-controlled robot before the race.

Remote control, monitoring and publishing equipment in the media stands.
　　A set of excellent underwater robot photos depends not only on the shooting techniques and skills, but also requires frequent communication with the diving team.

　　The preliminaries of the morning will determine the trail of the night. I need to formulate a shooting plan for the night based on the trail, swimming posture, and the characteristics of the contestants, and direct divers to move the robot to the point where they can realize their conception.

On August 5, 2024, the Mexican team was in the collective technical selection competition for synchronized swimming at the Paris Olympics.

On August 2, 2024, French player Marchand (middle) was in the men's 200m individual medley final.

On August 3, 2024, Zhang Yufei, the third player of the Chinese team, was in the final of the men's and women's 4x100m medley relay for the swimming event in the Paris Olympics.
　　For example, if you want to photograph the moment a single player comes out of the water, you must place the robot in the center of the swimming lane, 15 meters away from the starting platform; if you want to photograph the player entering the water, touching the pool wall and rotating body, you must place the robot under the swimming lane line in front of the starting platform. Some popular points need to be made in advance, such as the fourth 15-meter point in the swimming competition and the points below the synchronized swimming departure table. Therefore, I have to come to the venue every morning to wait for the time window for divers to go into the water after the preliminaries to lock in the ideal shooting position.

Before the game, queued up with Foreign Communications to deploy remote control robots
　　August 4, 2024 is the last final day of the swimming event. I studied the preliminaries of the Chinese team in advance and believed that the Chinese men's team would be on par with the American team in the evening, so I asked the divers to move the camera to the starting point between lanes 4 and 5. For this reason, I also watched the scene for two hours to prevent the foreign media from moving the underwater camera to my lens. I didn't return to the workshop to prepare for evening shooting until the last diver came ashore.

　　The final result in the evening was exactly the same as I expected. The Chinese team won the gold medal with a slight advantage, and the position of my robot could clearly capture the scene of each player sprinting, as well as the scene where the Chinese team's last player Pan Zhanle took the lead in touching the pool wall and reaching the finish line.

On August 4, 2024, Pan Zhanle (left), the fourth player of the Chinese team, took the lead in touching the pool wall to win in the men's 4x100m medley relay final of the Paris Olympic swimming event. The Chinese team won the gold medal with a time of 3 minutes, 27 seconds, 46.
　　Underwater robot photography is an independent category, even independent of the entire sports photography. The emergence of underwater robot photography has not only changed the way the Olympics are reported, but is also reshaping the entire sports photography industry.

　　This technology puts forward all-round requirements for photographers: not only requires in-depth understanding of the event, but also basic mechanical and network knowledge is needed for disassembly, assembly, deployment and debugging equipment, a strong body is needed to carry robot bodies weighing up to 35 kilograms, fluent foreign language communication with divers, photography managers, and technical consultants, and skilled post-production skills and powerful computers to complete picture processing. Finally, there are a lot of labor and time costs that are essential.

　　With the advancement of technology, sports photography is constantly switching to new tracks. The remote-controlled photography images that used to be supplemented now can now stand on their own. The facts prove that unique angles can have a shocking effect like wonderful stories. (Reporter Xia Yifang)

[Editor in charge: Chen Tingyu]