Gizmodo Australia » tennis

Wiimote Tennis Serve Trainer Won’t Make You Into Roger Federer

John Herrman — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 11:20:11 +0000

The line between Wii games and the real-life activities they emulate is increasingly squiggly and faint, no thanks to people like this guy, who’s jury-rigged a tennis serve trainer out of his Wiimote.

Its uses are limited—it exists solely to help train its user to throw a perfect serve height (A high, confident toss made 30-60cm. inside the baseline allows the server to uncoil both upward and forward into the court, making contact at 1.5 times body height)—and it might not be terribly practical, but you have to admire the ingenuity. Preemptive sic:

I poped (ed note: this is my favourite new verb) open my wiimote soldered in a few wires to the minus key and then taped the wiimote to left arm (I am right handed). Then I taped the other end of the wires to my thumb and wrapped a tennis ball in aluminium. So now when I had the ball in my hand it completed the circuit and pressed the button which registers the data in the software. I then toss the ball and when it leaves my hand it unpresses the button stopping the registry of the data from the accelerometer.

From here, our intrepid inventor is able to feed his data into a laptop to calculate his throw height and adjust accordingly. Clever. [Eyes on Tech—Thanks, Mans!]

Channel 7’s HD Channel Playing The Australian Open In SD

Nick Broughall — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 04:16:55 +0000

Maybe it’s just me, but if I were a TV network executive with a whole HD channel at my disposal, I’d make sure to fill it with HD content. After all, that ‘HD’ in the channel’s name does mean ‘High Definition’, not standard definition.

What I would not do is broadcast the exact same SD content on the HD channel, even if it was the Australian Open. But that’s exactly what Channel 7 are doing, starting today. Why? Because they hate you.Well, that and the fact that they don’t actually make any money off their HD channel with advertising, nor does it improve their ratings.

Considering how hard the FTA channels are pushing the upcoming FreeView service and its 15 channels (including the three HD channels), this is just another reason I’ll be sticking with Foxtel.

[TV Tonight]

Tennis Racquet With Built-In Hand Dryer For Control Superfreaks

Sean Fallon — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 18:00:00 +0000

If you suffer from a debilitating case of hand sweat while playing tennis, the folks at Control Freek are offering up a solution with their new air circulating tennis racquets. Using the latest is wiffle technology, Control Freek has cut some high tech holes in their handle and added scoops to trap and circulate air to your palms while you play.

Sweat-free hands equal a sure grip, a sure grip equals better tennis, and better tennis equals a US$275 racquet. Sure there are products out there that cost less–but look at the dude pictured above. Only those who are extreme enough to wear a suit and boxing gloves while playing tennis are worthy of a Control Freek racquet. [Control Freek via Inventor Spot via The Design Blog]

Lacoste Asks: How Will We Play Tennis In 2083?

Sean Fallon — Thu, 22 May 2008 01:10:00 +0000

How will we play tennis in 2083? From the looks of things, Lacoste believes we will be in a virtual room with collapsible rackets and cool looking robotic suits. Although, I have to admit that the video after the break portrays it as more like a futuristic version of racquetball to me—but either way, it is a sport I could definitely get into.

[Lacoste via Techpin via Gearfuse]

Tennis Ball Howitzer Vs. Things You Find at a Grocery Store

Wilson Rothman — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 01:40:00 +0000

Leave it to the geniuses at the NIT Physics Lab in Japan to build a cannon that fires ~~ping-pong~~ tennis balls at ~~near-sonic~~ 700 Km/h, annihilating cabbages, Coke bottles and what look like sundry colourfully packaged snack-food items. There’s no dramatic tension here, just the satisfaction of seeing the strong overpower the weak. Want more? Update: Some of you pointed out inconsistencies that, upon review, turned out were the result of me reading one thing and watching another, combining the two into one big idea. My apologies.

I don’t read Japanese, but this cabbage-penetration vid literally got me aroused, especially when they switch to slow-mo:

This final one has most of the quick shots from the first vid, only with more build-up and speed indicators:

[YouTube via Make—bonus crazy slow-mo ping-pong devastation pics there!]

Prince’s Wii Sports Tennis Controller

Jason Chen — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 18:30:33 +0000

Unlike the lousy plastic Wii tennis add-ons we’ve seen before, this Prince Wii Tennis add-on smells of authenticity. This is partly because Prince is a well known name in the Tennis industry, but it’s also partly because they used actual strings to construct the face of the racket. We’re not saying this is great or that it’s worth $14.99, but if you’re going to buy a Tennis racket for your living room reenactments of Prince of Tennis, you might as well buy it from Prince. [Kotaku]

Serena Williams and HP Ads

Brian Lam — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 23:30:16 +0000

More US Open / gadget combo posts. Here’s a new HP ad by Serena Williams. Fact: I recently discovered that these commercials were made on HP workstations at the Goodby Silverstein agency in SF, not Macs as I’d assumed all ad agencies do. This comes by way of an HP exec, but only the people at Goodby know for sure. Great ad, either way, especially when Serena tosses the competition away like a little gnat.

Lonely Tenniscentric Transformer Wishes the US Open was Two Months Ago

Adam Frucci — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 19:45:00 +0000

With the US Open in full swing here in NYC, tennis fever is sweeping the globe. Combining tennis fever and the quickly-waning Transformers fever, Sony Ericsson came up with this badass commercial featuring a transforming ball launcher. It’s too bad they’re advertising a phone rather than the robot, as the robot really puts the phone to shame. Hell, it gets more on-screen time in this ad than Ratchet does in the entire movie. [Prime's Diary]

Tennis Balls Make Ballsy Benches

Seamus Byrne — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 15:00:00 +0000

Dutch designer Tejo Remy must have decided to give up tennis and sit around all day instead, so he took all the tennis balls he could find and turned them into these benches, selling the idea to the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam. It’s a prime example of what relaxed dope laws will do for the enlightenment of a culture. Come to think of it, tennis balls are fuzzy and cushy, so if you mount them to a steel frame like Tejo did here, these might just turn out to be comfy seats. Don’t try this with baseballs. [inhabitat]