FLOWERY BRANCH – The Falcons are not going to have drones flying over practices to virtually enhance their film this season, head coach Dan Quinn said on Tuesday.
The team was interested in the new technology that is only being used in the NFL by the Dallas Cowboys. Several college teams, including Clemson, SMU, Vanderbilt and Auburn, use the technology.
Credit: D. Orlando Ledbetter
Credit: D. Orlando Ledbetter
The Falcons had talks with StriVR Labs, a virtual reality company, about their software that allows players a 3-dimensional look at live action from practice.
“Any time there is a chance to do things better, we’ll always look into it,” Quinn said. “As far as using the drone . . . . it’s not something that we’ll look into at this time. I do love the fact that there’s always a way to push and to find and use different energy, whether if it’s drone.”
Under Falcons general manager Thomas Domitroff, the franchise has looked to technology to help improve player performance.
Back in 2011, the Falcons and Polar USA entered into an agreement to use heart rate monitors to establish work load and peak efficiency times.
In 2013, the Falcons entered into an agreement with Catapult, an Australian company, to provide them with GPS athlete tracking technology.
At that time, the devices were used by seven other NFL teams to monitor athlete movement and they let the team know how hard each player is working.
In 2014, the Falcons entered into a deal with Sparta Sports Science to develop an athletic performance program based on “force plate” technology.
The Falcons put nearly 100 players, including No. 1 overall pick Jadeveon Clowney, through "force plate" workouts during the 2014 pre-draft process.
“There’s been a big push on the human performance side of things with GPS tracking and speed,” Quinn said. “Every time that there are new things that come up it’s always worth looking into, but for us in terms of the drones this year, we won’t do that.”
Quinn plans to continue to monitor the development of the technology.
“There is some big talk with some virtually reality out there on how do you positon the camera in order to get it to be used in such a way,” Quinn said. “Hopefully, I think there will be a time when we can get to that. I don’t know where we are with that. That is the next wave of stuff that could be coming. It would be a really unique thing for a backup quarterback or a safety to get reps to just watch the guy in front of them and hope they don’t get sea sick with the camera moving all of the time.”
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