IndyCar on FOX to launch Iron Man Cam at St. Petersburg

FOX Sports is bringing more features to its IndyCar broadcasts this season, starting with something it loosely refers to as the "Iron Man Cam" which applies live graphics to its Driver’s Eye helmet camera feed.

Modeled after the in-helmet graphics shown with Marvel Comics’ Iron Man character, FOX Sports will feed fans IndyCar fans live data and other information of interest while using its Driver’s Eye technology. The goal is to unveil it this weekend at St. Petersburg, but if there any glitches, it will be rolled out at one of the many races afterwards in March.

“We're actually going to use the heads-up display, and this is one of the things that I'm really excited for, with a model that actually works in the Driver's Eye,” FOX Sports EVP Operations Michael Davies told RACER. “We’ve got to find another name for it, but we're calling it the ‘Iron Man’ for now because it kind of looks like Iron Man. I'm hoping we can kick it out at St. Pete, but if it doesn't come out in St. Pete, we'll do it in race two or three. You're just going to see a lot more of those kinds of graphics.”

Davies is applying a gamer’s mindset to IndyCar on FOX’s visuals.

“The more you can make motorsports coverage look like a video game, the better,” he said. “So now here come the drones, here come the different cameras, the heads-up; even some of the NASCAR camera positions we ended up with…that was inspired by me playing Forza with my son. So we're thinking more in that direction.”

A greater emphasis will also be placed on sound quality during the IndyCar broadcasts.

“The other thing is, you look at 'F1, The Movie' and that's another inspiration from both video and audio,” Davies continued. “It's a great yardstick to say, ‘Man, I want the cars to sound like this.’ And middle of the last season, we made an astonishing discovery in IndyCar, where both of the microphones on the in-cars were just back by the engines, right?

“So you heard the engine pretty well, but all we did was take one of those mics, put it up front, and now you're hearing the rumble strips. Now, when a car comes apart or they smash, now you can hear it. So, now we're thinking, ‘Man, what if you had four mics? So that's something we're working towards, more audio.”