We are the only center ice archive on the web, and we strive for accuracy. Let's take a look at some improvements we have been working on the last month or two.
If you search for official diagrams of an NHL rink on the web, you will notice a variety of of shapes for the rink. Obviously the current NHL rinks are all one exact shape and size, so it was important for us to nail down the correct shape and correct markings. Also we have have noticed that colors of lines and markings can vary depending on lighting and even whether or not the teams are using paint or in-lay logos. So we have been studying many photos of freshly painted rinks and aerial images from outdoor games to make our rink graphics as accurate as possible. Below you can see the changes we have made.
The biggest change is to the shape of the rink. The corners of the rink are more rounded off. Our old graphic actually matched up more with a few older rinks that had sharper corners, so those will remain the same. (Meadowlands, St. Louis Arena, etc.)
Next, we changed the crease color to a darker shade of blue, and reworked the crease layout for some of the pre-2000's crease designs. While we are on the topic of colors, we have also used a lighter shade of blue and red for the standard markings on the ice.
One change that is not reflected in the comparison above (because most ices on our site were already updated over the last year) was enlarging the ref circle. Our original full rink graphics had much smaller and inaccurate ref circles. We are also trying to make sure they are in the correct location on older rinks where the ref circles were often off-center or on the opposite side of the rink.
Another change that you cannot see because it a back-end site improvement is that full rinks will now load faster on the website. Previously, clicking on a thumbnail would take you to a page where the full rink graphic would load in it's full size of over 4000 pixels wide. Now it will load in a smaller size and you can click to enlarge full size if you wish to download.
We have finished all of the NHL ices. We have moved on to AHL in which we have completed all of the current teams and are now working on former teams. We will start upgrading other leagues soon as well.
Stay tuned for more updates and feel free to check out our progress at the center ice archive!