Game Day
Setting up
- Mount the camera phone sideways, with the whole court in view. Use the zoom slider on the camera screen. 0.5× (ultra-wide) fits a court from close up.
- Open SideoutCam, then open SideoutTally and connect (it reconnects on its own if you’ve paired before).
Starting a game
On either phone, tap Start Game:
- Filming for: which of your teams this game is for.
- Opponent: a saved team, or Type a name….
- Match:
- Format: Best of 3, Best of 5, or Pool Play (two sets to 25, both always played; a 1–1 split is a result).
- Play all sets: high school rules. Every set is played even after a team has won the match.
- Resume recording after a timeout: 30 or 60 seconds (see Recording, Pausing and Timeouts).
- Tournament (optional): files this game under the tournament’s folder on Google Drive. It stays set for the next games until you end it.
- Video: quality (720p, 1080p or 4K, at 30 or 60 fps), bitrate, and stabilization. On the camera phone you can also choose Also save to Photos.
Tap Start Game. The camera screen opens on the camera phone, and SideoutTally switches to scoring.
Keeping score (SideoutTally)
- Tap a team’s score for +1.
- Press and hold a score to fix it with − and +.
- End Set locks in the set score; it stays on the scoreboard as a previous-set column. Right after a set ends, the button becomes Undo End Set until the next point, in case you ended it by mistake.
- The scoreboard in the video updates instantly.
- ⋯ (More) has Change Format (e.g. pool play turned into best of 3; scores are kept), End Game, and Disconnect.
- On a small iPhone (such as an iPhone 8 or SE), extra rows like a heat or battery warning, the live link or a timeout countdown can make the screen taller than the phone. Swipe up to reach the buttons below them; the top row (connection, camera view and ⋯) stays in place.
You can also score on the camera phone: the side panel has − / + for each team and End Set.
Lineup and substitutions
If your team has a roster (My Teams ▸ the team ▸ Roster), the On court row under End Set (SideoutTally) or in the camera’s score panel shows who’s playing. Tap it:
- Before a set: tap six starters and up to two liberos, then Save. Save stays grey until six starters are picked (liberos don’t count toward the six); a roster of fewer than six needs everyone. Players listed as Libero on the roster come first in the libero list.
- Each new set: after End Set, the row turns orange (“Set 2 lineup · tap to set”). Tap it: the previous set’s lineup is already filled in. Tap Save to keep it, or tap players to change it first. If you start scoring without setting it, the previous set’s lineup carries over automatically (the row says “from Set 1”), and you can still change it.
- During a set: tap a player on court, then the player coming in. The substitution is recorded with the score (e.g. “#14 Kim in for #7 Parker · 12–9”). Undo Last Sub takes back a mis-tap.
- Liberos: the liberos you pick are part of the whole set. They go in and out freely, so you don’t record libero swaps: the Lineup screen shows the six on court, then the set’s liberos under Liberos this set, and liberos are never offered as substitutes. The libero is whoever you pick for that set, whatever their roster position: a player listed as Libero who isn’t picked for the set is treated like any other player.
- Substitution count: the Lineup screen shows “Substitutions: N”, and the On court row reads like “On court: 7 12 3 9 4 15 · L 2 5 · Subs 1”: the six on court, the liberos after “L”, and the number of substitutions.
- Change Starting Lineup corrects the starters (this clears the set’s substitutions).
- Forgot? If you tap Record before setting the set’s lineup, recording starts right away and the Lineup screen opens on that phone, already filled in from the previous set. Tap Save, or Done to skip.
The lineup is saved with the score on both phones, and comes back if you Resume. When you tag a highlight, the players on court and the set’s liberos are listed first.
Ending a game
Stop any recording first, then choose ⋯ ▸ End Game (SideoutTally) or the ✕ on the camera screen:
- Save Score & End keeps the score so you can come back to it. Both phones then offer Resume Westview vs. Eastside.
- End & Start New Game finishes it.
The score is also saved automatically after every point, so if the camera phone shuts down unexpectedly (a ball hits it, the battery dies), Resume brings the game back at the right set and score.
Warm-ups
Before the first set, tap Warm-Up (SideoutTally) or Record Warm-Up (camera). Warm-ups have no scoreboard and no highlights, and are only uploaded if you choose to include them.
Stats
SideoutTally can record stats for your players as the game goes. On an iPad turned sideways, the stats sit to the right of the scoring screen; on an iPhone or an iPad held upright, open them from ⋯ ▸ Stats.
- Tap the player: the cards show who’s on court and the set’s liberos, from the lineup. Bench… picks anyone else.
- Tap the stat: Attack, Block, Pass, Serve or Dig. You can tap the stat first if you like.
- Tap the outcome:
- Attack: Kill, Blocked, Received, Out
- Block (for the player who blocked): Point, Error
- Pass: At setter, Setter moved, Out of bounds, Overpass
- Serve: Ace, Received, Fault
- Dig: Kept alive, Rally ended
Each stat is saved with the score, on the camera phone, and comes back with Resume. With Outcomes add the point on (the default), an outcome that ends the rally scores it too: Kill, Block Point and Ace for your team; Blocked, Out, Block Error, Pass Out of bounds, Fault and Rally ended for the other team. An Overpass doesn’t score: play goes on. Turn it off to keep scoring on the score buttons only. Undo takes back the set’s last stat, and its point if nothing’s been scored since. Recent stats for the set are listed under the outcomes.
To make a highlight of the play you just recorded, tap Highlight under the outcomes (while recording a set). It’s named for the player and the stat, e.g. Parker Attack (not the outcome), so nothing else is asked. Pick the clip length (10–60 s) just above the button; it’s the same length the ★ Highlight button uses.
When you upload the game to Google Drive, its Game Summary document gets a Stats table: a row per player and one for the team, with kills, attacks, errors (blocked or out), hitting percentage ((kills − errors) ÷ attacks), blocks and block errors, aces, serves and faults, passes at the setter (of all passes) and digs kept alive (of all digs). Uploading again updates it.