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ITV Schools on Channel 4 1987-1993

(June 2016)

This site closed in March 2021 and is now a read-only archive
BH
BillyH Founding member
Is that off air though? I assumed most of those captions were from a video montage, and some of them might have been made for worst case scenarios but never aired.
BE
benriggers
Must admit, I've never seen an ITV Schools on Channel 4 breakdown. I presumed if a programme fell off air there would either be a slide or a return to the rotomotion which, as I posted in the original post, can apparently run for as long as needed.


There was one breakdown where they used an 30th anniversary year slide, a photo of the Channel 4 ident and slide apologising for loss of programmes and that they couldn't go back to them.
RO
robertclark125
It details it on the top of that page. The fault occurred in Autumn 1992.

http://www2.tv-ark.org.uk/schoolstv/ch4schools_media.html
NJ
Neil Jones Founding member
Is that off air though? I assumed most of those captions were from a video montage, and some of them might have been made for worst case scenarios but never aired.


I don't know is the honest answer. I'd like to know though if that is off-air or otherwise.
IS
Inspector Sands

I'd forgotten that Billie Piper was on a 4 Schools ident
TC
TonyCurrie
When ITV opened in 1955, shows were broadcast all day - until the dire financial situation kicked in and the daytime schedule was axed. There were daytime serials, magazine shows etc... The more restricted schedule - that lasted until 1972 when the daytime service launched, must have come later.

I think the misunderstanding of your post is your reference to "all day" because of course Parliament restricted television's hours of transmission and programmes certainly didn't appear "all day", but were spread across the day. Associated-Rediffusion made the most of what they had by running some morning programmes, then half an hour of test card, then more programmes. Then more test card. And after children's TV there was an hour's gap. When Lichfield opened, ATV didn't bother with morning programmes and started at 4pm instead.

The "Schools programmes suspended" caption relates to an ACTT dispute. Any breakdowns in schools programmes in the days when they were shown on the local ITV station would be covered by the announcer, because the union ruled that as long as the station was on the air their had to employ a live announcer. (I was the national union negotiator, so I remember fighting hard for this rule at the time.)
SP
Steve in Pudsey
Must admit, I've never seen an ITV Schools on Channel 4 breakdown. I presumed if a programme fell off air there would either be a slide or a return to the rotomotion which, as I posted in the original post, can apparently run for as long as needed.


The rotomotion was played off tape, so I'm not sure that it could stay on indefinitely. Although it was computer controlled so perhaps the automation could switch between two machines with separate copies of the same tape cleanly.
NJ
Neil Jones Founding member
The rotomotion was played off tape, so I'm not sure that it could stay on indefinitely. Although it was computer controlled so perhaps the automation could switch between two machines with separate copies of the same tape cleanly.


That has amazed me, I always thought it was completely computer controlled and generated, it never occurred to me it could have run from tape. Learn something new every day here Smile
BE
benriggers
Must admit, I've never seen an ITV Schools on Channel 4 breakdown. I presumed if a programme fell off air there would either be a slide or a return to the rotomotion which, as I posted in the original post, can apparently run for as long as needed.


Here you go! An example of when ITV Schools on C4 went off air for most of the morning.
(Thanks to SiCo)
RO
robertclark125
The tape backtimed, so that it came up at exactly the right moment after the fade to black when the last programme ended. The details of the timing of the programme were fed into a computer, so the tape was automatically backtimed to where it had to start, when it was time for the junction to begin. The only one this didn't apply to was the last junction of the day, at the end of programmes, when the ITV logos glided onto screen, and after the fanfare, it faded out.
SP
Steve in Pudsey
There's a short piece here about how S4C did it manually with good old fashioned backtiming

http://www2.tv-ark.org.uk/schoolstv/s4cschools_history.html

There was a companion article about how it worked at C4 on the Schools TV website (which closed over 10 years ago, the content was supposed to be integrated into TV-ark, but it didn't all make it, perhaps because Simon Luxton was dealing with it before his death). Can't find it in the Wayback Machine, but it was basically all under automation, IIRC.
SP
Steve in Pudsey
Must admit, I've never seen an ITV Schools on Channel 4 breakdown. I presumed if a programme fell off air there would either be a slide or a return to the rotomotion which, as I posted in the original post, can apparently run for as long as needed.


Here you go! An example of when ITV Schools on C4 went off air for most of the morning.
(Thanks to SiCo)


The 30th anniversary was 1987, do we know if this was post September when the ITV Schools on C4 service "proper" was up and running, or one of the occasional days when something displaced Schools to C4? The use of that anniversary slide implies the latter - would Central have still played out the Schools sequence on that occasion?

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