ST
Talking about disappearing faces - whatever happened to reporter/presenter Victoria Davies?
ST
ITV West Country are now advertising for a weather presenter via the ITV jobs website. I presume this means Alex wont be returning? Or perhaps Bob is retiring...surely not?!
CI
Alex moved up to the national team last year, so Bob could be retiring.
ITV West Country are now advertising for a weather presenter via the ITV jobs website. I presume this means Alex wont be returning? Or perhaps Bob is retiring...surely not?!
Alex moved up to the national team last year, so Bob could be retiring.
WE
Alex B has been on the national’s for many years now. Lucy V is the main presenter with Becky M part time. Alex will return to the national’s and continue part time when Laura Tobin returns to GMB.
LS
Lou Scannon
Both yesterday and today, the main evening ITV News West Country became a shared live pan-regional edition from about 6:18pm onward. The last sighting of the Clifton Suspension Bridge backdrop was just before the national ITV News preview, and immediately after it we were greeted by the ropey CGI gallery backdrop for the rest of the programme.
Both nights we had a slightly awkward linger on the national news presenter, smiling at the camera after they'd finished speaking, before we cut back to the West Country studio. Clearly absorbing a couple of seconds' timing difference between the two West Country sub-regions.
Presumably the "Plymouth" edition also used the national news preview to cover the join.
I think that here in "HTV"-land we had the pre-recorded 18 minutes on both nights, as I'm sure that all of the various snowy OBs lacked a "Live" indicator in their location OSGs.
The pan-regional sections of the programme were dominated by snow-related OBs from arguably "overlap" locations (Porlock yesterday, Taunton today). Bob Crampton's weather forecasts were of course still sub-regional, as these are clearly recorded even earlier in the day than the "as live" version of the programme is.
Jonty Messer's recap of the weather-centric main headline at the end of yesterday's programme was largely vague and generic, but he did mention something about a young girl's death due to a snow-related crash. To us in "HTV"-land, this came across as something that must've only just been a breaking story at e.g. 18:28, as it did not relate to anything from earlier in the programme. I've since found out that the incident was in Looe, Cornwall (so must've been featured on the "Plymouth" version of yesterday's programme). Jonty's careful wording avoided saying e.g. "as mentioned earlier", thus allowing different sets of viewers to perceive it as either a recap or a breaking story. Sleight of hand, indeed.
Tonight's programme ended with an utterly pan-regional compilation of viewers' photos/videos of fun in the snow, all location-labelled on screen (so not trying to disguise the Gloucestershire-Cornwall scope at all).
Both nights we had a slightly awkward linger on the national news presenter, smiling at the camera after they'd finished speaking, before we cut back to the West Country studio. Clearly absorbing a couple of seconds' timing difference between the two West Country sub-regions.
Presumably the "Plymouth" edition also used the national news preview to cover the join.
I think that here in "HTV"-land we had the pre-recorded 18 minutes on both nights, as I'm sure that all of the various snowy OBs lacked a "Live" indicator in their location OSGs.
The pan-regional sections of the programme were dominated by snow-related OBs from arguably "overlap" locations (Porlock yesterday, Taunton today). Bob Crampton's weather forecasts were of course still sub-regional, as these are clearly recorded even earlier in the day than the "as live" version of the programme is.
Jonty Messer's recap of the weather-centric main headline at the end of yesterday's programme was largely vague and generic, but he did mention something about a young girl's death due to a snow-related crash. To us in "HTV"-land, this came across as something that must've only just been a breaking story at e.g. 18:28, as it did not relate to anything from earlier in the programme. I've since found out that the incident was in Looe, Cornwall (so must've been featured on the "Plymouth" version of yesterday's programme). Jonty's careful wording avoided saying e.g. "as mentioned earlier", thus allowing different sets of viewers to perceive it as either a recap or a breaking story. Sleight of hand, indeed.
Tonight's programme ended with an utterly pan-regional compilation of viewers' photos/videos of fun in the snow, all location-labelled on screen (so not trying to disguise the Gloucestershire-Cornwall scope at all).
LS
Lou Scannon
Tonight's ITV News West Country is mainly an OB from the Cheltenham Festival with Jonty Messer. And we're the genuinely live sub-region tonight.
Weatherman Bob Crampton is also at Cheltenham racecourse. I assume that the SW version's forecast will be done by e.g. Kate Haskell, then?
Kylie Pentelow is therefore alone in the studio, with a round-up of the rest of the day's news.
Presumably, viewers in the "Plymouth" region will get no explanation why their (pre-recorded) programme is single-headed tonight. There have been occasions in the past when the "HTV" edition has been single-headed without explanation, which presumably coincides with OBs from the likes of the Devon County Show or whatever.
Weatherman Bob Crampton is also at Cheltenham racecourse. I assume that the SW version's forecast will be done by e.g. Kate Haskell, then?
Kylie Pentelow is therefore alone in the studio, with a round-up of the rest of the day's news.
Presumably, viewers in the "Plymouth" region will get no explanation why their (pre-recorded) programme is single-headed tonight. There have been occasions in the past when the "HTV" edition has been single-headed without explanation, which presumably coincides with OBs from the likes of the Devon County Show or whatever.
ST
Indeed they did - David Wood alongside Kylie.
If they were clever, couldn’t they get a 3rd presenter to copresent the Westcountry version, they’ve done that before in my region.
Indeed they did - David Wood alongside Kylie.
LS
Lou Scannon
I recently wandered down to Arnos Vale for the first time in absolutely ages, and have discovered that Bath Road Studios (home of ITV News West Country) has at some point been renamed as "Here"! (Stylised as "[HERE]" ) 
Originally Harlech/HTV's own building, it at some point in the ITV plc era became independently owned. Since then, ITV West (as it was still called at that stage) has been leasing back just the parts of the building/site for which they still have use. The 2005-2013 version of the "ITV West" logo was the last time that the main large signage on the roof and at the driveway entrance was "ITV West", before being replaced by "Bath Road Studios" branding.
During the BRS-branded era, the only places where there was any smaller "ITV West" (or, latterly, "ITV West Country" ) signage were at the side of the main building towards the rear (presumably the bit of the main building that ITV still occupy?) and on the separate smaller structure/building at the back of the site (which appears to be a small multi-story car park or something, so presumably for either e.g. OB vans etc and/or ITV employees' own cars?).
The tall "[HERE]" signage at the driveway entrance now shows a list of 20 companies/organisations that occupy the facility (just plain white text on a black background, not their logos). The first listed is ITV West Country. Judging by the rest of the list, the majority of the building has nothing whatsoever to do with television anymore. There is a separate shorter sign next to it, stating "Also home to ITV West Country" (using the actual current ITV West Country logo). This is first time for several years that anything prominent and easily visible to passing pedestrians/traffic going along Bath Road has proclaimed ITV's presence there.
Originally Harlech/HTV's own building, it at some point in the ITV plc era became independently owned. Since then, ITV West (as it was still called at that stage) has been leasing back just the parts of the building/site for which they still have use. The 2005-2013 version of the "ITV West" logo was the last time that the main large signage on the roof and at the driveway entrance was "ITV West", before being replaced by "Bath Road Studios" branding.
During the BRS-branded era, the only places where there was any smaller "ITV West" (or, latterly, "ITV West Country" ) signage were at the side of the main building towards the rear (presumably the bit of the main building that ITV still occupy?) and on the separate smaller structure/building at the back of the site (which appears to be a small multi-story car park or something, so presumably for either e.g. OB vans etc and/or ITV employees' own cars?).
The tall "[HERE]" signage at the driveway entrance now shows a list of 20 companies/organisations that occupy the facility (just plain white text on a black background, not their logos). The first listed is ITV West Country. Judging by the rest of the list, the majority of the building has nothing whatsoever to do with television anymore. There is a separate shorter sign next to it, stating "Also home to ITV West Country" (using the actual current ITV West Country logo). This is first time for several years that anything prominent and easily visible to passing pedestrians/traffic going along Bath Road has proclaimed ITV's presence there.
LS
Lou Scannon
ITV West Country are now advertising for a weather presenter via the ITV jobs website. I presume this means Alex wont be returning? Or perhaps Bob is retiring...surely not?!
Alex moved up to the national team last year, so Bob could be retiring.
I'm sure that Alex Beresford is (or at least was) juggling both West Country and national GMB weather duties for what seemed like a long time. Whilst he was participating in Dancing On Ice, his fortunes in the show were frequently charted within ITV News West Country - very much still treating him as "ours". I can't honestly recall seeming him back on West Country weather post-DOI, so perhaps he has gone for good now?
I'm sure there was at least one random day in the last week or two where I've seen some hitherto unknown young man (who looked like he was barely even 20 years of age, to me!) doing West Country weather. I forget his name. Maybe he's the new recruit? Or maybe a student on work experience?!
Dear old Crampers (i.e. Bob) is still there as ever, and still quite frequently. Given the seemingly limited demands of his current role at ITV, I can envisage Bob sticking around well beyond State retirement age (à la Fred Dinenage) for many moons yet. I've no idea of Bob's current age.
We seem to have been increasingly falling back on Kate Haskell (down the line from the Met Office, I think?) whenever Bob's not around, for a fair while now. So, it would appear that Alex has gone, rather than Bob being about to go.
LS
Lou Scannon
The young guy you mention, it wasn’t Chris Page from Anglia was it?
Ah, yes, that name sounds right.
Clearly not a new West Country recruit then!
Must've been a last-resort down the line from Norwich, I guess.