Northern Ireland news thread

She's been back most of the week actually, mainly doing features reports but she has done one or two reports for the main programme as well. She hasn't resumed her post as Friday night newsreader yet though, Tracey Magee is still doing it at the minute.

Lots of little technical gremlins on UTV Live tonight.

Lots of late or missed cues: the Weather Line sting failed to start on cue. I spotted this last night as well, the VT on the Tassagh report also failed to start straight on cue, and you could hear the audio in the studio before Big Ivan's commentary came in; and some of Paul and Alison's cues when reading over VTs were gappy. Poor Alison got tongue-tied a few times as well.

I'm sure the second headline cut to a black screen before wiping to the next headline too.

Nice to see an interviewee on Mark McFadden's report with a UTV umbrella, sounds like they recorded that interview beside St. Eugene's at the top of the hour

And can someone please tell UTV's graphics department that white text on yellow land mass cannot be read easily on screen! I also think the reports on the council changes were far-too Belfast biased. Come to think of it, most of the reports tonight seemed to be focused on Belfast.

Also nice to see a bit of free promo for Queen's! And the same for Burger King... couldn't they have sent someone else apart from David Morgan to do that report though? And where did the burger go, not to mention the Mars bars, Walkers crisps and pints of beer that also featured in the report? Nice nod to Benny Hill too, but it looks like with all the gremlins the show ended just then, at least it did on the broadband stream.

I noticed Claire hosted the sport from the desk tonight instead of the sofa... and has Thomas Niblock moved to sport? He has done a few GAA reports over the past few days, I know he has a background in sports reporting for the Irish News, I wonder if he is being lined up to cover for Claire when she goes on maternity leave.

Arial Black Condensed on the sport competition caption!

What was Frank's report/piece on Ultimate Ulster like? Was it suggested that he would be the host - or will that be a no-no?

Let's see whether Newsline made any slip-ups tonight to even the balance out.

What a waste of a report about the fiver, they interviewed about 2 people went to shops etc just to end the report saying that Ulster Bank and Northern Bank said there is no shortage, what a waste

The CGI map used to indicate the new councils on Newsline was a bit cheap and garish, I expected better.

Who decided to turn "North West" purple and "West" pink?

Nice to see an OB featuring journalists from Omagh and Enniskillen in the "middle ground" of Irvinestown, at least it reflected opinion on the council changes outside of the Belfast area.

The Boundary Commission.

http://www.rpani.gov.uk/index/map-proposed-boundaries.htm

I bet there'll be a few people in those parts who will complain about their area being coloured in Sodomite tones.

And can someone tell Stephen Watson that Drogheda is pronounced "Draw-heda", not "Droc-ada".

Yeah it's been presented there for the past few days now, I think from the end of last week. I know Adrian definitely presented from the desk on a few occasions last week. They must have decided to move it again!



According to the press release on u.tv he will be the host!

Just found the story. It reads:

VIEWS OF ULSTER PEOPLE NEEDED
FOR NEW UTV PROGRAMME

UTV needs the views of Ulster people to help in producing a brand new programme for next autumn entitled Ultimate Ulster.

If you’re passionate about landmarks, walking routes, eating out, public parks and gardens or impressing visiting relatives on a day out in Ulster, then UTV wants to hear from you.

The information from the biggest-ever survey carried out by UTV will be used to compile a ‘Top 10’ which will be screened in a 10 part series presented by Frank Mitchell.

Michael Wilson, Head of Television at UTV said: “We believe that this is our biggest-ever survey of local opinion and we’re really keen to hear as many points of view as possible.

“We’re asking people to nominate their best days out for visitors, as well as the top places to eat or stay. And we think that at the end of the process, we’ll have some very interesting results.”

Other categories include the most desirable locations to live and Ulster’s top romantic spots.

If you would like to take part in the survey or receive further information, simply log onto www.u.tv/ultimateulster or write to - Ultimate Ulster, UTV, Ormeau Road, Belfast BT7 1EB.

Completed questionnaires must be returned to UTV by Sunday 10 December 2006.

You gotta love that press release. First they tell you it's UTVs biggest survey, followed just a few lines later, by them asking for people to submit responses! Says it all really, perhaps they've never surveyed before.

The very same umbrella that sneakily made it into a BBC Newsline report too...

It's a very clever idea if it's what they're doing, giving people who are being interviewed by several crews at once an umbrella with their own branding on it, knowing it'll be used by the interviewee to protect themselves getting wet but also being used for sneaky putting your logo on other competitors output.

Now, I doubt it was thought of on purpose to do that, afterall the UTV Logo was blocked so to look a person under it, the logo is in reverse on the outside, and in this case just a U!

Guess what we had on UTV Live again tonight?

Yes, it's another two-way graphic!

http://www.utvtoday.co.uk/images/twoway.jpg

Now I'm all for change but this is getting a bit ridiculous. In the past few months, UTV have had 7 different two-way graphics, this one being their 8th!! And they still haven't fixed the aspect ratio problem!

The background on that graphic looks like the one UTV used for about a week as a CSO backdrop when they introduced a new UTV Live logo in January 2001...

And they had another map with white text on yellow landmass tonight.