Election 2014

Emily Maitlis has posted this picture from the rehearsals for election night.

Look who's back ! We're dusting off the touch screen for May 22nd. And Swindon has just fallen into NoC #2014elex pic.twitter.com/CSZoGNyzIF

— emily m (@maitlis) May 9, 2014

Are they having a studio audience?

Do they normally have such a big election studio for the Euros? Didn't they use N9 last time?

I believe they used N9 with one of the TC's (4?) for the virtual graphics...don't hold me to that though.

Possibly as a rehearsal for doing the General Election from Elstree for the first time next year?

I know they used TC5 for the virtual-ness for the US Elections.

The embed up there hides the caption, which reads:

I think his point was they could have chosen to "upsize" this election coverage, in order to ensure everything works fine for the GE next year.

Yes, this would be a bit like when I think ITV did their only ever proper networked local election coverage in 1996, seemingly as a try-out for the following year's General Election, as it was the first time they used Jonathan Dimbleby.

That set looks suspiciously like the Vote 2010 Set - have they kept it in storage all these years?

Yes.
And yes, being the first time we've rigged Elstree for this, it's a good rehearsal for 2015.

So, the Euros/Local Elections are on Thursday, and from a pres view it appears that the BBC are using almost the exact same set as they used for the General Election in 2010, which is interesting as usually this coverage is much more low key, and I believe previously came from N9! I think someone has mentioned that this is in preparation for the elections next year, which will be the first to not come from TVC in a number of years!

Look who's back ! We're dusting off the touch screen for May 22nd. And Swindon has just fallen into NoC #2014elex pic.twitter.com/CSZoGNyzIF

— emily m (@maitlis) May 9, 2014

Day two of euro rehearsals. Studio looking fabulous. Touch screen gently springing into life #euro2014 pic.twitter.com/gpYvg2tdAK

— emily m (@maitlis) May 20, 2014

What are the other broadcasters doing?

The only other UK channel with dedicated results programmes for the local and European results is Sky. ITV have a 30 minute late news on Sunday night for the European election results, same as 2009, according to TV Choice though some online listings show it as a 20 minute bulletin

The elections mean there are full length national BBC News bulletins on Bank Holiday Monday at 1815 and 2205, plus an edition of Newsnight on BBC2. ITV have a normal lunchtime news scheduled. (Channel 4 News at Five News at 5 also air as normal, but they often do on bank holidays IIRC)

EDIT - From flicking through the RTE tv listings UTV have a 40 minute election special on Saturday teatime and a 45 minute UTV Live on Monday. BBC2 Northern Ireland have various election specials across the weekend. In the Republic RTE and TG4 have various special election programmes