noggin's posts, page 308

Turkey 'Coup' 15-Jul-2016

Though TRT World have a London studio base, which was on-air via various social media live streaming platforms (Twitter and Facebook Live I believe) independently of Istanbul.

Emergency Broadcasts

I think describing it as 'state-owned' is unusual, but probably accurate, though it doesn't really tell the whole story. (Describing it as 'government' owned would be different and less accurate I'd argue)

However describing the BBC as a 'state broadcaster' is a different issue, as 'state broadcaster', in normal use, implies the government of state controls the broadcaster (usually editorially) - and that is not the case of the BBC as its independence, editorially, is enshrined in a Royal Charter.

Many European broadcasters that could be described as 'state-owned' are more accurately described as 'public service' broadcasters, in the more accepted meanings of the two descriptions I'd say, with some exceptions where independence from government is not the case.

Olympics Update - to remain on the BBC until at least 2024

I believe the EBU provide satellite (and probably fibre) backhaul facilities for a world feed, but most high-end rights holders (C4, Sky UK, Sky Deutschland etc.) present from site and fibre their own programmes back.

Fibre is a great solution - but not all countries would have access to a fibre feed.

It's also worth noting that just because the EBU provide satellite space / fibre capacity - this is independent of any rights deal the EBU may have. Just like BBC studios being used to make ITV shows, third parties can rent EBU capacity for their own content.

Olympics Update - to remain on the BBC until at least 2024

I thought Matt Lauer's "Google Him" comment was a knowing way of pointing out Meredith Vieira's ignorance of Tim's identity... I may be being charitable...

BBC One's 3D Week (from 1993)

Yep - this was a 'fake 3D' system that used the Pulfrich effect, with one eye dimmed slightly by a darker lens, and constant motion with parallax. The eye converts the parallax into realistic 3D - but it isn't stereoscopic.


TVS made a couple of 3D shows I think - both in the Real World series, and a couple of 3D movies (House of Wax was one I think) were shown around the same time.

This used conventional red/green (I think) lenses - but they pushed the saturation of the source cameras, which were colour not B&W, to give a form of colour 3D (though it wasn't great) Personally I thought the B&W clips were often a bit more successful. Think the research cameras they were using were from Philips in Breda.



Yep - C4 used Blue/Yellow filters instead. They broadcast the 3D Colour Coronation stuff I think.

BBC Scotland thread

Hmm - it wasn't THAT bad. Was just scratching on his shirt by the sound of it. Sometimes apologising so obviously isn't always a good idea.

BBC News Channel Presentation - 21/03/16 onwards

Do you mean 720p? 720p is 1280x720 and is the same aspect ratio (and for a lot of content effectively quite difficult to tell apart from) 1920x1080.

There should be no black bars anywhere if it is a straight upscale - as they are the same ratio. If there are black bars top and bottom and different width black bars left and right then that suggests (assuming the display isn't differentially cropping) that something has gone awry. Unless you are looking very carefully on very demanding material 1080i25 and 720p50 (aka 1080/50i and 720/50p) are pretty similar in quality terms - particularly on talking heads at BBC News bitrates...

You'd possibly see black bars left and right with poorly handled SD (where 720x576 has been scaled to 1920x1080 rather than 702x576 - which is the actual 16:9 active picture area in SD - with black bars padding either side).

One area where things can go wrong is that 1920x1080 isn't actually recorded in most digital systems in that format (as it isn't a nice MPEG multiple). Instead 1920x1088 is recorded, with 8 lines padded with black on recording and cropped on replay. That can sometimes cause very small amounts of scaling errors if it is handled incorrectly.

However it sounds as if something worse has happened in this case - and I think I've seen something like this happen before. Could be that the show has been delivered in an odd ball format - particularly if it was edited off-site in the field...

** EDIT - just seen the screen grab. That looks like a poorly handled 576i SD up convert, possibly from a down convert with the downconverter probably doing the right 1920x1080 to 702x576 with a 9 sample black pad each side to generate 720x576 (which won't be seen on an SD set as that should only show the 702x576 portion), but then the 720x576 (not the 702x576) portion scaled back up to 1920x1080 - giving you black bars each side in the 1920x1080 frame.

So many people think you should show the full 720x576 frame - you shouldn't...

Caroline Aherne 1963-2016

For a long time Super 16 wasn't approved for use as an acquisition format for BBC HD commissions. This caused no end of complaints from DoPs and producers who wanted to produce on film (rather than shoot electronically) but didn't have the budget for 35mm.

The BBC worked with some production teams to develop a workflow using 2 or 3-perf 35mm (which is cheaper than the standard 4-perf) - and I think "The 39 Steps" was shot on 35mm this way. (After all - the cost of film production is largely based on the amount of film that you physically use and process - which is why 16mm is cheaper than 35mm, and why 4-perf is more expensive than 3-perf, and 2-perf cheaper still)

However more recently the BBC are allowing Super 16 to be used for HD acquisitions - but with some caveats about light levels and stock used. (Super 16 can suffer badly from film grain noise in low-light - and noise is the enemy of compression...)



Apples and Oranges. Pride and Prejudice was commissioned for SD broadcast (not HD). The remastering in HD was an attempt to deliver the highest quality result possible from an existing archive production. You can't compare this with decisions taken when commissioning HD productions. (The results of the remaster are great - but that doesn't mean you'd chose the same workflow for a new commission)

Historical broadcast audio equipment

I'd expect most 'shared folders' to be backed up offsite as a matter of course as base level ATOS provisioning. But for stuff like emergency kits of parts I'd expect them to be specifically saved somewhere known to be resilient. (Box is the BBC preferred DropBox-type service for instance)

Amazon Fire TV and Stick

Yes. Real shame. The proliferation of terrible Chinese Android boxes with it pre-installed (along with infamous plugins that assist in piracy) are the big problem.

The main reason XBMC became Kodi was so that the trademark could be protected - but it's a never-ending battle.

Amazon Fire TV and Stick

Yep - very annoying that Kodi has effectively been hijacked, The community developing it do their best to discourage illegal add-ons (and ban their discussion on the official forums)

Kodi + TV Headend is a really good quality, low-cost PVR and TV viewing solution, and if you add a low cost server you can create a great library of your own DVDs, Blu-rays and CDs.

Historical broadcast audio equipment

I suspect that these days as long as you can login to the BBC's internal computer network (which you can from any local radio station) then you'll be able to download media to an alternative site (though there may be more formal plans in place this would be a reasonable approach to take in extremis)