noggin's posts, page 62

HD remastering 4:3 programmes

I believe some elements of the Talons of Weng Chiang were shot on OB VT too.

YouTube Gold

Yes - that was my experience working with Roland too.

YouTube Gold

Reverse scan (i.e. mirror image) monitors are often used by puppeteers. In the old days you'd use a CRT with modified scans (it wasn't a standard feature), these days it's easier just to delegate a resizer or DME in the mixer and send it out via a spare aux output from the vision mixer.

Noel on Strike

Yes - I think all of R&D's Quad D1 (and later compressed D1) stuff was transferred. I don't know about any other Quad D1 that may be in the BBC archives though. (Though I suspect it all ended up with R&D?)

Richard Russell details his Quad D1 to HD-SDI conversion design - and the rescaler he implemented. (He'd done high quality DVE / re-scaling in other BBC projects)

(Be interesting to know if BBC Archives have any 1125/60 1" Digital VTR material too, as The Ginger Tree was edited in that format, but the English subtitles were definitely added in the SD 4:3 PAL domain, so the 1" DVTR versions won't be UK Masters...)

Noel on Strike

If it was from an HD trial of Noel's House Party, that wouldn't have been used for broadcast. They ran the limited HD trial productions alongside SD rather than down converting and 16:9->4:3 converting (which made looking to camera an issue...), or if the show was recorded did things twice if possible.

Taskmaster move to Channel 4 confirmed

Yes - though via it's production and sales arm, BBC Studios. (BBC Studios is also a rival for Avalon as a production company)

Noel on Strike

it may well be that they cropped an existing 4:3 master - or they just transferred a short sequence.

Similarly if it was just a 16:9 telecine of a film edit, that was telecine to the Eureka 1250 line standard, a 1250/50 Quad D1 (or compressed D1) VTR copy would be useless - as there isn't really much to play it on outside of BBC R&D (who have a converter that takes Quad D1 1250/50 (aka 1440x1152i25) and converts it to the current 1920x1080i25 active system)

If by then the transfer was to 16:9 SD - then it may well have been to Beta SP (the clip in Tomorrow's World is clearly playing from a Beta SP VTR by the look of the grey bar as the TV input is switched before it goes into play - and there were 16:9 modified Beta SP VTRs used by BSB for their 16:9 MAC transmissions - though it may have been regular Beta SP, as there was no major reason that Beta SP couldn't be used for 16:9 video. BBC News used regular Beta SP for 16:9 well into the 00s)

That said, you'd be surprised how different versions don't get into the repeat system - for various reasons.

Noel on Strike

Not directly related but I remember a Tina Turner TOTP performance being part of a BBC HD demonstration on an open day. It was in the era of TOTP having neon circles and squares - I can't remember if it was shot in the European 1250/50i system (i.e. 2x625 which would be 1152i25 in modern active-only descriptions) or the Japanese 1125/60i system (which was 1035-1050i30 - not 29.97 - but evolved to be 1080i29.97 which is the current 1080i standard!)

The BBC shot a lot of 1250/50i stuff in the late 80s and early 90s - both alongside regular PAL 4:3 production and separately. (Wimbledon Centre Court had separate 1250/50i coverage in the early 90s, with NHK shooting 1125/60i on Court Number 1 I think - or was it the opposite side of Centre Court?) Ballets and Operas were also shot on both formats by the BBC.

Carols from Kings was shot 1125/60i (and converted to 4:3 PAL) at least once for the Japanese I believe - who by then had an HD channel on-air using MUSE HD transmission tech. And of course, The Ginger Tree (a BBC/NHK co-pro) was shot 1125/60i (onto 1" Digital VTRs) by a BBC camera crew in the UK and Japan, and online edited in TC1's gallery I believe. As no 1125/60->625/50 direct conversion was possible, the BBC broadcast unfortunately went 1125/60->525/59.94->625/50 I believe.

The Noel's House Party was almost certainly shot 1250/50 using the BBC experimental HD OB truck (an ancient ex-BBC Wales P-registered ex- VT? truck) that had KCH-1250 BTS HD cameras (3 tube) which were eventually augmented/replaced by very early (and quite noisy) LDK CCD cameras (which I think had 1" rather than 2/3" sensors - like the early HiVision HD cameras) This truck also housed 4 x D1 VTRs to allow for Quad SD recording (1440x1152 from 4 x 720x576 streams) - though by 1993 this may have been upgraded to include the compression system that reduced the number of D1 VTR streams required. The truck had a small GVG-110 CV-style single bank analogue component mixer with HD bandwidth analogue processing.

The 1250 system had some sizeable investment behind it - Aston made a 1250-line Aston 4 equivalent (and Pesa also made a 1250 line CG), Quantel produced a 1250 line Paintbox (though they were already using 1125/60 for the user interface monitor for their print-resolution Graphic Paintbox and I think also had a HiVision Paintbox for the 1125/60 system) Although it ultimately didn't take off as a system - and to be fair, neither did PAL+ - the investment in 16:9 production that followed did help when DVB-T/S arrived and 16:9 digital broadcasts became feasible. (D/D2MAC 16:9 - like PAL+ - was not a huge success)

YouTube Gold

That's really only true of 405 line B&W stuff isn't it? (405 line VT recordings were archived onto film as a decision was taken that 405 Quad VTRs were not going to be around for long - and film was a more suitable archive format - and these days its a lot easier to transfer 16/35mm B&W film than 405 Quad VT - so that wasn't a totally stupid though process...)

However PAL 625 colour VT recordings, with some exceptions, do remain as video recordings if they survive. BBC Two went 625 colour in 1967 so most archive that does survive from this era that was shot colour, does remain as video (with some telerecording B&W international sales copies an exception) These days it's data rather than video tape it is stored on though.

YouTube Gold

Definitely shot on video - there are clear tubed camera artefacts all over it that wouldn't be present on film. Just randomly I clicked on a bit with ducks on water and that is a text-book tubed camera look, and clearly hasn't been anywhere near a film recording.

2019 General Christmas election.

I think everyone is waiting for the Brexit Party election launch news conference at around 1100?

If they put up candidates in every seat that sends one message (they are taking 'No Deal' to mainstream Tory heartland seats, and offering an option to the current Boris Johnson deal), if they only put up a small number, it means they are effectively, tacitly, supporting the Tories in their Brexit stance (and sending the signal that 'Vote Tory' = 'Vote Brexit' in a manner that the Brexit Party approves of)

2019 General Christmas election.

Yep - it was their Atrium when ITN owned the Grays Inn Road building, but they sold that many years ago, and now only lease a portion of it used for their studios, newsrooms and offices. AIUI they have had some issues with using the Atrium in the past, as it required long-term booking with the building owner/management operation.