You could tell when the "virtual" era had moved to N6 because it didn't quite 'look' the same on screen. Not the "virtual" elements, but any wide shots that included the desk definitely looked different. Was the desk smaller in N6?
Yes - the desk and overall set were both smaller in N6 ISTR.
I think there have been some Super 16 HD shows, on ITV at least, if not the BBC.
There's been 2-perf 35mm ones as well. I saw some outtakes from one of the Royle Family specials which shows it was filmed that way.
I think one of the early BBC HD film productions (The 39 Steps?) was 3-perf 35mm. (The BBC, at the time, were suggesting that 3-perf 35mm may be a better choice with a similar cost, instead of Super 16 ISTR)
It is kind of a moot point now - as most stuff is shot on Arri Alexa or similar digital movie cameras (Red, Venice, F65 etc.)
Speaking of that, I've always found it unusual that N6, 8 and 9 (there was no N7 because they were worried about it being confused with TC7 apparently) opened in reverse order. N9 opening, as you said, in November 1997, N8 roughly a year later when News 24 moved there, and N6 in May 1999 when the main news bulletins moved there.
I may be talking complete rubbish here, but I'm pretty sure I read/heard somewhere that the last year/months(?) of the virtual era news came from N6. Is that right? I've never really been able to confirm it again. I know that TC7 replaced TC2 for some news programmes in 1997 and that N9 opened in November 1997. Stage 6 (the News Centre) opened in 1998 and this section included both N6 and N8. News 24 moved into N8 and World moved into N9. At this point, N1 and N2 were no longer used for News bulletins. So, did the BBC1 bulletins move into N6 in 1998 or not until May 1999 and the rebrand of BBC News? Can anyone in the know confirm what actually happened?
Wouldn't that have meant they had to completely rip out the blue set and build the new cream one in the space of 13 hours? Last virtual bulletin ended just after 10pm on 9 May 99 and first appearance of the new set was 11am next morning.
I can't remember how the switch from the legacy blue look to the newer beige and red look was handled, but the blue look was the first one broadcast from N6 I'm sure. (N6 had upstream keyers on every camera channel, just as N1 and N2 had)
BBC News 24 launched in full 16:9 production in N9 (though it wasn't really known as that then) in November 1997
Speaking of that, I've always found it unusual that N6, 8 and 9 (there was no N7 because they were worried about it being confused with TC7 apparently) opened in reverse order. N9 opening, as you said, in November 1997, N8 roughly a year later when News 24 moved there, and N6 in May 1999 when the main news bulletins moved there.
I may be talking complete rubbish here, but I'm pretty sure I read/heard somewhere that the last year/months(?) of the virtual era news came from N6. Is that right? I've never really been able to confirm it again. I know that TC7 replaced TC2 for some news programmes in 1997 and that N9 opened in November 1997. Stage 6 (the News Centre) opened in 1998 and this section included both N6 and N8. News 24 moved into N8 and World moved into N9. At this point, N1 and N2 were no longer used for News bulletins. So, did the BBC1 bulletins move into N6 in 1998 or not until May 1999 and the rebrand of BBC News? Can anyone in the know confirm what actually happened?
Yes - the Blue 'Virtual' set (and technology required to support it) was installed in N6, and the programmes moved from N2 to N6 without a major visual rebrand. The Lambie Nairn Ivory and Red relaunch came some months later.
Last edited by noggin on 14 September 2019 12:45am
There have been HD versions made of 16mm/Super 16 shows though of course. Including the BBC doing a Blu-ray of Pride and Prejudice. Though obviously none of those shows were made with HD in mind.
Yes - lots of Super16-shot shows have since been remastered for HD. The 1980s Joan Hickson Miss Marples have been released on Blu-ray in the US (but not the UK - and UKTV are still showing the old SD PAL versions) I think Morse has also been remastered now too.
Also, noggin I remember reading a case study that a US based broadcaster tried a split production method, with the vision mixer panels here in the US and the crate back in the U.K. and there was little to no delay difference between switching onsite or remotely. Do you happen to have any insight on that?
You're going to have a lot less latency on your control data than any video feeds, so any delays in switching will be masked.
However if you are basing your decisions on a delayed monitoring feed fed back to you on-site, that point is moot. The control data may have low latency, but the decision data that causes the control action to be taken still has latency (as it is based on a delayed feed)...
I think the suitcase tv approach makes sense for remote production in connectivity starved locations (where LongGOP compression is used to backhaul a minimal number of feeds with significant compression latency) - but it's solving a problem that ideally would be better solved by not existing in the first place. As connectivity is continually improving, IP connecitvity and latency is reducing. As we move to p50 and p100 production, frame durations also become shorter and deinterlacing delays are also removed (so a 1 frame delay caused inherently by a requirement to store a frame goes from 40ms (i25) to 20ms (p50) to 10ms (p100)) Latency caused by other issues - network latency etc. remain the same though.
Who's to say the bulk entire operation will be based there anyway or any one particular place. NBC may choose to have to main newsroom elsewhere and have small newsrooms and broadcast sites in various places like CNN does.
Plus remote production technology means your presentation spaces and transmission facilities can be on different continents. (50Hz vs 60Hz origination is a thing to consider though)
I’d assume if NBC is involved it will be 60hz. Isn’t it easier from a technical perspective to drop a few frames rather than adding 10?
The challenges are pretty much identical - most decent quality converters can do either. It isn't as simple as discarding 10 frames or creating 10 new frames (that approach would be horrific in motion terms). Instead you create an entirely new 50 or 60 (*) frames from the source by motion detection, vector tracking and image interpolation.
It's a pain. And best avoided if at all possible. But sometimes this just isn't possible. (And don't think that a vision switcher with 'frame rate conversion' on its inputs, like the new BlackMagic mixers have, is a solution. The frame rate conversion is pretty basic and not by any stretch 'broadcast quality' - though some broadcasters also use sub-par conversion solutions in News...)
US Broadcasters with European bureaux usually keep them 60Hz and convert incoming 50Hz sources to 60Hz. European broadcasters usually take the opposite approach and run their US operations 60Hz and convert when content reaches the UK (this is partially historical, because handling PAL 50Hz in the US was near impossible, but Europe was a bit better at handling NTSC)
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Also, noggin I remember reading a case study that a US based broadcaster tried a split production method, with the vision mixer panels here in the US and the crate back in the U.K. and there was little to no delay difference between switching onsite or remotely. Do you happen to have any insight on that?
That's not unusual in remote production these days. SVT in Sweden are doing lots of Remote production, and not just in sports, using this approach.
They recently ran 75 cameras remote from Åre and Östersund back to their main TV centre in Stockholm (using the Net Insight Nimbra J2K solutions with GVG LDX cameras and XCU CCUs - where the XCUs were in Stockholm not on site). Sound, Vision control, EVS, the vision mixer crate and graphics were also in Stockholm. However the director and vision mixer (person) were on-site - with multiviewer feeds generated in Stockholm fed back, and the GVG mixer top on-site. There was some latency - but it was entirely workable. (~160-200ms I think - 4-5 frames in PAL i25) AIUI the SVT team suggest not having an on-site full OB saved them ~10% in budget terms, and reduced their carbon footprint by removing a lot of air travel for control room crew (who didn't have to leave Stockholm).
They now use the same approach for Allsång på Skansen, a weekly open-air music show, broadcast from an open air venue in Stockholm. This has also removed the OB truck hire cost, they use a control room they already own back at their TV centre, and just have a smaller vehicle owned by SVT with interface gear, and a small production area with displays, talkback panels and a mixer top, plus some on-site RF capacity. There is still obviously a FoH sound operation, but the broadcast mix is done back at base in their TV centre.
AIUI Discovery Eurosport are aggressively pursuing this for a pan-European production operation - with two big centres in Chiswick Park and Hilversum - which will work into all the Eurosport national operations (on-site production teams, but remote control of GVG Kahuna 9600s, LiveTouch servers etc.) You can sit in a control room in Stockholm or Oslo, remotely producing using equipment in the UK or the Netherlands. All thanks to ST-2110. Latency is likely to be a bit more than the Swedish experience AIUI but still workable.
Sadly you don't mention what the model of the set you looked at Currys PC World is.
However, the Richer Sounds LG set you mentioned is a decent 43" model and if they're offering a service to disabled customers, along with a six year guarantee, I'd go for that. (John Lewis have the same model for £424 without any of the perks).
I think it's the LG 43UM7600PLB in the thread title.
What I would say is that LG potentially 'making the screen' for Sony doesn't mean as much as you may think. What this means is that the LCD panel is potentially the same, or made by the same manufacturer, across multiple models of TV, it doesn't mean they give you the same picture quality. That's because a lot of the picture quality is defined by the processing of the input signals before they get to the LCD panel. Even if they use the same SoCs - there can be some significant software and configuration differences that will impact picture quality.
This will be different between manufacturers - even if they use the same screen panels.
If at all possible I'd try and see both displays in person - and ask for the remote control so you can disable all the nasty motion processing, contrast enhancement, noise reduction etc. and compare them with the same content on both displays.
I compared LG, Sony, Panasonic and Samsung displays and could never get the LG and Samsung to look as 'unprocessed' as the Sony and Panasonic sets. This has been the case for the last 2 TVs I've purchased - though both were 49" (I wish I could go OLED but don't have the space for a 55").
My most recent TV is a Sony FALD LCD HDR set and is by far the best TV I've ever owned.
I'd recommend LG for OLED TVs, but am less keen on their LCD (sometimes called LED) displays. However other people see pictures differently and are very happy with their Samsung or LGs. To each their own.
Is the delay in live contributions on the Outside Source screen normally that bad? Seeing Katya Adler and Christian Fraser's two ways is awkward as they start speaking before their mouths move on the screen (but fine when taken full screen).
Yes - it's normal. Modern flat screen displays, particularly when fed interlaced (rather than progressive) signals introduce delay (this can be anything from a frame and a half to quite a few frames). Similarly there can be a delay in feeding the output of a studio vision mixer to a studio in-vision screen, and in addition Outside Source may well process the live incoming OB source via the touch screen processing, again adding more delay.
This first started being obvious on-air when the Barco walls arrived in N6 and TC7 in 2006-ish, as the amount of processing required to feed the Barco walls, and inherent in the DLP projection technology they used introduced enough frames of delay for it be obviously out-of-sync.
The only real way round this (if you can't remove the video delay) is to delay the audio to match AND then also introduce a matched video delay in the full-screen version of the content (you are also feeding undelayed to the screen). In other words so you feed the source undelayed to the screen (which then delays it), but cut to the delayed version full frame (the delay matching the delay introduced by the screen).
This is also an issue with AR virtual screens and similar solutions are required.
However in so-doing you are introducing latency into the audio chain, adding more delay to answers being heard on-air after questions have been asked.
You also need some clever macros, or dual presented OSs etc. to practically do this.
Last edited by noggin on 10 September 2019 10:36am
There was a test weekend where an entire Saturday evening of entertainment shows was letterboxed to 14:9 using a black mask and appropriate framing during production (quite a while before Digital TV started) as a test to see if viewers complained massively. (Noels House Party was one of the shows ISTR)
Some drama shot on Super 16 was telecined to 14:9-15:9 letterbox (whilst still being edited in the 4:3 domain) before digital TV launched, so some shallow letterboxing was beginning to be seen outside of movies.
BBC News 24 launched in full 16:9 production in N9 (though it wasn't really known as that then) in November 1997, and News 24 content shown on BBC One and BBC World was shown in 14:9 letterbox format. (I think Europe Direct launched from N9 before the official launch of News 24, as the show launched on BBC World prior to News 24 launching)
However the widespread use of 14:9 letter boxing (aka 14L12) started when shows started being made and delivered in 16:9 FHA (full height anamorphic - aka 16F16) This started when the BBC formally launched their digital platforms in approx November 1998 (when News 24 also moved to N8 from N9)
If a show was made in 16:9 widescreen for broadcast in widescreen on BBC One Digital or BBC Two Digital, then it had to be converted to 4:3 format for broadcast on analogue outlets. 14:9 letterbox (aka 14L12) was the most common intermediate ratio used (and the BBC commissioned most shows to be 14:9 safe), however 16:9 sport was 4:3 safe and broadcast as 12F12 (i.e. full-screen centre-cut-out). It was also possible for movies to go out 16L12 (i.e. 16:9 deep letterbox), but initially it wasn't unusual for BBC One analogue and BBC One digital to split and show different copies of the movie on each outlet (allowing for a 4:3 pan-and-scan rather than permanent centre-cut-out from 16:9 to be broadcast on analogue) This facility stopped when (or before) the analogue NTA areas closed I believe, and BBC One analogue became a permanent ARC-ed output of BBC One digital from the DTA (albeit with dynamically driven ARCs).