BBC News this Christmas - impact of cuts & Covid

The lights have sparkled like that on Christmas Day for the last few years now. It's a nice touch.

They always used to do a straight handover in the 1980s like in the clip below at 33:30

I can remember the 1976 Morecambe and Wise Christmas Show, when Angela Rippon suddenly appeared in the spoof newsflash. My mum sat bolt upright and said, 'Oh god, what's just happened? '

The one time the vision engineer gets to apply the cross filter is basically Christmas or TOTP!

Does anyone know the actual reason that there is a ban on the World daytime backdrop appearing on World & NC simulcasts coming from Studio C? It seems the only time the World backdrop is 'allowed' to appear on the NC is 9 - 10pm Mon-Thurs during Katty & Christian's hour, and 1 - 5am when no one is watching anyway.

If it's because the backdrop is seen as London centric, apart from the London Eye, it could be a generic city style backdrop from anywhere in the world.

Sorry if this has been covered before but I have missed it if it has. With all the simulcasting that's been happening over this holiday period, it's a shame that NC viewers don't get to see it and get the inferior, fake, blurred and out of focus newsroom backdrop instead.

Rich Preston tweeted this pic of himself after his nightshift today and the World backdrop in C is far superior to the fake newsroom backdrop, esp the daytime version.

https://twitter.com/RichPreston/status/1343511872180527104?s=09

It must be a formula in the template if = bbc news channel + studio c = terrible fake news backdrop.

I'm guessing the 'official' reason is nothing London centric is allowed as a backdrop on the NC, and 'continuity' in terms of backdrops is seen as more important for the NC than on World, so during simulcasts the out of focus and blurred newsroom backdrop must be used. Apart from overnight when no one is watching the NC anyway.

The thing with London-centricity is that it isn't even a real backdrop anyway (in that it isn't geographically accurate). There is no reason they couldn't make one with landmarks from across the UK.

But I've always assumed the reason is a mixture of templates and to hide the fact they've moved studios - originally it was only used for the News at Five. I know that it is shot from a different position, but to the casual viewer its a lot less of a noticeable change than switching to a skyline backdrop that is otherwise unseen on BBC News in the UK.

Maybe because of the agreement with PBS?

It’s seen in the uk on the 5am hour everyday and occasionally on Sunday mornings when they use studio C due to marr being in E. it’s actually a really nice background a lot nicer than the night time version and the horrible newsroom one.

I think you're possibly right. I've noticed on some daytime simulcasts (normally on a Sunday AM) if they're using the skyline backdrop it's usually the same worded intro as what's used overnights (this is BBC News, I'm *INSERT PRESENTER NAME* our top stories). If they're using the fake newsroom backdrop it's normally the more long worded intro (this is BBC News with the latest headlines for viewers in the UK and around the world). I can only assume the latter is News Channel produced.

It makes you laugh really that there is an idea that UK viewers can't cope with a London background on the national news, but they didn't think twice about decamping and hosting from the middle of Westminster from days on end for key Brexit and election stories over the last few years.