BBC Breakfast

I don't think it's a pity they moved to Salford, I just think the choice of facility used was wrong in too many ways. MediaCityUK has much to offer, but this wasn't the best choice.

I think it's probably time the BBC considered moving Breakfast to something more befitting at Salford. they've proved the point that it can still be successful outside London, but at least let it use a decent studio in that location.

I wonder if they could do something using virtual/AR techniques to paint out the ceiling and replace it with a virtual height extension?

In fact, with that kind of technique they could take out some of the screens on the long wall to reveal the windows, and have a green cyc that could be pulled across in front in the winter months, in a similar vein to how Granada turn their set around to avoid the Daybreak effect?

I agree and it is obvious Breakfast moving was very much an after thought rather than always planned for. Aside from the practicalities I also think the Breakfast set just looks tired (and was pretty much out of date once it was installed). It always looks better when they relight it and along with a new sofa they could probably freshen things up quite easily in the short term if they wanted too. The graphics are long overdue a revamp too - they created something quite modern but on brand for the 2016 Olympics and again for their "Big Breakfast" special using the views of Media City and I don't understand why they didn't develop that further.

I've been working on and off for a long time on a mocked up set design that works in the awkward studio space they have without looking quite so visibly awkward. I don't have the exact dimensions (I wish I did!) but I think I'm reasonably close after many, many incarnations and I reckon it's possible to squish in an NBH-style set:



The challenge would be getting decent shots without cameras all over the set, but I think with some clever set positioning and masking (the bit I'm still working on) it's possible to do.

They should just do a curved/circular set of screens around the sofa if they can’t make an L shape, even if it means losing one of the screens. It just looks like a botched job as it stands.

Something like the Newsround set perhaps?

The Breakfast/North West Tonight studio situation has always baffled me - I remember in the build up to the move for North West Tonight they had a reporter in what they described as their 'new studio', and have managed to find it on YouTube:



Of course they never ended up in a ground floor studio with piazza view, and even if they had they'd still be in a weirdly shaped and generally inappropriate studio - who thought it'd be a good idea to designate a space that starts out really wide and then goes hugely narrow with a massive pillar in the way as a TV studio?!

That might be the current Winter Olympics studio (aka meeting room) right at the end of the report?

No, I think the ad hoc studio is on the top floor of Dock House (where the non R5 radio studios, and part of BBC R&D are). Breakfast/NWT/Radio 5/Radio Manchester/BBC Sport are in Quay House

https://www.flickr.com/photos/dullhunk/15783147160

You can see it quite clearly in the 3D view of Google Maps. The top of Dock House is the only building with the balcony going around and square (!) walls.

At first glance, i thought that was some fancy VHS tape.

I've always found the Breakfast set ridiculous and too artificial - time for a refresh and move to London or even Birmingham. The set is too big for what is required: one news desk. The Breakfast programme itself is not exactly inspiring any more with GMB now ahead of the game in terms of image and style.
BBC spend saft amounts of money on CGI backgrounds for its regional news programmes instead of a real newsroom background opaqued or a proper news set. Why the need for BBC or ITV News to have bodies in the background to show how busy they all are or banks of monitors is beyond me.
Sorry, rambling over...