To be perfectly honest with you, Hyma, I hardly watch BBC News at all. I get my news mostly from ITV and Channel 4 News with an odd half hour of BBC News here and there when needed. So, I can't be classed as one of your News 24 'oddballs'. If I've picked up on all of these problems from casual viewing, then there must be something wrong with the channel.
My comments were more aimed at Worzel and CBBC rather than yourself rob, I must also apologise for completely missing your big post on the previous page as if I'd read it then my post would have been a tad different.
Having said that, I'd take issue with two of your points, namely music and graphics. ITV have essentially rehashed the same tune three times in the last few years too, as have Channel 4. As for the graphics I don't mind the astons as such and think they're probably tidyer than the ever growing in width ones we were getting up to 2007.
What Worzel is suggesting though is that the News channel is bland looking because they're not moving around the set enough. Now whilst I can understand what he's thinking, he is wrong.
C*rol M*lia, of Look North fame used to do a dance around the set every night, however the set in Newcastle was a minor revamped version of the original 1999 set. It didn't have the ability to do snazzy effects like the opening to the 6 used to have with the big image and the stand up first story.
Things like this only work when the set is designed for it (which of course the 2003
N8 WAS designed for, as was its revamp last(?) year.
The current thing in
N6 is one of the shoddiest and most ill thought out sets in the history of television </digitalspy>.
Whilst the Barco studios might be innovative they have a limitation of being flat and boxy. Andrew Marr and Politics Show get around this by having lots of little bits of furniture and pillars. Indeed the original sets in the studio added lots of texture.
Look at the original desk for Working Lunch:
http://www.hymagumba.com/uploads/wl6.jpg
On that photo you have a desk with a 3D effect due to the perspex, you have a stylish chair, and probably most importantly you have a corner. They may seem a minor thing and the original implementation may have had problems with the mirrors but the corners are a major part of the set. Think of the original opening to the six when they introduced the "fab-filter" titles that unfolded into the studio. You had Sophie standing with a background on the wall, the desk behind her and the corner in shot.
I honestly think that without a major alteration to the set it's impossible to do anything with N24. The desk they have is too big, stuck in the middle of the studio and rammed up against the back wall and means that they always end up doing flat on camera angles. In fact lets look right this second at the channel, I bet I know what it'll look like.
oh yes, right up against the wall.
Now what Worzel is suggesting would be possible with the older style of set, but not with the current one, and even if it was possible, the utterly ghastly background to the set with its greys and miserable flat and blatantly fake newsroom design is not suited to it. At least the skyline of the original set had depth to it.
If they tried to do that in the current set it would look absurd, it's so pokey thanks to that desk. You essentially have two options aside from the desk:
Using the side wall as they do for sports updates. Now given that this looks stupid at the moment with the crappy laptop stand and odd angle, increasing the frequency of it will only make it seem worse.
In fact every time I see the sports presenter there, I think of this
http://static.desktopnexus.com/wallpapers/73683-bigthumbnail.jpg
It's like they've snuck in when the floor manager isn't looking, they have no ownership of their part of the set.
The other option, (or 2. for you numbers fans) is to stand in front of the desk. However as the desk is so big in comparison to the studio you'd either end up with a mega closeup or Jon Sopel straddling the thing, neither of which appeal to be.
But
having said this all
, whilst N24
*IS*
dull to look at, monsterously dull in fact, it retains the trustworthiness.
Whilst Channel 4 have also retained this, ITV News and (to a lesser extent) Sky have managed to degrade themselves by focusing too much of the dance of news rather than actual content. I actually cannot watch ITV News now without laughing at it's ridiculous titles and preposterous set, then the drivvel pretending to be reports appears and I turn off.
Sky meanwhile I can't put my finger on, but their set and over dramatic presentation diminish the reports (which mostly are still decent quality) look. This is one of the things, whilst N24 (pre-2008) and C4N have it right, and by the looks of it so do BBC World with their revamp today, it's very easy to tread into rubbish territory if you try to hard.
More stuff like this please!