General Presentation/Logistics Questions

The cameras were composited with the graphics up-stream of the vision mixer - so when you cut to a camera on the vision mixer, it already had the graphic elements composited in.

There were some clever keying techniques used. There were clever tri-level key signals used to force foreground, force background or 'use a CSO key'. This allowed you to have an area of permanent studio camera, an area of permanent graphic, and just a small area of CSO just where you needed it (say around a presenter's shoulder). Therefore only the bit of set in the precise area of overlap needed to generate a good key, and using much more complicated shapes than you would have with a simple CSO mask.

The Nine O'Clock News always impressed me the most - as the studio flat behind the presenters (apart from during the 1997 election I think) had a real blue and orange map behind them - but the blue area was the bit they needed to key off, whilst the yellow bit was always fully masked when an inset was keyed in).

For it's time it was a brilliant realisation using existing technology (analogue component laser disc players, chroma keyers, Charisma and a simple control system to lock them all together allowing some very clever sequences) - though in on-screen terms it was pretty cold and distancing, and the wide shots really were very OTT. (And when it went wrong - more often than not on Breakfast News - it went wrong stunningly! I remember a BCU of someone's eyes filling the little hole for the studio elements in the virtual wide shot)

Real window from studio into the newsroom - they knocked a wall down in N3 I think. ISTR that the One, Six and Nine, for a time, all came from different studios - with the One (white era) in N1, the Six (blue filing cabinet era) in N2 and the Nine (acquarium era) in N3, though some headline sequences required two galleries to work together (I think the Flying Fishfinger Nine did) I think Newsround was in N2 as well at this point.



The fake lights were pre-rendered into the CGI on the laser discs - and timed to the music. There was no live CGI rendering - it was all pre-rendered and just played from laser. (And I doubt the lighting desk had GPI outputs - it was probably decades old!) Remember that the virtual set elements were just video recordings played from laser discs under the control of a box that could also control Charisma (to tie the DVE moves that inserted the camera shots into the pre-rendered wide shots) I think it was a case of the Lighting/Vision person just doing the real lights down at roughly the same time as the virtual lights down happened (which was usually a music cue as well?) And to be honest lights ups and downs are quite forgiving of timing errors.

In this day of servers, computers and all other sorts of technical wizardry, are there still telephone handsets on or under the presenters desks, in case the gallery needs to tell them something important when all such gadgetry fails?

I only ask because the image above of Sissons and Ford on the Six reminded me about the two blue telephone handsets which used to be deliberately visible on top of the desk. Then recalling that I haven't seen a telephone on any newsdesk for yonks!

Curious about that random small monitor that's placed on the floor in front of the desk. Is that for the studio mice to watch?

Talking from my experiences; they rely on talkback systems which are essentially two way radio link to the gallery, nothing more complex than that, so that's how they'd relay messages to the presenters. I also think you can listen to them if you know the frequencies and have a scanner

Historically the phones were a final backup and for producer->presenter comms, whereas talkback (which wasn't universal in days gone by) was for director->presenter comms - which wasn't the same thing.

This BBC Presenter at Buckingham Palace today actually had that tablet app, which she calls a "genius little prompter app". Cool.

http://yfrog.com/h6iwyucj

Edit: what's that blue thing the gentleman is holding?

It looks like a folding reflector in a bag. One of these: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjlsP9KDjcs

Is that a remote control for the iPad that Mishal is holding? I didn't know you could get one.

It's probably specifically for the iPad prompting app - suspect it either plugs into the dock or the headphone socket (using the volume control buttons?). You can use an iPhone/iPod Touch as a hand controller for the iPad prompting app with some systems as well.

I've not seen it on the iPad - but Autoscript's main location prompting system has some very cool speech recognition facilities that allow it to follow your voice. (Better for entirely scripted set-ups than areas where you need to mix interview/ad lib stuff with scripted links)

And the blue bag is a Lastolite or similar bag containing a fold-up reflector (often white on one side and silver/gold on the other) or chroma-key backing (blue one side, green the other). Suspect in this situation it's a reflector to help cope with bright sunlight.

Sound: I remember in the "old" days, newscasters, whilst wearing clip-on microphones, also had a battery of microphones (usually two) mounted on the desk in front of them. I recall seeing this as recently as the BBC virtual glass operation.

Nowadays, there is nothing on the desk, partially because the design of the desktop doesn't contain a little alcove within which to hide the microphones, which also used to be nestled amongst the buried monitors.

Question: if - for whatever reason - the clip-on microphone fails, where or what is the back-up these days? And are there concealed microphones somewhere on the newsdesks which still act as back-up? If so, where are these positioned in the case of BBC, ITN and Sky newsdesks, because my eagle-eye can't see 'em??

Furthermore, IIRC, the old BBC News 24 studio (the current home of BBC World) used to have a pod on the right hand side as we look at the screen, where occcasionally the weather, business or sports would be presented from. Within said pod, I can vaguely recall seeing a small cable-mic just hanging down from the ceiling, obviously rigidified by some means. Am I dreaming this, or was there indeed a microphone dangling from the ceiling (obviously out of shot)?

Spurious and curious. (Midway down the attached page, you can see a wide shot of Trevor and the floor manager, which typifies the type of desk-top mic I am referring too. IIRC, that shot is only from ten years ago-ish. Thanks to TV Ark for the images.)

http://tv50.org.uk/news/itn/nat2/index.htm

There are usually spare mics rigged in news studios but often these days there are actually two mics attached to one clip:
http://www.canford.co.uk/images/itemimages/large/91-938_01.jpg

There are sometimes hanging mics suspended from the grid, especially over stand-up positions but desk mounted mics aren't particularly common in my experience these days. I have known floor-standing mics to be positioned under the desk (the kind of mic you used to see between Wogan and his guest on his chat show).

The usual reason for radio mics failing is the batteries going flat. While Radio mics give directors the freedom to get presenters to move between positions more easily, there is always the danger they'll stop working if the battery level isn't checked before a programme. A lot of sound ops will change the batteries in radio mics (and radio talkbacks) before each programme.

Wired mics are more reliable and can sound better, but can also fail - if the cable is damaged or unplugged, or if the phantom power fails (most professional mics require a 48 Volt charge to be present on the cable to power them, generated by the sound desk). Wired mics are often rigged for guest positions in news studios, as guests come and go, sometimes a 3rd of 4th guest mic might not be used in a while. If it was a radio mic you can bet your bottom dollar the time you needed it, the batteries would go flat.

http://www.radioandtrunking.com/prod-images/Motorola_TCR1000.jpg
Those are the talkback packs that were worn on Midlands Today, IIRC, might have been Kenwood, but very similar to the above.