The Newsroom

the great big BBC News studio shuffle

Studios now shuffled. (April 2006)

This site closed in March 2021 and is now a read-only archive
TR
TROGGLES
Dunedin posted:
cylon6 posted:
I was thinking why revamp the studios when they will be moving to Broadcasting House?


Because this now probably won't happen until 2010- it's entirely reasonable to refresh into a new studio for 4 years.

I think News 24 will be allowed one more minor refresh in a year or two (perhaps just one of either the left or right pod areas) before moving to the new BH.


If Broadcasting house is finished by 2010 it will be a miracle. Nobody really knows what they want. They have replaced the contractors, replaced the architect and replaced the BBC management. There are now yet another set of plans drawn up. The present news centre is only a few years old and there is nothing wrong with it. It certainly is big enough since about one third of the work force is due to be sacked or privatised in the name of Value for Money. How can they justify spending millions on this project? Don't believe the Private finance rubbish, all licience fee payers will be paying for this edifice for 50 years
NS
NickyS Founding member
TROGGLES posted:
Dunedin posted:
cylon6 posted:
I was thinking why revamp the studios when they will be moving to Broadcasting House?


Because this now probably won't happen until 2010- it's entirely reasonable to refresh into a new studio for 4 years.

I think News 24 will be allowed one more minor refresh in a year or two (perhaps just one of either the left or right pod areas) before moving to the new BH.


If Broadcasting house is finished by 2010 it will be a miracle. Nobody really knows what they want. They have replaced the contractors, replaced the architect and replaced the BBC management. There are now yet another set of plans drawn up. The present news centre is only a few years old and there is nothing wrong with it. It certainly is big enough since about one third of the work force is due to be sacked or privatised in the name of Value for Money. How can they justify spending millions on this project? Don't believe the Private finance rubbish, all licience fee payers will be paying for this edifice for 50 years

The News Centre is not big enough at the moment with various bits of News within the main TVCentre. The building at BH will hold the whole of News including the BBC World Service/News Online - they could certainly NOT fit into the News Centre.
RO
Ronant
So can anyone say when the new sets will be finished and ready for use? May 2nd was mentioned but someone said that it wasn't happening then - can anyone shed any light?
NG
noggin Founding member
BBC LDN posted:
cylon6 posted:
I was thinking why revamp the studios when they will be moving to Broadcasting House?


Although the move for News should begin at the end of 2008, it won't be complete until 2010. That would be a long time to go without a revamp.


Very few people believe TV News will be in BH by 2010 - 2011 or even 2012 are the current rumours.

Given that the current BBC One set is largely 3 years old (though the virtual newsroom backdrop refresh was relatively recently) - waiting another 5 or 6 years (until the current set was nearly 10 years old) would be far too long.
IS
Inspector Sands
TROGGLES posted:
[
The present news centre is only a few years old and there is nothing wrong with it.


It's older than you think, about 10 years old.

There's nothing wrong with the centre itself (except perhaps the air-con) but some of the broadcast equipment is a bit out of date and will need replacing/refitting before the move to BH, particually if BBC News goes HD in a couple of years
HA
harshy Founding member
James Hall posted:
archiveTV posted:
NickyS posted:
Not worth it's own thread but an interesting little snippet in Broadcast today ...

Graphics specialist Vizrt has signed a four year deal with the BBC to provide it with live rendered 3D graphics systems. The deal, worth between £1 and £2m, will enable the BBC to buy Vizrt graphics software at reduced rates. Networked news programmes and the larger national and regional stations are expected to be the first to take advantage of the rates.


Lets hope it's as successful as TOG.


No doubt Harshad Patel will still be there telling us there's a problem with the titles though! Razz


LOL Laughing
CH
chris
Inspector Sands posted:
but some of the broadcast equipment is a bit out of date and will need replacing/refitting before the move to BH, particually if BBC News goes HD in a couple of years


I think it will be less than a couple of years. The World Cup is coming in HD, all provided by the BBC. Germany are actually using the BBCs equipment to film all of the coverage in HD.

So, maybe the news will be in HD sooner than you think....
MS
msim
chris posted:
I think it will be less than a couple of years. The World Cup is coming in HD, all provided by the BBC. Germany are actually using the BBCs equipment to film all of the coverage in HD.

So, maybe the news will be in HD sooner than you think....


Is there really much point in having news in HD? I can understand the benefits (to a degree) for sports and drama programming but given that most news reports are pretty bog standard interviews etc it just seems like a waste of money to me. Do we really need to see John Prescotts face in full HD glory? *shudders*
PC
Philip Cobbold
msim posted:
chris posted:
I think it will be less than a couple of years. The World Cup is coming in HD, all provided by the BBC. Germany are actually using the BBCs equipment to film all of the coverage in HD.

So, maybe the news will be in HD sooner than you think....


Is there really much point in having news in HD? I can understand the benefits (to a degree) for sports and drama programming but given that most news reports are pretty bog standard interviews etc it just seems like a waste of money to me. Do we really need to see John Prescotts face in full HD glory? *shudders*

You can argue the same thing for if the news should have switched to being in widescreen, as it adds very little to the program. But when HD becomes the standard television format, viewers are going to expect everything new to be made in that format. It would almost be like converting everything over to colour, but then continuing to make the news in black and white.
IS
Inspector Sands
Philip Cobbold posted:

You can argue the same thing for if the news should have switched to being in widescreen, as it adds very little to the program. But when HD becomes the standard television format, viewers are going to expect everything new to be made in that format. It would almost be like converting everything over to colour, but then continuing to make the news in black and white.


Yes, the TV companies have to always be ahead of consumer demand and product supply in order to have the content ready for when the format becomes mass-market.

The BBC always like to be (and should be) first wth any new technology and HD is now actually available to Telewest and Sky customers. The first HD news channel (Al Jazeera International) will be launching at some point in the next few months. I predict it won't be long before before the beeb will be doing HD news.

It should be a fairly easy change compared with what has gone before - changing from digital SD to digital HD is far easier than analogue to digital or colour to black and white
NG
noggin Founding member
chris posted:
Inspector Sands posted:
but some of the broadcast equipment is a bit out of date and will need replacing/refitting before the move to BH, particually if BBC News goes HD in a couple of years


I think it will be less than a couple of years. The World Cup is coming in HD, all provided by the BBC. Germany are actually using the BBCs equipment to film all of the coverage in HD.


Err - not sure where you get that idea from. The BBC have only three HD units, and no more than around 20 HD cameras (until recently they only had one HD unit and fewer than 10 cameras) That is only about enough to cover ONE venue in HD...

It may be that a BBC unit is involved in the HD WC coverage - though I'd expect the BBC's HD effort to be concentrated on HD Wimbledon coverage which has been announced, and overlaps with the World Cup AIUI.

I've heard that pretty much all the HD kit in Europe is likely to be involved with the World Cup coverage - presumably Visions, Alfacam, Telegenic etc. are all working on it.

Quote:

So, maybe the news will be in HD sooner than you think....


The BBC have announced a 12 month trial - nothing more. To significantly upgrade studios and launch a service would require government approval - which will take time, however I would expect an HD service well in advance of 2012!
ST
Stuart
Does anyone have any idea what the new National News/Breakfast sets will look like. Rumours were we would see them next Tuesday, so presunmably someone has inside knowledge Laughing

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