ITV News

It's chromakey. It stands for colour selection overlay I think, but i'm not sure. It's when they have blue but more commonly green screen backgrounds, like the 'theatre of news' which allows them to do all sorts of things, like during Wmbledon (my favourite 'chromakey moment') when they put Mark Austin into a tennis pitch, when he was just inside the studio. However, most of the ITV News involves chromakey, if you've ever seen shots of the studio without it turned on, it's very interesting.

Talking about SKY News giving the other news channels a niche at doing something different - I was thinking about the difference leading upto the hour from xx:55 - xx+1:00 (for example 20:55 - 21:00)

SKY seem to go for an advert break at 20:55 - 20:58, have a 30 second mention of the top two stories, then at 20:58:30 have a one minute weather update, followed by(the already bland) top of the hour countdown studio swoop with the headlines beginning exactly on 21:00.

It does make sense as when channel hopping at the top of the hour, while most channels have ads, Sky News now has a preview and the weather, which people will probably watch for a couple of minutes rather than searching through, then perhaps stay for the following bulletin.

Indeed GMTV has always done a straight run through to TOTH, and I always wondered why News Channels don't do something similar - it's certainly more likely to keep you watching.

Such as this shot (which inexplicably has "Breaking News" superimposed on the background):

http://www.rp-networkservices.com/tvforum/uploads/itv3.jpg
It really looks cheap and second rate when compared with the new Sky News newswall

Nina Hossain currently co-presents the ITV Lunchtime News with Nicholas Owen. She also does regular presenting on the ITV News Channel. Nina, 30, was born in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire.

Stuart, where did you get that shot from? By the way, the 'Breaking News' is projected onto the greenscreen to aid the presenter, so he or she knows what is actually appearing on it, otherwise it would be rather hard to guess!

When does Nina present on the News Channel, or are ITN trying to make her feel important?

well that would hardly make her feel 'important' would it? It would probably do the opposite.

I can only remember her presenting on the NC a couple of times - at Christmas, and when she carried on after the Lunchtime news in the wake of the London terrorism this summer (not the tube bombings).

the 3pm when she was preseting the Evening.