The Newsroom

The NEW Central West and BBC Midlands thread

Suzanne Virdee's sudden departure from BBC Midlands (September 2004)

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NG
noggin Founding member
Inspector Sands posted:
noggin posted:
Surely even if they weren't coming via the Mailbox they'd be in 16:9 on DTT as the feed to DTT/Satelite would be the same as the one for the East Midlands?


Nope - if they were coming from Nottingham but being routed via Pebble Mill's news gallery (which was still 4:3 analogue) they would go out as 14:9 on DTT. (Satellite could be re-routed in London though)


I meant the easts output going direct to the west transmitters without any gallery or building in between - Pebble Mill and Mailbox both being bypassed completely[/quote]

That would be very difficult to engineer I believe - the DTT system isn't set up for this kind of routing - it isn't like analogue where you could re-route an analogue video feed with Sound In Syncs (and replace the opt-out ID in blanking) This is because there is more done prior to the transmitter - like coding and muxing - and this involves regional specific data. I think if you did a straight patch of the data anyone retuning their DTT box would get duplicate BBC One services - as the East Midlands service has a different MPEG2 broadcast ID and the box will think it is a different channel to the West Midlands BBC One. This is a recipe for disaster...

Easier to organise for DSat I suspect though - as you could probably just duplicate the East feed into the West chain.
WT
The World Today
noggin posted:
The World Today posted:
noggin posted:

Yet again a studio designed for a wide shot


I AM BEING SINCERE - That has got to be one of the most intelligent comments I've heard in relation to studio design in this day and age. I can't think of one studio that has a decent MCU or CU these days, in the past great examples of this were ITN's News at Ten and LNN's London Tonight.


Much as I dislike many other things about it - BBC World's main presenter shot looks like it has been purposefully designed. I also quite like BBC Three's presenter shots.


Yes I suppose you are right the BBC World News MCU is a nice shot and has clearly been desinged with that shot in mind. (Haven't seen BBC Three yet) The Midlands Today MCU isn't that offensive though but maybe we'll see more tonight.
MB
Mr.B
gillw posted:
Just as a matter of interest, does anyone know where Pebble Mill got its name from?

Ah well... I've received the following from someone at the Mill, watching this thread... he says...
My Mate posted:
It's in Pebble Mill Road. I think there was also a medieval mill in the immediate area. There we go!
Even the Shell Garage on the Pershore Road has changed to become Texaco now. When it was the Shell garage it was called Shell - Pebble Mill. That's all gone now!

Plus, a few years ago a brand new housing development near the entrance to Cannon Hill Park & the Edgbaston Cricket Ground in Brum was christened the Pebble Mill Estate... so at least the name will continue, even if the most famous building in the area is to be flattened... Crying or Very sad
TV
tvmercia Founding member
it was all very exciting wasn't it!!

its all looking pretty fab, and the lenses they're using make the studio look 100x bigger than it really is. all they need to do is tweak the headline graphics - and totally re-jig the name captions - they weren't looking as "odd" as that last time i saw. perhaps it was a spur of the moment thing Laughing

shame there was no signing on the 3.25 bulletin - i really do hope they haven't dropped it. a worthy feature bbc mids have bothered with for as long as i can remember!

the next *biggie* will be whether or not kay's midlands breakfast system premiers tomorrow Shocked
SA
Salty Founding member
Anyone else notice a skip in sound and vision when the Mailbox opts on analogues?

My opinions - The headline music needs to be changed to thunderclaps – or toned done a lot, it doesn’t work. And why do we need to be reminded that we’re watching midlands today on the astons? If they got rid of that, they’d be able to have a smaller live bug – the current one is far to big for what it displays.
CW
Charlie Wells Moderator
Anyone got some captures?
TV
tvmercia Founding member
Salty posted:
And why do we need to be reminded that we’re watching midlands today on the astons? If they got rid of that, they’d be able to have a smaller live bug – the current one is far to big for what it displays.

its not having "midlands today" there thats causing the problem - they just need to use the format they were using previously at pebble mill - it worked fine. just tweak the colours if they must.

i personally think its nice to have the programme name on the aston.
JC
Jack Carkdale
Aah... different daytime and evening variants of the title sequence it seems...
ND
ndp
I only caught the end, just before the went to some cheap tatty studio elsewhere... Wink

Seriously, the new MT certainly looks puts the national news to shame. I can't think of any news programme in this country that looks better IMV.

(Though I didn't like the headlines graphic)
JC
Jack Carkdale
19:00 , and the Midlands Today website still looks as it has looked for weeks/months, no Mailbox overhaul yet. Even the Pebble Mill postal address is still shown at the very bottom of the front page. Rolling Eyes

http://www.bbc.co.uk/england/midlandstoday
ST
South Today
tvmercia posted:
it was all very exciting wasn't it!!

its all looking pretty fab, and the lenses they're using make the studio look 100x bigger than it really is. all they need to do is tweak the headline graphics - and totally re-jig the name captions - they weren't looking as "odd" as that last time i saw. perhaps it was a spur of the moment thing Laughing

shame there was no signing on the 3.25 bulletin - i really do hope they haven't dropped it. a worthy feature bbc mids have bothered with for as long as i can remember!

the next *biggie* will be whether or not kay's midlands breakfast system premiers tomorrow Shocked


Do you know what happened to Kay today?
TV
tvmercia Founding member
South Today posted:
tvmercia posted:
it was all very exciting wasn't it!!

its all looking pretty fab, and the lenses they're using make the studio look 100x bigger than it really is. all they need to do is tweak the headline graphics - and totally re-jig the name captions - they weren't looking as "odd" as that last time i saw. perhaps it was a spur of the moment thing Laughing

shame there was no signing on the 3.25 bulletin - i really do hope they haven't dropped it. a worthy feature bbc mids have bothered with for as long as i can remember!

the next *biggie* will be whether or not kay's midlands breakfast system premiers tomorrow Shocked


Do you know what happened to Kay today?

no Sad

hopefully she was perfecting her news travel and weather system ready for tomorrow

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