The Weather Forecast Thread

I'm sorry if I'm missing something here, but isn't this something Sky News has been doing with their weather for a number of years now?

And GMTV have been doing 3D fly unders for years as well.

What I can't understand is why they've made the land a muddy brown colour, compared to the bright lime greens and blues of the current look it looks very dark

I think the brown landmass makes it easier to see the difference between cloud/sun. I'm not sure that shading would work so well on green?

But still on that screen that's so fuzzy you couldn't make out the old symbols, so God help us with the new.

Will BBC World be using these new graphics? If so, will the launch coincide with the domestic services launch?

All services will be changed to the new system from 0600 on Monday.

I'm going to continue to say that we should wait for the full launch before we make a judgement.

BUT...

If the preview on South Today is representative of the whole package, then I'm left feeling distinctly unimpressed by it. In fact, I'm tempted to suggest that someone at the BBC Weather Centre may have gone completely mad. I can see the point in theory, but in practice it looks a bit dull, colourless, dark and boring.

And I agree, on days when it's sunny everywhere or cloudy everywhere it might be difficult to tell which the map is showing.

But, as I say, I'll wait until launch on Monday.

From what I saw on SET tonight, it didn't appear spectacular and looked harder to simply look up and see in a split second what it would be like in my area at a particular time. Obviously someone feels it's beneficial but if the symbols have been lost for good, I know a fair number will complain. Let's hope it's not change for the sake of it (not keen on the brown though!)

Here's how South East Today covered the story (6.8mb/2mins 30secs)

Asa

You may well be right, after all, green fields wouldn't all be the same green if it's anything like Scottish TV's 'flyover'. I was watching STV weather for the first time in a while this week and was genuinely impressed. Once they do the west to east 'flyover', they then focus specifically on a town/city and zoom in very closely. They did Edinburgh on the day I was watching and you could clearly see Arthur's Seat (a prominent extinct volcano in the city) and all the patchwork of different coloured fields around the outskirts of the city. They still use a big symbol of a sun though - just to be clear.

From the caps on page 14 though, it looks like the new weather will probably be most effective on regional forecasts as you are closer to seeing exactly what will happen. I hope the UK animations don't go too fast - may be hard to judge the weather for the country as a whole that way.

BBC Scotland never gave us a preview at 6.30pm, but looking at BBC Newsline on the web - they've confirmed the symbols have gone for sunshine, and shown the movement symbols for wind - very like Sky's.

The 'whole of the UK' view might get a few complaints from those in the far north of Scotland though. Shetland's tiny from the angle they seem to favour.

Well it's official it will debut THIS MONDAY!!!

Read more here:-

http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2005/05_may/14/weather.shtml

We know.

OOPS!! All looks a bit bland though, the current maps are supposed to be photo realistic so why replace it with maps that aren't. Mind you, I missed a lot of the sneak peeks that everybody here are referring to so maybe I've got a false impression.