BBC Children In Need 2001

Good to see Tim Vine on, doing a lot of quick silly gags, its just like Whittle!

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By the way, who were all those weathergirls, there were 2 I didn't recognise?
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Re, the newsreaders dance, I take it Anna Ford didn't want to take part, (Or Huw for that matter!)
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In relation to the regional opt outs, since 10.35pm, they've just consisted of a Film. Tom Ingall did the last live opt at about 9.40pm

(Edited by Andrew at 11:35 pm on Nov. 16, 2001)

Nice to see Tim Vine and Jeremy Vine both appearing - believe it or not they are, amazingly enough, brothers! (No - I'm not joking!)

The weather girls were :

Sarah Wilmshurt
Isobel Lang
Penny Tranter
Helen Willets
Carol Kirkwood

They have all appeared on BBC One, but the lovely and 'gorgeous' Carol was mainly News 24 until recently, when she started on Breakfast. (Though like all morning News 24 weather presenters she is also on BBC One after the early news summaries.)

Helen W moved from BBC Wales to TV Centre to help launch the News 24 weather service, but quickly moved to present on BBC One as well.  Sarah W started, I think, on BBC World, but now appears on all outlets.

(Edited by noggin at 11:38 pm on Nov. 16, 2001)

Yes it was Penny Tranter I didn't know the name of.

Wales is similar, with lengthy opt outs, so I keep having to switch to the analogue signal from BBC West (just across the channel). Fuzzy, but watchable.

Anybody know why the nations are doing their own thing much more than usual this year?? Surely this is something they could have done on the interactive service by taking Walking with Beasts off for teh night, and replacing it with regional CiN.

Steve

Yep - but BBC Interactive is only really available to digital satellite viewers... So the main point of getting people involved locally would be lost.

It does sound like the Nations are doing more than usual (or maybe similar), but the English regions have been massively cut back. Only 5'00'ish opts, rather than the longer 10'00' - 20'00' of years past.

I think they have been going to the Network OBs for quite long periods, and I think the OBs may also playing in their own VTs (if the problems during Portsmouths VT were anything to go by), instead of the regional opts. This would allow the Television Centre studio to reset (and possibly rehearse) the next items, which they used to do during the opts in previous years.

Nice to see they kept a regional bounce song in (though not as impressive as the past few years when there were 13+ regional choirs all, almost, singing in-sync)

It is a pity that the English regions are not doing as much - it'll be interesting to see if it has any impact on the regional totals... If they give them.

Sarah started on Radio Five, where she was the mian morning forcaster for a couple of years

As regards the regional optouts, I have to say that I'm REALLY not impressed with BBC North West this year. Opting has seemed to me to be VERY poor - randomly disappearing from London and playing RECORDED bits telling us why we should donate.
Surely Diane could have stayed around at least until ten? She's done it solo before now - anyone else remember Pudesy's Loft or whatever they called it a couple of years ago?
I wasn't expecting much when I heard on MHP that the BBC had cut back regional input , but this really took the biscuit.
Sorry, but in my opinion, extended OBs from bloody Doncaster really DON'T serve as any substitute for at least ONE live regional o0t...

OK, rant over now!

I heard a terible rumour that Susan Osman, of News24 overnights and Points West, was going to sing!!!!!! Can any West Country folk let us know if she actually carried out this threat!

Well - BBC London has been opting out with entirely VT reports. No studio at all (that I have seen)

BBC DSat (in England) has been carrying on with VT (I presume played in from the CIN main programme as it is widescreen, and different to London)

BBC South seemed to have an OB early in the evening, with Roger Johnson, their sports presenter, as sole presenter, linking into VTs. I think this may well have been the Portsmouth OB used by the main programme. The later opt was from the So'ton studio, and may well have been on VT - no way of knowing really - though it may have been tight to get Roger from Portsmouth to So'ton in time.

Anecdotally BBC North (Leeds) have been using Tom Ingall at the Doncaster OB.

Does anyone know if BBC East Midlands, or Midlands, linked from Leicester?

If so then it would make sense - the regions with big OBs got to use them for their short opts - those without either stuck to VT, studio as-live and VT, or live studio and VT.

Of course - I think one of the best bits of this years CiN has been the cute animated Pudseys.

I think they've managed to finally give him a real character - pressing the remote controls, jumping around on the menu astons.

The dancing Pudsey in the big projector during the music numbers always raised a smile!

Well,it's over!

Great thing just said by David just now into Weatherview- 'Well the weather's rather boring. Compared to all that today it's rather dull'

Noggin - one thing I've always wondered about these regional music items each year...

how do they sync up the regions so everyone is time (with all the other problems that occur, this never seems to go obviously wrong).

Do all the OBs get sent cue from TVC, even if there were a fraction of a second delay it would be quite obvious - and presumably the time delay each region's feed will be slightly different?

William