BBC Newcastle Studios

Yep - and I think it occasionally did 9.28s as well - as the sound cuts on vision cuts and button klunking was unmistakeable.

ISTR that a lot of regions got GVG Master series pres desks to run their presentation studios - and these were used by station assistants/tech operators in some regions (with the desk often sited in a minigallery in the graphics area) or with a remote panel designed for self-op use (with different shaped buttons for different sources - circle, square, triangle, hexagon etc.? so you could feel your way to the right source if you got lost 'in-vision') and some regions used both (main panel in graphics for Breakfast, self-op for daytime etc.)

Quite a few regions had the ability to use either gallery with either facility - though it was often a case of just re-routing the vision inputs to the desk on the router to sources in the 'other' studio and ensuring the right mics were plumbed through, and the presenter was fed the right talkback.

AIUI many old-skool regions had dual opt-chains with Pres and the main studio able to opt simultaneously and independently - so that you could do programmes on both networks at the same time. This meant most regions had split pulses to allow them to genlock to either network and to select which network they were genlocked to (graphics and VT areas could only work to one pulse chain at a time) - though some networks fudged this by putting a synchroniser into the opt-chains and rather than genlocking to network they synchronised the studio output to network incoming feed AND then synchronised the network feed on the vision mixer (so you had a potential couple of frames of hop as the studio soft-opted - which you didn't get with the genlocked regions.) However if you genlocked and Elstree started doing naughty non-sync things AND you were still locked to network without a flywheel during the opt, all sorts of nastiness could ensue (VTs off lock etc.)

ISTR Bristol doing a variant of the opting simultaneously on both networks thing recently to run a different package about DSO on analogue and digital platforms.

That's quite tricky to do ISTR - as in most regions the digital opt-chain is slaved to the analogue chain (with a delay to match the coding delay on the digital network feed)- but I suspect if you dig around hard enough you can engineer it?

What I guess is that they overplugged the analogue opt switch with the pres gallery output rather than studio A.

Pres puts a feed of Studio A on its mixer and goes into circuit when A performs the opt in the normal way. (So digital is fed with Studio A in the usual way, analogue is fed with Studio A via pres). Pres stays in circuit for the whole programme; the round trip through pres shouldn't add more than a frame of delay, so the timings should be ok for a one off.

The only other complication then is subtitles, I believe they were only able to subtitle one output, so the subtitles would need to be blanked on the platform that didn't get them.

Yep - that would make sense - so the pres studio mixed away from the main studio output and played out an analogue-only item whilst the main studio output continued to play out the content for digital viewers.

Wonder if we'll get that 'pleasure' in BBC Midlands land?

You might - if they can be bothered to set it up. As noggin says, there is a great deal of engineering thought required to make it work. Bristol may have been helped by the fact that it's an older centre and Bristol Pres always did have the ability to opt on one network while the main studio opted on the other. In fact, Bristol Pres could (and did occasionally) take control of several 'downstream' regions at once - something that can't now be done since the rearrangement of the network distributuion. Transmission of Late Kick Off certainly wouldn't be the problem it is now had they left the distribution as it was. However, the old Bristol Pres gallery with the GVG Pres Desk is no more and has been replaced with a much newer (and I gather less liked) desk in the back of graphics. It's entirely possible that when the new pres gallery was put in, the ability to opt twice was got rid of. Especially as there's no support for opting on Digital BBC 2 at all.

Anyway, while The Shoebox does have a 'pres' gallery, it depends whether it has enough connectivity to split analogue and digital streams.

Editorially it's slightly different as the West Midlands has multiple switch over dates, West's was all at once. It's bound to be possible somehow but whether the will (or imagination) to do it is there is another matter

I'm not sure it was as occasional as you might think. The West, South and South West regions all took a weekly Sunday lunchtime political programme from Bristol. Originally London Switching Centre (until it shut, and then CAR) would switch a Bristol to London contribution circuit into the BBC2 distribution for Southampton (Plymouth was fed via Bristol). Eventually they diverted the Southampton network feeds via Bristol, so Bristol Comms could do all the switching themselves and to free up the contribution circuit.

Apparently Hannington didn't like the Bristol originated signal and would frequently flip over to RBS Crystal Palace.

I didn't know that - how long ago was this? The last time I remember it being used via the old Pres Gallery was for Restoration in 2005 - a series of BBC 2 opts to South, South-West and West regions. I believe for TX of Late Kick Off, there has to be lines booked from Southampton (where the show is recorded) to Bristol and Plymouth where there also need to be pres galleries staffed as well to perform the opt from Network to Southampton...! Progress...

Not sure on a date, but from the anecdote I'm basing the above on if you could find out when LO SWC closed you'd be in the right ball park. The pan-regional programme was called 'Westminster South and West'.

Apparently it wasn't long after the circuits were routed through Bristol and Plymouth and Southampton started to produce their own political programmes.

Thought I'd share some pictures of the two studios at BBC Southampton. These were taken during the final days of the fit-out in about 1990:

A very empty Studio-A which shows the lighting support system noggin mentioned, albeit without any lamps:


And a shot of Studio-B, which appears to be being used as a camera store when this was taken.