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BBC ONE / TWO Clock

(March 2005)

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DE
denton
Steve D posted:
denton posted:
Steve D posted:
In those days there was a separate clock for the analogue pres area which was spot-on.


If the Clock used in your analogue Con was spot-on (exactly in time with network's Clock, with no added delay), how did you manage to manually cut from your Clock to the network feed without (a) catching a glimpse of network's Clock ... or (b) seeing you Clock move on to one-second-past the hour?


Easy! By that time the NTA were using Compass and their cut to presenter in vision - as I'm sure you'll remember - was fixed to go bang on the second. We were still using the old manual Pro-Bel mixer, so it was just a case of being quick off the mark and hitting the big orange CUT button (well, pressing it gently actually) the nano-second that you saw presenter in vision on your preset. In effect you had a second to execute the cut, and as the presenter always left a beat pause when they were cued, it was never a problem.

49 times out of 50 it worked and indeed, when I joined, letting the second hand move into the next quadrant before the cut was regarded as something of a hanging offence!

Strictly speaking it wasn't exactly sync to the network clock, it was sync to station timecode, the master clock of which was sync to the the same standard (Rugby LW) as network.


Ahh so it wasn't exactly the same as the network clock. Similar set up to ours then.

Although from memory we had a wee bit more slack as I was always able to lead sound when our Clock was -1 to the hour, close my mic' and hit the CUT button as hard as I liked at the top of our Clock's hour.

Not sure if our analogue Clock was synced to station timecode. I remember once finding that the engineers hadn't bothered to take account of Daylight Saving and I had to call them down with seconds to spare to get it correctly set before the junction.
SD
Steve D
denton posted:
Not sure if our analogue Clock was synced to station timecode. I remember once finding that the engineers hadn't bothered to take account of Daylight Saving and I had to call them down with seconds to spare to get it correctly set before the junction.


On one occasion when there had been some work going on in the racks, somebody partially dislodged the timecode connection to our Digi BBC One clock making it intermittently sync. During the junction up to the One, it went something like 10 seconds to 1..... 9 seconds to 1.... midnight.... 7 seconds to 1... midnight..... etc. etc. Highly entertaining to me sat in the Prep area, but not so amusing to the director in the chair!
BT
Baroness Trumpington
Steve D posted:
it was just a case of being quick off the mark and hitting the big orange CUT button......the nano-second that you saw presenter in vision on your preset. In effect you had a second to execute the cut ........when I joined, letting the second hand move into the next quadrant before the cut was regarded as something of a hanging offence!

Me too! My favourite game of "chicken" was seeing how long I dared wait before cutting off the clock at the top. Sad, really, but that's how life was in those days.
Bring back the screen clock, I say! If it helps push those dancing morons off the roof, it'll be doing a good service.
SP
Spencer
The thing which gets me about the accuracy issue of clocks on TV via digital platforms is that exactly the same arguments apply to radio via digital platforms.

Plus, bearing in mind that the BBC offers non-stop online streaming of radio but not TV, which can be up to a minute or so behind, I'd actually say the arguments for ditching time signals on radio were stronger.

However, does Radio 4 do away with the Greenwich Pips? Of course not. Those in TV presentation have just used this issue as an excuse to get rid of clocks because for some reason they're no longer deemed fashionable.
DA
DAS Founding member
Spencer For Hire posted:
The thing which gets me about the accuracy issue of clocks on TV via digital platforms is that exactly the same arguments apply to radio via digital platforms.

Plus, bearing in mind that the BBC offers non-stop online streaming of radio but not TV, which can be up to a minute or so behind, I'd actually say the arguments for ditching time signals on radio were stronger.

However, does Radio 4 do away with the Greenwich Pips? Of course not. Those in TV presentation have just used this issue as an excuse to get rid of clocks because for some reason they're no longer deemed fashionable.


Well that debate does make sense, but there is faint chatter that the days of the GTS are numbered... exactly the same argument is being used to try and get rid of the pips, though I would argue they serve as a punctuation mark as well as a time signal. You sort of know where you are. There was an argument made on a Today Programme feature about the pips that people really don't need to know the exact time and, in any case, the exact time is no longer possible thanks to digital. That may be true, but does that mean we should do away with the pips? Or the TV clock for that matter? I would say not.
GE
thegeek Founding member
Antz posted:
Maybe with the new controller at BBC One, it might make a return. I can see what people are saying about accuracy, but look at BBC News 24 for example. They have a clock on screen almost 24/7!

What's more, the new countdown introduced today has brought in more accuracy. Granted, nobody's going to set their watch with 25th of a second accuracy, but the numbers are there...
SJ
sjhoward
Surely if accuracy of a clock was a problem, then a clock showing a countdown rather than the current time could be used - something along the lines of the old school programming countdown.
PC
Paul Clark
I liked the clock, it was good at closedowns when the announcer would say goodnight, sometimes cutting to an ident showing, before it finished up. Those days are over, it seems - and what happened to Ceefax on BBC 2? I haven't seen it in a while.

Using idents instead of a clock is inappropriate at times - even the BBC know that, having to use a still frame of an ident without sound, preceding the most serious of announcements.

Well, there was a news report at 8, they just used a BBC News graphic and text I think...
IS
Inspector Sands
What is wrong with the clock on the front of the video recorder which is under/on/next to your telly. Failing that the clock on your arm?
:-(
A former member
Happy 3rd Birthday BBC1 Dancer Idents!
PC
Paul Clark
Joe Havard posted:
Happy 3rd Birthday BBC1 Dancer Idents!


And on the topic of clocks, sometimes I wish BBC 1 & 2 would turn the pres & idents clock back by 10 years, and stick with them.
SD
Steve D
Readers of, and contributors to, this thread may be interested in an on-line article here:

http://www.miketodd.net/other/gts.htm

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