BBC1 Christmas

That'll be news to me, Dan, Mux and Marksi then. I think you'll find that most network scripts need at least a modicum of re-writing. Some of them need to be torn up and started from scratch - especially if there's a female announcer at network and a male announcer in the nations. Some of us are not comfortable with adding the word "phwoorr.." after the name of some supposed hunk of a film star/tv presenter etc. etc! Indeed those of us who are not Scottish would not be particularly convincing using the word "wee" as often as it sometimes turns up on network scripts.

Announcers in the nations would also tend to do a news intro in whatever style they were comfortable with.

The Scotland, Wales and NI announcers parrot the London intro word perfect, which does somewhat undermine the reason for having them.
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Eh, not quite true, the NI announcer said something along the lines of "welcome to Christmas on BBC1 Northern Ireland", I wasn't at home or I would have taped it.

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I will confess I don't get much chance to monitor the nations' output but when I do, scripts into network shows come across as almost verbatim. Especially when start times for the same programme vary. The BBC2 intro to "ATV Night" ten years ago being one case in point; I've seen both network and Cardiff links into the above.

Having done some CA scripting myself I appreciate you're not going to rewrite anything you don't need to in a fast-changing, fickle line of work. That said the announcers in Glasgow, Cardiff and Belfast do a sterling job of bringing individuality and the personal touch to their scripts.

At the same time as doing " CA scripting" as you put it, were you making up graphics, acquiring programmes and trails from tape or from another transmission area (local or remote), managing servers, listening to up to three galleries and a network director, making changes to schedules for timing purposes on a continual basis, previewing material, checking transmission and OFCOM forms while monitoring the output (on three platforms) in terms of vision, audio, aspect ratio, subtitles and audio description?

No, thought not.

Yes, sometimes we use the same scripts as the network annoucer because they'll be perfectly functional for the purpose. Often we don't. This may be because we have thought of something that we think is more relevant to our audience, or because we aren't showing the programmes that network are, at the times or the days that they are. We may have less, or more time on the symbol than the network announcer. Or, as Steve has already said, because the style of the network announcer is different to our own.

Yes and no actually. I made up all the graphics, sourced the programmes from tape, uploaded them and scheduled the timings "Presfax" style. Listening to other galleries was not required for GHTV, but checking TX was.


As I thought would be the case.


Regional ITV showed the importance of presenting programmes with your viewers in mind; what was right for the LWT audience may not have worked with TSW viewers, for example. Given the cultural differences between the nations and England it's a crucial part of the service.

tvarksouthwest wrote:

I'm not sure you can compare "GHTV" with BBC ONE in any sense.

True - for one thing our continuity wasn't live; God knows how it would have gone if it was! And we were the gallery. But we could react to the unplanned if necessary and there were a few occasions where TX failed and extra showings had to be organised at short notice.

So you're basing your assertion on 1 link from 10 years ago?

You've forgetten to add that your "channel" was also in breach of every relevant copyright law. Indeed you comparing what you did on "GHTV" to what I do is kind of insulting though I guess you don't mean it that way. Can we stop now and get back to Christmas?

I hate to break it to you, but hoping for 'Pages from Ceefax' instead of News 24 isn't really the most efficient way of browsing the glorious content Ceefax has to offer.

Maybe not Barney, but I'm hoping for it nonetheless.