Best and worst BBC regional news studios

Slightly off topic but any other region would have a hard time if they had to take shots of the North West Tonight titles, as you can clearly see Salford Quays, Liverpool, Blackpool, Jodrell Bank and a coupld of houses below the Runcorn Bridge!

I have watched other regions titles and I don't like to say this, but there isn't that many landmarks that I recognise on them, except for places like the Humber Bridge.

But Look North Leeds took NWT's footballers running over the bridge, and NWT took Look North Newcastle's paddling kids too -- both very non-descript pieces of film, which really could be anywhere. Though it does seem only the three northern regions doing all the main swapping and sharing.

Those dogs in Dukesfield [Runcorn] made way some time ago though..
Three prettier places than Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland you'll struggle to find, yet the maps are still used there, which is somewhat boring of them.

And from the three BBC regions I knew before 1999, I don't think the generic look brought in that year improved any of them in the slightest.

I agree. A few of the regions have started looking quite nice since they replaced the mustard yellow with red and improved the graphics (a bit...), but I don't think the original corporate look actually made any of the regions look better - just consistent.

The problem was (and still is, to a certain extent) that the corporatisation of the regions was poorly thought through. It was a nice idea, but very badly implemented in most regions. For starters, while the idea of a 'window' was a nice one, many of the regions just couldn't handle it - so we ended up with some regions using dodgy CSO or screens that were far too small. Plus, of course, a lot of the background images were invevitable very browny-grey (buildings), resulting in a very dull backdrop in many cases.

Basically, the studio design they settled on, with loads of beige and horrible mustard yellow, wasn't nearly good enough to be rolled out across the entire country - but they did it anyway.

When NWT adapted the coroporate look in April 2000, I thought it was a nice change to be honest, as there was a window now, a complete new look as they had now ditched the music which they had been using since the early 1990's, which by the year 2000 started to get out of date IMO, though I don't like the idea of the corporate look, I much prefer the look than the previous look which dated rather quickly IMO. Now luckily for NWT, their window looking on Oxford Road, Oxford Street and The Library doesn't look to bad, as you can easily see The Library, but to make sure it was Manchester I would prefer a shot of the Town Hall or something like that. I didn't like the mustard set as it was dull and seemed like it came from an extremely small broom cupboard which it did literally and the CSO and self-op with the window looks terrible and with most English Regions not having 16:9 facilites it made it look worse. Though obviously most regions bulidings are pretty small.

Now I am just wondering, other than NWT and BBC Religion and probably GMR, what else do they do at Oxford Road? Because I have seen the back of it and it is huge, probably enough space for another studio or something.

BBC Manchester is one of the Network production centres. I believe they have a studio exclusively for network production, stuff like Question of Sport.

A fair bit of network radio comes from there, Mark & Lard on Radio 1 for example, as well as GMR. Isn't Manchester the "regional HQ" for the North region (ie North West, Yorks&Lincs, North East) which would imply the need for admin staff.

All the TV studios at BBC Manchester except for the local news one have closed. All production facilities - Studios, Post Production (i.e. all the BBC Resources parts) are now run by '360media' a company set up by Granada and the BBC. So any BBC programmes that are recorded in Manchester are done at Granada, but there are production facilities at Oxford Road.

The BBC building is soon to undergo some work - it is too big now that the studios aren't used and the rest is a bit shabby. Part will be redeveloped, possibly sold off and the rest upgraded and refurbished

Apart from religion and network radio (such as Mark and Lard and a large radio drama department) there is a large network production base including an Entertainment department, The 'I Love...' series was made there as are quite a few clip-based series. There is also a large current affairs base - currently making 'Real Story' for Monday nights. There is also an orchestra there - there is a large studio for them in the building