Channel Television gone widescreen?

Was just randomly channel surfing, and noticed that Channel has all their adverts and programmes in widescreen, even their local promos are in widescreen. When did this happen?

Don't know. However, there's something wrong. Just seen an ad break, local and national commercials were indeed 16F16 (full screen 16:9). However, the programme currently showing, Murder She Wrote which is 12F12 (4:3) on the rest of the ITV network, is 14P16 (14:9 pillarbox) on Channel.

I've not yet looked, so can't be certain, but remember that Channel going widescreen involves issues both at Channel themselves in St Helier and with the "dirty" feed of Meridian south, which has traditionally been the "intended for analogue consumption" one in a mixture of 4:3 and 14:9.

If one half has been upgraded, but the other hasn't as yet, there could be some "odd" results for a while.

They must have upgraded their cameras and equipment. Watching Channel now and Puffins Pla(i)ce is in 16:9 and I'm assuming Channel News will be he same as well.

EDIT: Time, Temp and Time check is now 16:9 and also Channel News' graphics can now animate, and it's the current ITV Regional news graphics.

Can any of our Channel Island members tell us what's being put out on the analogue transmitters on the islands?

Is the Channel TV local 16:9 output being put out in 4:3 centre-cut or is it being arc'd into 14:9, as happens on the mainland?

What's Puffin's Pla(i)ce like nowadays? When does it air, and did they mention the widescreen?
It would have been something that would have been mentioned a few years ago.

Weekdays it airs in the slot where everyone else shows Regional Weather some time during the afternoon

Weekends it airs during the evening regional news slot

I haven't seen it for ages either, is it still Sam Palmano hosting?

AIUI Channel used to rebroadcast an analogue off-air feed of Westward, which switched to TVS when the franchises changed hands (TVS presentation overnight which wasn't blanketed by Channel included - Not In The Channel Islands text on trails for TVS stuff not shown by Channel) and then Meridian.

When ITV launched on DSat, the structure changed, and Channel were then fed directly via a fibre. (I presume this was from LNN / ITV Playout South) This may well have been switched from a 4:3 feed (as Meridian analogue transmitters would have been fed ) to either a permanent 16:9 feed (with 4:3 material pillarboxed) or a mixed aspect ratio channel - with either having embedded AFDs (Active Format Descriptors) to allow Channel to switch aspect ratios in sync with Meridian's output (just as the BBC do for their national variations on BBC One and Two) - for both their DSat and analogue feeds? (Different ARCs in ech path as they are serving a different function)

I suspect Channel Pres can over-ride the network AFDs - or ignore them when they aren't passing Meridian straight on - and all this aspect ratio stuff might be a bit new to them?

(Red Bee still get it wrong... A 16:9 film was broadcast in 4:3 centre-cut on BBC Four on satellite a couple of days ago - looked awful and switched part way through...)

Pretty well dead on there, noggin.

They used to get a fibre feed of the same signal that was being used for the Rowridge analogue transmitter.

I suspect that they're now getting, down the fibre, the same Meridian south feed as goes to Astra and to Rowridge for muxing up for DTT.

The other possibility, although less likely, is that their playout has been farmed out to London, Leeds, or Feltham (or even somewhere in Soho). Local live stuff, comes up the fibre from Jersey. The analogue transmitters, just as for BBC 1/2, could be fed directly from Astra.

I'd be very interested to see what the analogue output locally looks like.

Well it looks like its a widescreen programme being shown in 4:3 on Analogue.

Unfortuneatly I have no capping device. So the best I can do is a couple of pics taken on my Digital Camera. My analogue signal isnt the best either.

But there again before today I can't remember the last time I used Analogue to watch 1-4

Thanks. Why is the first image horizontally stretched, is that your TV incorrectly set, or is it 'as broadcast' ? It looks to me that there are black bars top and bottom, making the output 14:9 letterbox (aka 14L12) which is UK standard proceedure for non sports, 16:9 originated footage as shown on analogue.