When Phillip talked about that incident on TV's Worst Nightmares (may have got that title wrong) he said that the Head of Presentation at the time had decreed that the BBC One Globe shouldn't be used in Children's sequences because "That's adult Television" ! Whether that's true or just Phillip adding to the story I don't know!
The globe had been good enough before Mr Schofield's time...
Am I right in thinking that he couldn't have got the clock up if he'd wanted to because the camera overplugged the clock's input on the mixer?
Am I right in thinking that he couldn't have got the clock up if he'd wanted to because the camera overplugged the clock's input on the mixer?
The clock and the camera were on the same channel of the vision mixer, with a switch to select whichever was required. This is why, if the announcer forgot to select the clock during Neighbours, you could see him huddled over the microphone in darkness introducing the Six o'Clock News.
When Phillip talked about that incident on TV's Worst Nightmares (may have got that title wrong) he said that the Head of Presentation at the time had decreed that the BBC One Globe shouldn't be used in Children's sequences because "That's adult Television" ! Whether that's true or just Phillip adding to the story I don't know!
The globe had been good enough before Mr Schofield's time...
Absolutely. Apart from a brief spell of introducing kids programmes over BBC Computer animations (generated live from the network control gallery!!) childrens programmes were introduced in just the same way all other programmes were, with the BBC1 Globe or clock. There were some unique children's slides (jigsaw slides anyone?) but with the launch of the In-vision continuity and separate Children's BBC branding, they decided that the BBC 1 Globe shouldn't be seen in Children's sequences.
Am I right in thinking that he couldn't have got the clock up if he'd wanted to because the camera overplugged the clock's input on the mixer?
The clock and the camera were on the same channel of the vision mixer, with a switch to select whichever was required. This is why, if the announcer forgot to select the clock during Neighbours, you could see him huddled over the microphone in darkness introducing the Six o'Clock News.
Not right, sorry! The vision mixer was a Cox Electronics device which combined video and audio sources. The camera (CON CAM) was on a separate button and fader, as were other sources including the CLOCK, SYMBOL (BBC1 COW), slide store, 3 "OS" (outside source) inputs, two cart machines, two microphones, two record decks, etc.
Not right, sorry! The vision mixer was a Cox Electronics device which combined video and audio sources. The camera (CON CAM) was on a separate button and fader, as were other sources including the CLOCK, SYMBOL (BBC1 COW), slide store, 3 "OS" (outside source) inputs, two cart machines, two microphones, two record decks, etc.
Well it's right according to the announcers who used to use it. You never saw an announcer accidentally put himself in vision just before 6pm then?
Come on then, is anyone going to let us mere mortals know how to get into this Broom Cupboard site? Is it locked out except to a chosen few? Obviously some of you have seen it, as you've commented on it.
Yet neither my home PC, my work PC nor my (future) in-laws' PC can access it.
It was there late last week when it was first mentioned on MHP Chat. I'm wondernig whether it's bandwidth issues as everything is on one page which includes near 200 jpegs which on my dial up just gave up on me so I had to manually right click and show picture for the remaining ones missing.
I've got the page with jpegs stored on my PC so if nobody objects, I could send it on as a zipped attachment to you.
Well it's right according to the announcers who used to use it. You never saw an announcer accidentally put himself in vision just before 6pm then?
It was a long time ago, but I'm sure I remember the Con Cam sharing a channel with something else - either the Clock or the Split Screen bank. In the "spare" suite, also known as Sub, there was a dangerous period when the Symbol channel on the Announcer's mixer was switchable to the output of a BBC computer which ran the Patman symbols for Children's BBC. I remember at least one BBC 2 evening junction where someone had forgotten to switch over and instead of the TWO symbol the viewers got something tasteful like "BBC Microcomputer NC3 Patman. Please select animation to run..." or whatever that primitive computer offered by way of a startup menu!
UK2.net offer no explanation for disappearance of the site, other than that there has somehow been a change to the DNS. It's been fixed and the site should be back soon.
I never saw an announcer put himself on screen into The Six and I'm sure it never happened. If it had, I'm sure I'd have heard about it!
It's possible that CON CAM may have piggybacked with PATMAN at sometime. Why the name PATMAN though?
Certainly by the early 1990s, CLOCK was on a separate button and fader. It was regularly punched up during CBBC airtime to allow Edd to play at being an announcer, and quack "This is BBC1" over said timepiece.
I actually bought the NC1 & 2 Cox mixers from BBC Redundant Plant when the 4th floor closed!
Well, very sorry Mr Taylor, but if it comes to deciding who to believe between the actual announcer who did it and an anorak who bought a second hand mixer out of the Elstree stores, I think I know who I'd go with.
There's a clip on MHP Private Parts featuring in vision Broom Cupboard on a March Saturday evening from 1993. Why you might ask. Well, Noel's House Party was due to air but was abandoned due to a bomb scare (or sommat similar) so they wheeled out an repeat of Noel's Christmas presents followed by Noel Edmonds in vision from the broom cupboard telling the viewers of difficulties in bringing the House Party and then he announced that there was time for Tom and Jerry to make up the spare five minutes left.
And ofcourse it was used the morning after the big storms ... if memory serves me correctly it was Nicholas Witchell sat in the box and john Kettley was wheeled in (and it was literally wheeled in) to squeeze next to him. That was before they managed to get a very plain looking Breakfast News on the air. I think they had power at TVC but not a Lime Grove which is where I think Breakfast came from - or it could be visa versa.
Had the pleasure of visiting the Broom Cupboard in my youth ... even sadder I had two interviews for jobs in the BC many many moons ago!