CiTV & Ministry of Mayhem thread

Yeah, by default go out in widescreen (with links, titles, w/s programmes and trails in widescreen) and everything else pillar-boxed - even CiTV-type curtains would be satisfactory. Then on analogue, show everything 4:3.

The BBC do it perfectly well with sport - with the digital era well and truly upon us, is there justification for programme after programme appearing in 14:9 on analogue? Any director with a shred of respect for their work should ensure the picture looks fine in 4:3.

did leah mention about going w/s today?. some of the studio shots was tight though, and CiTV pinboards website did say it will go w/s soon.

That's a fairly good idea, we'll have to see what they do, after all it was only the first day. I wonder how many CITV shows are widescreen, I'd say the following:

4:3 - The Flintstones, All Grown Up!, What about Mimi?, Pirate Islands, Spongebob Squarepants

16:9 - Tiny Planets, Hilltop Hospital, My Parents are Aliens, Engie Benjy, Jungle Run, Meg and Mog, Art Attack, Globo Loco, Star, You Can Do Magic

Does that sound about right?

That's about it, most of the new homegrown stuff is 16:9 now (14:9 protected of course) and has been for the best part of the last two or three years. My Parents Are Aliens went widescreen either from the second or the third series, I know the first one was 4:3.

Well at least CiTV aren't as bad as CBBC when it comes to this issue, at least they have widescreen idents, I managed to catch the end of The Flinstones (I was watching Countdown) but it didn't look bad in 14:9, but I saw some of All Grown Up in 16:9 and it looked awful and I was watching this on a widescreen TV, but I saw a bit of My Parents Are Aliens in 16:9 and it looked alot better.

But why are they doing this now? Why didn't they do this on September 8th? Wouldn't have this been alot easier, or have they JUST installed these new cameras or the transmission equipment at Carlton Central?

Talking about My Parents are Aliens....

KIDS DRAMA: My Parents Are Aliens
Date: Wednesday 22nd October 2003 16:30 to 17:00 (starting in 8 days)
Duration: 30 minutes.
(New Series, Subtitles) "Age Concerns"
Children's drama series about extraterrestrial visitors. Josh's voice has broken. Brian and Sophie decide that they too should set about ageing, so Brian targets a local old folks' home.
Starring: Tony Gardner, Carla Mendonca, Danielle McCormack, Alex Kew, Charlotte Francis, Keith Warwick, Patrick Niknejad, Isabella Melling

Great scripting me thinks, able to interweave the cast developments into the storyline. Should be good. Looking forward to it. Even after seeing all these reruns I still prefer the old Sophie but beggars can't be choosers.

At last i saw more of the studio today not seen that much of it before.

I saw some of it and it looked like they had a massive safe. (Like the one out of The Parole Officer in the bank)

They do have a massive safe, i think it may be just a door. As the door opens towards the cameras, so they just have the door open when they walk out of it, you never actually see into it. It would have looked better if it wasnt on a white lit sheet, if they'd built a surrounding a bit like the door with a metal looking surrounding.

They keep making little tweaks to the set. But I would like it if the director started to use wide shots. It isnt the same not having a long shot of the studio before they go off air.

It will be interesting to see what they do with the studio at christmas.

Paint it red and green?

Or just leave it and pretend that there's falling snow but you can't see it because it's white?

I suppose it would be better to keep 4:3 programmes as 4:3, though watching the programmes today in 16:9 didnt appear to bad. With having a 4:3 tv, I had to put the letterbox on though, the dog escaped my picture in 4:3, it now appears to be 14:9 safe.

I believe that all idents and promotional graphics were created originally in 16:9, and they have simply cut them out. I didnt catch the start up ident in 16:9 as I only noticed when i saw the dog in its wierd position. The dog still looked big in 16:9, though it is very transparent which is a good thing.

It seems as though new technology has been installed at central west, as the problem before was something to do with the system in the studio gallery was unable to put out 16:9 images.

I wonder if they have purchased cameras that can produce 16:9 images; if they had them previously surely they should would have used them for bag the swag when he was dislayed on the studio 16:9 monitors (that explains the 16:9 monitors though). At times Leah's head did disappear out of frame at points, so perhaps what theyve done is cropped the live stream to 16:9, could this be done?