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cue dots

hope thats the right term (November 2005)

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AL
Allan100
hi, what are the function of these and why don't you tend to see them now days?

Thanks
BO
BOL I0X
From my experience, they where to notify either the viewer or the controllers that an advert was coming up. You see it now and again nowadays, but it's probably all gone digital.
ST
Stuart
BOL I0X posted:
From my experience, they where to notify either the viewer or the controllers that an advert was coming up. You see it now and again nowadays, but it's probably all gone digital.


They were certainly never for the viewers' benefit, purely for technical reasons AFAIK, on BBC 30 seconds before the news, and on ITV before the adverts were due to start (although I think that was only a 10 second cue).

They are often still seen on 16:9 where you are watching in letterbox mode (as I do). I seem to only recently ever see the " II " which BBC use; For along time I can't remember seeing the old "white square" which was familiar on ITV on the old "4:3 only analogue" signal if the picture was slightly mis-aligned on the set itself.
AN
Ant
StuartPlymouth posted:
BOL I0X posted:
From my experience, they where to notify either the viewer or the controllers that an advert was coming up. You see it now and again nowadays, but it's probably all gone digital.


They were certainly never for the viewers' benefit, purely for technical reasons AFAIK, on BBC 30 seconds before the news, and on ITV before the adverts were due to start (although I think that was only a 10 second cue).

They are often still seen on 16:9 where you are watching in letterbox mode (as I do). I seem to only recently ever see the " II " which BBC use; For along time I can't remember seeing the old "white square" which was familiar on ITV on the old "4:3 only analogue" signal if the picture was slightly mis-aligned on the set itself.

I see it on The Paul O'Grady Show everyday (in letterbox).
IS
Inspector Sands
As their name suggests they were for cueing the next item, the clever thing about them was that as they were carried in the picture if all other means of communication (i.e. talkback) failed they would still be seen.

They aren't used so much now because of digital and satellite delays - if you're using an off-air source to provide your cue you might not see it until 5 seconds later by which time it's too late
NG
noggin Founding member
ITV and the BBC used them in opposite ways.

In ITV - the studio would put up cue dots to signal that they were about to throw to an advert break. That way every regional advert playout area could see the dots - even if they didn't have talkback - and know that they had to standby to playout their adverts. (In this case the studio or OB, or even VT playout!, was using them to "talk" to presentation areas)

The BBC used them to allow network presentation to warn a studio they were about to go on-air. That way if an OB or studio lost talkback from presentation, if they could see off-air or network they could take their signal from the cue dots. (In this case the network presentation area was using them to "talk" to the studio or OB)

The BBC stopped using them when digital distribution and transmission was introduced, as the delays introduced by these methods meant that you couldn't accurately time a junction from off-air.

However the BBC now use them in a more ITV style - specifically at Wimbledon - where they are used (and appear visibly in the 4:3 centre cut out portion of 16:9) to signal that a court feed is about to stop being multi-lateral (i.e. core coverage for all broadcasters) and start being unilateral (i.e. a BBC interview that other broadcasters might not want to take is about to happen)
AN
Andrew Founding member
Antz posted:
StuartPlymouth posted:
BOL I0X posted:
From my experience, they where to notify either the viewer or the controllers that an advert was coming up. You see it now and again nowadays, but it's probably all gone digital.


They were certainly never for the viewers' benefit, purely for technical reasons AFAIK, on BBC 30 seconds before the news, and on ITV before the adverts were due to start (although I think that was only a 10 second cue).

They are often still seen on 16:9 where you are watching in letterbox mode (as I do). I seem to only recently ever see the " II " which BBC use; For along time I can't remember seeing the old "white square" which was familiar on ITV on the old "4:3 only analogue" signal if the picture was slightly mis-aligned on the set itself.

I see it on The Paul O'Grady Show everyday (in letterbox).

I think GMTV still use them as well, just before going into the regional news. They'd come on supposedly a fixed time before the throw to the regions and go off 5 seconds before just as the sting starts, but due to the fluid nature of the post-news banter they could stay on screen for ages
NG
noggin Founding member
Yes - it is usually the ON to OFF cue-dot transition that is the hard count. They appear at an approximate time before the break - as an early warning - and then disappear again at a fixed time (say 5") before the end of that segment.

In the case of BBC cue dots the on and off times could be agreed with presentation, and often depended on how the show was starting.

If it was a 10" pre-roll for the titles, you might ask for cue dots to go on at 1'00" to TX, but then to go off at 10" to TX - so you ran your titles as the dots disappeared. If you were running on a 5" pre-roll you might ask for cue dots that disappeared at 5" to TX. You would always get Pres to flash their dots, to check you were seeing the right feed - occasionally a problem if you were doing an OB in Scotland, but not getting London network off-air, because Scotland were doing something else...

Occasionally BBC Europe (a BBC satellite feed that was also known as One/Two mix, and carried the best of BBC domestic output that the Beeb had the European rights to) - a precursor to BBC Prime but much closer to the domestic schedules - would be used to cue OBs coming from mainland Europe (say Athletics from Rome, or a Morning Worship from France) as the OB might be able to receive and see the cue dots on that (even if the programme wasn't going out on that network!) It was, and is, a very neat system - not universally used elsewhere.
SP
Steve in Pudsey
How do the pres areas in the nations manage to cue studio and OB based material, if the pres Director is announcing they can't really be doing a count on talkback at the same time, or does the automation do that?
MA
marksi
Steve in Pudsey posted:
How do the pres areas in the nations manage to cue studio and OB based material, if the pres Director is announcing they can't really be doing a count on talkback at the same time, or does the automation do that?


You can usually give them a count up to, say -15, at which point the assistant in the studio gallery will continue the count, and/or you will have told them that the symbol will be a particular duration. So if you are using a 12" symbol into the programme then they can count 12 to zero from the point they see the symbol. This only works if the production is studio based or has an off-air feed. If it isn't and hasn't then you can either agree a clock start time... or pre-record the symbol anno in order to do the count.

Of course there is always the option of doing the anno, closing the mic, opening talkback and yelling at them, but that's not really very neat... Wink
NU
The Nurse
In a moment of insanity I bought a machine that generates these things off Ebay for 99p! Annoying thing is that my telly cuts off far too much from the edges of the picture and I can only see the very edge of the dot. So it is now gathering dust in my rack.

I heard that on ITV the dots went off exactly 5" before the break was due to start because that's how long the VT machines playing the ads would take to start.
MA
marksi
The Nurse posted:
In a moment of insanity I bought a machine that generates these things off Ebay for 99p! Annoying thing is that my telly cuts off far too much from the edges of the picture and I can only see the very edge of the dot. So it is now gathering dust in my rack.

I heard that on ITV the dots went off exactly 5" before the break was due to start because that's how long the VT machines playing the ads would take to start.


Most VT's are run off a 5 second pre-roll.

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