Eurovision 2006

Not exactly very luxurious in 1999 was it? "Rabbit hutch" springs to mind. I imagine quite a few of the venues over the years (or at least those before health and safety regs became commonplace) required you to climb ladders and scaffolding to get to the commentary boxes..

What fantastic, entertaining, original and high-brow offerings are there on Dutch TV then?

Nice of the Greeks to flaunt their insecurity with that ludicrous mouthful for 'Macedonia'.

Greece may well be the cause, but Macedonia are always referred to as the Former Yugoslav Republic of... in Eurovision.

It's going to be a piss poor final this year. "We are the Winners" & "Teenage Life" are bad but what the hell are Finland on LOL!

The first year they appeared, they were referred to as 'FYROM' which is less of a mouthful, but does sound like a type of plastic!

Well on the final list they managed to squeeze it in... just!

http://www.rp-networkservices.com/tvforum/uploads/esc017.jpg

I'm VERY surprised that Slovenia and Belgium did not get through. I personally thought that both of them were certain!

That will only be the case for countries that take the 16:9 feed and convert it to 4:3 (or broadcast in 16:9 - like the UK but to people with boxes set to 4:3 cut). The EBU standard feed available to 4:3 countries will be 14:9 letterbox, and the graphics are 14:9 safe.

Well I enjoyed the added value of having Paddy live in-vision and some interviews and VT.

As for the semi-final itself...

1. Euro Disco is obviously VERY out. Belgium and Slovenia gave really strong performances - especially Belgium - and didn't even qualify. Nothing surprises me about Eurovision - but that is sad for Western European music IMHO.

2. The lighting is much less contrasty and dramatic - but you can see the backing singers and dancers better this year!

3. The coverage is far less dynamic - far more ped mounted cameras, and fewer jibs, and slightly less use of steadicam. The Skycam was interesting - but the picture quality from it was appalling - looked like a miniDV camcorder with a rubbish lens.

4. Sound balance seemed pretty good for most songs - certainly much better than the Istanbul semi in 2004.

(For those that don't know the coverage this year is not being done by the Swedes, who have done the last 5 years or so, as they are so experienced with their Melodifestival competition that selects their Eurovision entry, and is 4 weeks of shows on a similar scale. Instead a German team are directing and lighting. The set is AIUI, as in previous years, a British constructed offering.)

I don't know about the rest of you, but I certainly could tell that this wasn't being done by the Swedes. Compared to last year, the camerawork is VERY poor. I'm not too pushed about this spider-cam...looks worse IMO. However, the set does look great (although I think there's too much lighting above it). Sound was OK for the most part but in some songs (esp. IRL) the music was too loud and the singer was drowned out.

Did anyone notice that during the Belgian entry, they accidentally cut for about 1 second to a camera in the green room (i think) which was pointing at the floor !!! I'm surprised nobody has mentioned it before now...I thought that was a dreadful mistake...I've never ever ever seen something like that in Eurovision...big cock-up by ERT

Nope. It's RTBF - the Belgian broadcaster.

Can anyone tell me what a "spidercam" is?