Sunday Life/"Studios" with windows

This is an interesting one - there are studios across the country sitting mothballed or unused, so it's a bit surprising that they decide to make a new one in a converted mill near Bradford for Sunday Life, and fit it out with a set that looks like TV-AM's.

http://www.truenorthproductions.co.uk/News/Sunday+Life+loft.htm

Even more surprising that it seems to have a proper technical installation rather than a lash-up involving a scanner, at least one of the cameras is looking a bit soft.

And assuming this is a live show, I wish the director wouldn't keep cutting away for pointless noddy shots.

The lighting is absolutely terrible, every shot seems to feature presenters or guests in the dark or in shadow, it's like they're just relying on natural room lights to do the job. It just looks amateurish.

yes, and as mentioned in the BBC News rebrand thread, they use very comfy sofas, so what I saw of it, the guests were slouched, and looked really silly!

looks a lot smarter than GMTVs 15 year old set with the same fake photo back drop.

I like these sets with live views out of windows but it's nothing new as Pebble Mill did it back in the 70s and 80s as did Granada reports on occasion.

I saw the start of Sunday Life and thought the set looked very nice. What a waste though to use it for only 1 hour a week.

Colin Jackson may have been a good athlete, but he's no TV presenter. He made me cringe through 15 minutes of The One Show last week before I gave up and had to switch over.

I seem to remember a lot of effort was given towards the creation of the TV-am sofas to avoid the infamous crotch shot. TV sofas are designed to be quite hard but hold the occupant in a more flattering position. Unfortunately these days the lack of attention to decent production standards has resulted in an 'anything will do' ethos.

Yep - though TV sofas can cost a HUGE amount (£10k+ wouldn't be unusual) as they are usually bespoke designs - and have a lead-time of around 2-3 months minimum usually.

With budget levels as they are - some shows simply don't have the money. It isn't a case of "anything will do" - it is a case of "we can't afford to do it properly" in many cases.

Out of interest - how do you know it is not a scanner? (Though lash-up is a bit of a poor description for OB working - if you chose the right truck you are often better equipped and resourced than in many studios - and with the right staff you often have better results as the crew are more experienced in a wider variety of shows)

As for not using a studio - sets with real windows are now really popular - to give a show a non-studio feel, and thus make it feel more "real" and "live". Also it is still usually much cheaper to rent a space like a loft or an office space and leave the set standing during the week - than do a show from a studio and set/light and strike every week - or pay for 6 days of "set standing" fees. (If you want your set to remain in the studio Mon-Sat and only use the studio on Saturday you would often have to pay something - even if the studio wasn't going to be used - though in some cases this may be cheaper than a Sat set/light and a Sun strike)

I was using lash-up to mean a temporary installation, rather than being amateurish.

My inference that they're not using a scanner came from the page I linked to which states that they've converted part of the floor to be a technical area, which I took to mean galleries.

Ah - lash-up to me implies short-term fix rather than long-term solution. OB trucks are designed to work day-in, day-out in a variety of situations - so lash-up doesn't ring true to me as a description of a decent scanner solution. (Of course it does ring true if you're using some cowboy operation who have accepted a job with a truck far too small to sensibly service the production and have bolted bits on "just for this job")

Having re-read the article I absolutely get why you wouldn't think it was using a scanner!



I'd read that as "fly away" or "de-rig" - which means a flightcased "OB truck without the truck" kind of solution where racks of technical gear are rented in flight cases and rigged on-site for the duration of the show. These can often be real lash-ups - as the kit is usually configured on a show-by-show basis and you only get what you ask for - not always what you need (it isn't unusual for production teams to not know what they need until they find out they haven't got it...)

It could be they've decided to invest in a whole lot of kit and properly build a gallery etc. - but I'd be surprised for a 24 show commission whether it was more cost effective than renting kit in. I wonder if they have got a fibre circuit to get them to network, or are using satellite or digital microwave?

I'd imagine the roof of that building would have pretty good line of sight to either Holme Moss or Emley Moor - I presume one or the other has microwave OB receivers.

Don't know if either of them have been upgraded from analogue PAL microwave (now totally unacceptable for a network show - though still just about acceptable for news - though with Freeview and DSat becoming the norm PAL subcarrier - the enemy to all compression - is to be avoided at all costs) to digital component working. I know BT now no longer offer microwave circuits (because they haven't upgraded their existing network to digital from PAL analogue) - but I know the Beeb can provide links for certain shows. Don't know if they have permanent digital microwave receive points or are just rigged as required.

For a once a week show it may well still be cheaper to use a satellite uplink - or given that the show is in an urban location - fibre may also be practical.