On the subject of switchovers, did these occur between channels because there weren't enough frequencies, or did the channels not have enough stuff to air? I'm assuming it was the former given switchovers rarely happen nowadays.
On the subject of switchovers, did these occur between channels because there weren't enough frequencies, or did the channels not have enough stuff to air? I'm assuming it was the former given switchovers rarely happen nowadays.
Even though this is true, I'm still amazed to this day The Christian Channel, Sky Travel, Sky Soap, The History Channel, The Sci-Fi Channel and Sky Sports 2 all shared one frequency at one time. Needless to say Sky saw sense and gave Sky Sports 2 it's own slot and moved the rest about.
A couple of other memories - seeing a black screen with the letters OU in the top right or sometimes top left corner. Was this used to ident the two outputs of OU Con so they were routed to the right networks?
I've just found a BBC2 closedown with an example of this (about 2m16s in):
Looking at the Genome entry for that day, BBC1 closed down almost simultaneously, so I wonder whether they were testing switching between the two outputs?
I never thought to ask this until I watched that BBC2 closedown, but is there a reason BBC2 didn't have to close down with the National Anthem? I know not all ITV regions did, but I don't know if it was just a courtesy thing.
BBC 1 always closed with the National Anthem. I don't think BBC 2 ever did, certainly I have not seen an example where it was used. The only BBC service still to routinely play the national anthem is Radio 4, where it is played just before 1am at the switch to BBC World Service.
ETP1 was initially used by the IBA to replace Test Card F. In true IBA style, rather than buy a PM5544 generator from Philips, they designed their own. Not a sign of a circle anywhere (an essential element for a test pattern) because I suspect they couldn't work out how to generate a smooth circle with the chips they had. Anyway, the generators were whipped off to the main transmitters and were certainly a lot simpler and more reliable in use than a slide scanner (not to mention the slides themselves which were so complicated in construction that a lot could go wrong. I have a slide of F where the colour dyes have faded and it's not a pretty sight.) When Channel 4 began testing, the transmitter generators were simply switched to show the ident IBA; CH4 instead. Later, when the channel was close to launch, trade came from C4 HQ and the card had double white lines above and below the ident so that you could tell whether it was coming from the transmitter site or London.
I never thought to ask this until I watched that BBC2 closedown, but is there a reason BBC2 didn't have to close down with the National Anthem?
I suppose it's the same reason that Radios 1,2,3 never did either... well I assume they never did. Was it just the Home Services that had the national anthem?
Quote:
I know not all ITV regions did, but I don't know if it was just a courtesy thing.
There was a story about someone in the North West who withdrew his advertising from Granada because they didn't play the national anthem on closedown
There's a video on YouTube of a BBC2 closedown with music from Electric Light Orchestra ('I'm Alive' from the Xanadu soundtrack) so they were certainly a lot different than what went out on BBC1
Then you remember some ITV companies were still showing footage of the Queen at closedown well into the 80s, which was a massive difference from BBC1 who were only showing the anthem with the globe. Funny how the ITV regions (well, the ones that were still doing it by then) were a lot more traditionalist than how the "establishment" BBC when it came to that.