Central West and BBC Midlands Thread

"We need the help of Viking Direct, that excellent office products company that will provide chairs so comfortable that Nick, Suzanne, Kay or Shefali will not experience any back discomfort at all whilst doing their jobs. They EVEN put a picture of Irwin Helford, Chairman Emeritus on all the front covers of their catalogues and Sale pamphlets!"

I think the new set is very good, although I think that the new astons leave a lot to be desired. They should go for graphics identical to the ones on LDN, where they are just plain red, with white text. They could improve the set even furthu by putting a silver frame around the CSO. It would match the plasma then, which have got their silver frames back on again. As regard to the window backdrop - is it not part of the Aston Expressway, near to the Dental Hospital and the fire station? I could be wrong.

From the caps shown it looks too much like Central News, and in a way I assume it looks like that they are trying to copy the style of Breakfast, it doesn't look right for a regional news programme. But they should have really revamped the whole set and the titles, it just looks poor and something which doesn't look right for the BBC, it's a good idea for later on in the programme when they do the light stuff, but it doesn't look right, when it is done all the time.

Granada took this direction in 1992 and lasted for 9 years and it made it look like a naff version of This Morning and made Granada Tonight look crap and rather tacky, but moving back to the desk was the best thing they did.

Didn't Nick have the same problem back in his TV AM days ?

ISTR him having a fair few days off due to his bad back, not helped by him being debagged live on air by Pamela Stephenson(Mrs Billy Connolly & one of the 'Not The Nine O'Clock News' team from the late 70's / early 80's, for the benefit of our younger readers)

(Long overdue for a rematch IMO !)

On the subject of the Wolverhampton Marathon, my mate did under 2 hours for the half marathon !!

Don't know about the WM team yet. I'll have to listen to Waddo & Julie, to see what happened, if anything !

From what I read I heard that the TV-am sofa was very uncomfortable, so this could be a problem.

And Westy, regarding Not The Nine O'Clock News, look at my sig.

of course you are entitled to your own opinion, but you have to remember not to apply your experience of north west tonight to midlands today - because they are 2 totally different shows in terms of style, content and format. nwt is far more upright and newsy - midlands today had a phase of being like that (and ratings flopped) - but now they're back on track doing their thing and doing it well! and it may not look like "the bbc" - because it isn't "the bbc" - this is "bbc midlands"



i know your a sutton person who must have come along the aston express way a fair few times - but i cant remember off the top of my head where those trees are. i can picture the area around lancaster circus by west mids county council building and by the dental hosp - but it really doesnt seem at all similar.

i was guessing that it was a shot maybe looking from the south of the city from pebble mill with a tighter shot?

Point taken Mr NW. I must borrow my sister's LP & transfer to CD at some point !

'Oh Bosenquet ' etc !!

(I think I've got 'Hedgehog Sandwich' somewhere !)

I'd agree if they were sat on-set 8 hours a day and were intensive DSE users. However they are probably on set for less than an hour and a half a day - and are not intensive users during this period. I don't think this is such an issue.

(As any DSE assessor knows - laptops without separate keyboards are not acceptable for long term use anyway...)

I thought the conservatory was much more revolutionary than a new sofa.

And much more elegant too! It provided a tone of authority yet homeliness.

Oh, I was of the impression that Kay sat herself down on the sofa at 5:15am and single handedly checked the status of every single traffic light in the midlands via her laptop for the duration of the whole of Breakfast.

My illusions have been shattered.

And of course the monitors set into glass-topped desks are just so ergonomic...

Yeah, the new set is something of a let-down after the conservaatory, but I guess the problem is that it's not going to be possible to use that as a set after the move to the new building.