The BBC World News Thread

I don't ever recall there being any fake plasma backgrounds. They replaced the back-projection screens around the desk with plamsas, and also installed a wall of Barco cubes in the left-hand-side pod.

I think that 'the eye' might mean that during the last period in N9 (as seen in Worzel's photo), rather than show a title-based graphic on the plasma when it wasn't 'in use' - they instead showed an image that looked like the newsroom background. So, essentially the plasma blended into the newsroom somewhat.

I think that I now have a vague recollection of that odd practice, although I thought they tended to concentrate on using the image on the Barco cubes as a background towards the end, with a long shot towards that end of the studio. It was N8 . . . .

I ended up in a Youtube black hole and remembered someone asking how quick the studio can change branding/colour scheme when this clip was found. It should start at 11:48 to see a quick click of the fingers to change it.

Another video here from a Q&A session with Ben Bland inside the Studio C gallery, the changing of templates is covered at 15 minutes... literally a press of a (touch) button...

When they moved into N8 in 2008, I seem to recall they did use a fake newsroom image on the Barco screens, albeit with a map of the world on top, if I remember correctly.

I think 'the eye' was quoting this image of N9 in Worzel's post:



The plasma screen to the left (that's switched off) is what had a fake newsroom image when it wasn't in use for an interview, etc. Before this set was unveiled in 2004, the plasma screens in N9 used to just show a graphic with the BBC News logo.

Can be seen on the plasma twice on this video I recorded back in the day via VHS so naf quality.



This is also during the time they canned the sport and business stings and breaks, dropped a proper closing, starting .30 headlines and practising ops instead of proper breaks. Was a mess!

Edit: here’s how well built and structured bulletins were prior to the renos and to dropping everything and adding opts and what not. Perfect.

You managed to capture a dodgy aston error in that Nik Gowing clip. I recall that happening quite a bit. Also great to see Rob Bonnet, Dharshini David (who's now back at BBC World) and the late Jon Leyne in that short clip.

I don't want to be mean, but I don't understand why people are so surprised at this. (Serious question:) did people think that crew went round changing physical gels on lights and loading up DVDs with new backgrounds or something?

I mean really all this started with the very first Barco sets in N6/TC7 where instead of a full strike and set between shows they just had to swap out the shiny table between Working Lunch and Newsround and bring in some extra chairs when required. I presume the lighting grid didn't need any work between shows either given that the two presentation areas were fixed. IIRC those sets needed a few seconds to cycle through the colours for the lightboxes as opposed to the instant LED change that NBH can do.

Still have a soft spot for those first two sets. The removal of the rear projection really made N6 look significantly less cramped.

The big takeaway from that video for me was quite how many errors there were.
Wrong astons appearing quite a few times (the best being when during the sports bulletin an aston for ColinPowell resigning appears with the name of a former London Mayoral cadidate) and the preview clip for the sport being a completely different one to what Nik Gowing was talking about.
That said the actual content and feel of the bulletin is what I wish the average news channel show was these days - a proper newscast.

I love how they can change the colour of the entire set at a flick of a button