Just catching up on the Covid special programme at 8pm with Sophy Ridge which is running for the next three nights.
Set wise it's a decent effort which doesn't use the glass box of the virtual studio.
Interesting that the keep having to use 'temporary sets' for stuff like this as they don't have any permanent studios that are fit for purpose. Bring back Sky News Centre. All is forgiven!
On a serious note, it looked really good on screen last night. Some new (less white) graphics and this would be a good direction for Sky to take.
I watched the show but was working on my laptop at the same time so didn't see if they had any split screens? Anyone else notice if they did and whether they were that lovely deep blue to match?
On the other hand, they have greater flexibility and don’t have vast spaces sitting empty for most of the time.
Exactly. These three special programmes are coming from a studio that has seen Thronecast, cricket, football, Skavlan in the past two years, and recently spent time as a socially-distanced EVS room for the Premier League. As a real studio rather than a glorified newsroom, it's vastly more flexible.
I see no issue with using temporary sets for special programmes - if anything, I think it would less imaginative to use the same studio for absolutely everything.
The Glass Box isn't particularly versatile, but it could be if the rotated the desk once again and made more use of the Sky Centre backdrop.
Westminster actually is quite flexible, all they need to do is wheel out the desk, swap it for soft seats, or a different desk etc. The screens can display whatever is needed.
I can understand Sky News's switch to a more white/clean studio style, if to try to convey more of a focus on the content rather than a gaudy studio, which to be fair, the Sky News Centre did steer towards. Still, one can have a clean, content-focused presentation while still conveying a more authoritative identity - and indeed an identity full stop.
I just think a decision needs to be made on whether Sky News is a rolling news channel - in which case, there's no point in having different titled programmes - especially as they are all currently identical in terms of news stories and how they are presented (save for one or two programmes having a standing presenter).
Or, they need to give more editorial independence to some of the programmes, with different graphics for each. And yes, that does sound like appointment to view, but I would much rather a proper ATV rather than the slightly fake style at the moment. Breakfast, Today, Afternoon, News Hour, Tonight, News at Nine and so on are all virtually identical. Just a different face reading the news and mildly varied title cards.
Programmes would feel more special if they focused deeper on a different story or something. One hour programmes (but less of them) that are actually unique would be more appealing - in my opinion at least.
I actually really liked the podcast special with Dermot that they broadcast on screen, something like that would be great.
Wonder if that means that the 12pm-2pm slot on Sky will go permaintley single headed with just Jayne? They probably don't need to have that.
I suspect it might, although that may leave a few of the weekend/cover anchors with fewer shifts. But Sky News Today isn’t double headed at the moment and Sky News Breakfast isn’t double headed either right now as Stephen’s doing the Early Rundown. The pandemic has caused the difference with Sky News Today, but it does stick out a little bit as the only weekday slot with two anchors. I’m not sure it really warrants two anchors, especially when there’s now a situation most Wednesdays when they have single headed shows before and after then a double headed slot for just an hour.
With the weekday breakfast slot up in the air, I wonder if double headed presentation could be dropped all together? For the weekend Sky News Breakfast, it’s easy to use the sport presenter which is usually Jacquie and the weather presenter for a little bit of interaction on the breakfast show, a second anchor isn’t required, especially when weekdays don’t have one. Although the Gillian & Stephen partnership works well so they may be reunited when circumstances allow.
Speaking of sport news, when did they stop doing daytime sport bulletins? From what I can see they run each hour from 5pm each day including the overnights, but then there’s nothing after 6am on weekdays? And it seems at weekends, they have live sport on Breakfast but then there’s nothing after that until 5pm. Seems a bit of an oversight for weekends not to have sport until 5pm; weekdays it’s potentially justified however. I know when Kay Burley took over breakfast there was no sport there, but I thought Sky News Today & The Sarah-Jane Mee Show still had sport?