Studio Operations (Part 8) – Ray Lee

Studio Lighting Studio B

Studio B lighting was a much simpler setup.  All the lights were on sliding pantographs, which had tracks running from one end of the studio to the other. The luminaires were mainly dual source again, but from what I remember the lighting circuits had switches on a panel in the studio, to allocate them to faders on the desk in the gallery. There was no memory system, and all changes had to be done manually. Considering the complexity of some of the programmes to be made in Studio B it was a testament to the ingenuity of the TM’s in arranging the lighting. One of the problems was that the height of the studio was insufficient in many cases to get the lights as high as would have been liked, and there was a real danger in some cases of tall people walking into lights where they needed to be fairly low to obtain the desired lighting effect.

Studio Lighting the Foyer

Photo by Robin Sunderland, no reproduction without permission

Photo by Robin Sunderland, no reproduction without permission

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pebble Mill at One Lighting, was all fixed, and before Gallery C was built there were no dimmers or lighting control. A series of scaffold bars were suspended from the foyer ceiling, and all the lights rigged on those or on floor stands. The “soft lights” were basically a set of 6 car headlight type lamps, and the key lights a variety of spotlights including some CSI discharge lamps. The latter had the problem that if you turned them off e.g. to reposition them, you had to wait 20 minutes before they could be turned on again.! The TM had to guess on how bright to light the area based on what he expected to weather to be like at transmission time. Too bright on a dull day would make outside look like night, too dark on a bright day would make the outside burn out on the cameras. The one time the TM could never win was when the weather was variable, with sun and clouds.

I happened to be on the racks on one such particular day. The programme started well enough with bright fairly sunny conditions, and lighting to match. About 5 minutes into the programme dark clouds came across and it started snowing, It became so dark outside that the cameras outside were wide open with master gain added in order to get a bright enough picture. The shots on the inside cameras looked as if it was night time outside. After half an hour, the snow stopped, (now about 4inches deep!) and the sun came out again. The inside cameras now looked as if there were no lights on, as the sun reflecting on the snow provided a backlight many times brighter. The outside cameras were now well stopped down, with no master gain. This was the day that there was a parade of Easter bonnets! A group of lightly dressed girls in Easter bonnets were now parading in the snow trying not to look cold, as the programme came to a close. At the end the director said to the TM, “That’s just one of those days where you can never win!”

Ray Lee

Joan Collins on Radio Birmingham

Joan Collins Radio Bham Alastair Yates

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission.

Press cutting from May 23, 1979, about Joan Collins storming out of a Radio Birmingham interview. The copy is rather hard to read, so here is a transcript:

Sexy, film star Joan Collins burst into tears and stormed out of a radio station in Birmingham today after a record by her ex-husband was played.

The 42-year-old star of films including The Stud was talking on BBC Radio Birmingham’s Alastair Yates show when she objected to the strong line of questioning from presenter Yates.

Producer George Mitchell said: “Alastair suggested to her that her book, Past Imperfect was a jumping into-bed book, just a catalogue of sexual encounters.

She accused him of not having even read the book, which was just not true. Alastair has read the book from cover to cover and so have I.

Then we played the record What Kind Of Fool Am I by her ex-husband, Anthony Newley, and she burst into tears and left.

I set the questions for Alastair to ask and I don’t regret any of them.

She asked to come on the show and I don’t see why any author should simply by able to sit there and plug a book.

We are not afraid of asking searching questions. The book is one long sexual romp so we asked about that. She seems very bitter about the men in her life so we asked about that too.

But she was on the air for only about 10 minutes before she started crying and refused to go on.”

(Thanks to Alastair Yates for sharing this cutting).

Top Gear: Waterworld

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Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission.

Waterworld was a Top Gear spin-off series. There were five episodes in all, transmitted between 20th July and 20th August 1998. It was presented by Jeremy Clarkson, Tiff Needell and Julia Bradbury. It was a magazine show which covered motorised water vehicles of various sorts.

Thanks to VT editor Ian Collins for making this titles grab available.

EMI TR90

 

EMI TR90 PS

Photo by Stuart Blacklock of the BBC EMI TR 90, with trolley

Photo by Stuart Blacklock of the BBC EMI TR 90, with trolley

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Photos by Stuart Blacklock of  http://www.vintagerecorders.co.uk/VR_View_Page.asp?IDS=131  no reproduction without permission.

The EMI TR90 was the standard audio tape machine for radio and TV studio and OB use. They usually lived on green trolleys as they were very heavy and were built like battleships. However they were the backbone of all BBC audio recording, editing and replay for many years from the late 1950s up until the 70s when they were beginning to wear out! Most of us learned our trade on these.The wheel like structures at the top of the photo are the tape reel adapters for  using on the big 10 inch reels of tape. Without these gizmos the ordinary 7 inch reels would fit onto the machine.

Pete Simpkin

The following comment was posted on the Pebble Mill Facebook group:

Alan Miller: ‘Certainly takes me back to BBC Glasgow in the 70’s when TR90’s were everywhere. Seem to remember that if the tension arm was not in the correct position that they would fail to play. This could be a bit of an issue in radio continuity where they were operated by remote!’

3rd Floor – Roof Plans 1971

D0124_John Madin

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Negative, 3rd Floor, Roof Plans, 1971. This digital resource is available under a Creative Commons CC-BY-SA 3.0 license, with kind permission of the Birmingham & Five Counties Architectural Association Trust, thanks to the Architectus project (part of the Jisc Content Programme 2011-13).

Here are the 1971 plans from the architect of BBC Pebble Mill, John Madin. They show the 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th floor plans, and the roof area of the office block.