Tvam- Timeslot

[RyoG]

The video description says they think this dates from 1987 or 1988, so maybe ITV did still broadcast it occasionally this late?

I'm pretty sure they didn't, in the 80s it was Channel 4's testcard in all but name, it wasn't in ITV.

Though this IBA enginnering announcements from 1985 does mention that there is still test card on ITV very early in the morning ("very little", but not none). Just that there's a lot more of it on Channel 4:

https://rewind.thetvroom.com/24994/progr...ober-1985/

I seem to remember on TV Forum someone posting a Scottish television closedown from the mid-80s where Tony Currie mentioned the test card coming on at around 5:20 before TV-am as well (though the test card in question might not have been ETP-1 of course). Though as I wasn't around then I can't give any first hand accounts.

That would be this one:

https://youtu.be/9TVwYdSInF4

I don't think Tony is registered here? He'd probably remember exactly what was broadcast!

[Inspector Sands]

Could the 5am morning news not have been routed through TV-AM for those regions who weren't 24 hours by that point, or would that be a legal minefield?

Technically possible but yes I imagine that would have caused a few issues with the ITV companies and TVam, the latter of course were rivals.

But then again they're the IBAs transmitters so I suppose they could do whatever they wanted... but who's airtime would that be? They weren't supposed to be a broadcaster.


But ultimately why bother, it's not as if the morning news bulletin was an established thing in those regions, their viewers weren't missing something they didn't know existed yet

[Markymark]

A bit of back ground.

Firstly it was never one of the ITV companies' duties or obligations to transmit Test Cards. The ITA/IBA were the legal entity broadcaster, and such things were their domain

Definitions are important.

TCF is a test card (though it was broadcast from an optical slide, today's versions are electronic)
ETP-1 was an electronically generated test card from the outset
Colour Bars were, and still are a test signal (not a test card either real or colloquial) . Always electronic

Originally the ITA would broadcast 'Trade Test Transmissions' out of programme hours. From 1969 Test Card F from a slide. All ITA/IBA Trade Test Transmissions up until 1978 originated from regional colour control rooms, sited at the primary regional VHF transmitter sites, (not necessarily the primary IBA UHF site, that's another story)

TCF was broadcast from a slide scanner at these control rooms, (those slide scanners could be used for captions as well of course)

Towards the end of the 1970s the IBA were finding it expensive to maintain these 14 or so slide scanners, and have 14 manned control rooms, so they looked to rationalise things.

First came the electronic ETP-1 test card, this was used experimentally at Rowridge (being Crawley Court's 'local' transmitter) around 1978. During 78/79 it was rolled out to all of the IBA's primary UHF sites , replacing the co-sited (or local) slide scanners at the control rooms. Associated with ETP1 were also simple blue apology captions that could be manually or automatically switched to Tx.

Also 79/80 ish the control rooms at Croydon, St Hilary, Emley, and Black Hill were expanded to be Regional Operation Centres, each monitoring and serving multiple regions. For instance Croydon looked after the London, Anglia, and Southern regions. The Colour Control Rooms in the other regions closed.

In 1982 everything was expanded to look after and service C4/S4C as well

Late 70s up until TV-am launch it seemed (at least in my part of the world) that Croydon 'woke up' the transmitters with ETP1 and tone from about 8am. At 08:30 they would cut to the local ITV company output. For Southern/TVS this was tone and colour bars until the 'start up' sequence at 09:20. Thames was either the same, or for a while they used the station clock and tone. LWT was black and tone. Every ITV company would have done something slightly different.

I never really got up early enough to see what happened before 6am in the Tv-am era, but my guess is the IBA woke up the transmitters from about 5am with possibly ETP-1, cutting to TV-am (which BT would have had already present on the circuits feeding the transmitters) from 05:30. Notably that blue slide with IBA branding

The absence or otherwise of Oracle teletext was also a good indicator of whether the signal was transmitter generated or studio generated

[Markymark]

But then again they're the IBAs transmitters so I suppose they could do whatever they wanted... but who's airtime would that be? They weren't supposed to be broadcaster.

They were a broadcaster, but a broadcaster not allowed to broadcast programmes, only announcements !

[Inspector Sands]

They were a broadcaster, but a broadcaster not allowed to broadcast programmes, only announcements !

Except that one programme they did broadcast, which cunningly had the word announcements in the title!

[Humphrey Hacker]

Please remember that in 1983 when TV-am launched, they went head first down the toilet financially, as their programme failed in the ratings. This would be the main reason for a stringent cut back in their broadcasting hours.

They launched on Tuesday February 1st 1983, however their choice of style for TV-am was far too heavy of a morning, news driven, political focused, and sorry to say just dead boring. The very first interview David Frost did on Day 1 was with Norman Tebbit about unemployment - just what you want/need to launch your breakfast service on Day 1. They counter balanced it with John Cleese appearing later on, but the damage was done on Day 1.

The devoted a whole one hour to news, business and farming from 6am to 7am with Robert Kee anchoring, who looked like he never knew how to hold his script when on camera. Weather was delivered by an ex-RAF officer Commander Philpott bellowing the weather at the viewer as if they were one his his first year cadets.

All of this lead to viewers deserting them for the more safer and reassuring BBC Breakfast Time with Frank Bough, Selina Scott and Nick Ross on BBC One, in their jumpers and nice sofa arrangement. By March 1983 TV-am had got to the point where basically 100,000 viewers were watching every morning, compared to the near 3 million on BBC One.

On the BBC documentary "The Battle For Britain's Breakfast" Gyles Brandreth remarked on how strange it was seeing Robert Kee who was well known then as a former Panorama presenter hosting a similarly heavy show on TV-AM

TV-AM Version 1 was ponderous and horrible against Breakfast Time. A true version of David Vs Goliath but this time David was smashed.

Ian Jones' summation in "Morning Glory" was correct in that the content was more suitable for a Newsnight style programme

[James2001]

There's a Grampian startup here which has GPN branded colourbars just before the startup, so that's clearly how they handled it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RmpYUJGA4og

[Neil Jones]

On the BBC documentary "The Battle For Britain's Breakfast" Gyles Brandreth remarked on how strange it was seeing Robert Kee who was well known then as a former Panorama presenter hosting a similarly heavy show on TV-AM

TV-AM Version 1 was ponderous and horrible against Breakfast Time. A true version of David Vs Goliath but this time David was smashed.

Ian Jones' summation in "Morning Glory" was correct in that the content was more suitable for a Newsnight style programme

Be that as it may, TV-am thought that was what Breakfast Time was going to be like, and then when Breakfast Time went in the entirely opposite direction, it stuffed them. The later incarnation was probably closer to the original Breakfast Time launch format, though of course a lot of later breakfast formats ended up copying the later TV-am format years later - even GMTV tried to paint a new picture after 1993, which failed, and they ended up copying TV-am pretty much word for word.

Robert Kee, according to a Transdiffusion comment on one of their videos was sold on one format for Daybreak (apparently something that would wipe the floor with the Today Programme on Radio 4), and got some half-baked news reading role with VT inserts instead. The rest of the output was, well it probably didn't help they were in the middle of an argument with Equity at the time regarding royalties. And of course 1984 and the Brighton bombing coverage (or the lack of it on TV-am) could easily have finished them off altogether.

[James2001]

TV Ark has a clip of the Thames clock with tone. The description says it was due to the transmitter being on all night because of problems, though the time on the clock ties in with them broadcasting it in the run-up to startup:

https://www.tvark.org/?page=media&mediaid=132615

[Markymark]

TV Ark has a clip of the Thames clock with tone. The description says it was due to the transmitter being on all night because of problems, though the time on the clock ties in with them broadcasting it in the run-up to startup:

https://www.tvark.org/?page=media&mediaid=132615

Didn't we discuss, and largely debunk the overnight transmission of the clock in the old place ?
Anyway, yes, that's how Thames did the run up from 08:30 to the start up for a period late 70s/early 80s

[JK1985]

I never understood the argument about the launch of TV-am, where commentators said that TV-am thought BBC Breakfast Time was going to be a hard news driven programme "newsnight with cornflakes" approach as one said, and so they chose to do the same. Why?

If you knew or had an idea that your opponent was going to offer a hard news driven format for their breakfast programme, why give the same style of programme for your new commercial company TV-am? No commercial sense there, as you would have ended up with two hard news driven shows, providing breakfast viewers with no choice what so ever, and a lot opting to remain with their radio favourites at breakfast.

If TV-am had felt BBC were going down the news format agenda, surely with any common sense you provide a lighter alternative, not simply copy the BBC in style?

[James Martin]

What is notable is how whenever the wheel tried to be reinvented, eventually the regression to the late-80s version of TV-AM took place. Both GMTV and Daybreak ended up ditching their new formats for the bright colour pallete and the sofas. It's only GMB that's managed to do something different and by and large flown.

[Inspector Sands]

What is notable is how whenever the wheel tried to be reinvented, eventually the regression to the late-80s version of TV-AM took place. Both GMTV and Daybreak ended up ditching their new formats for the bright colour pallete and the sofas. It's only GMB that's managed to do something different and by and large flown.

And it was the same on Channel 4 - whatever The Big Breakfast tried they always ended up with two presenters sitting in front of some glass doors. When it became RI:SE that too ended up as two presenters sitting front of some glass doors.

[Markymark]

Originally the ITA would broadcast 'Trade Test Transmissions' out of programme hours. From 1969 Test Card F from a slide. All ITA/IBA Trade Test Transmissions up until 1978 originated from regional colour control rooms, sited at the primary regional VHF transmitter sites, (not necessarily the primary IBA UHF site, that's another story)

This page has a little bit of detail and a picture of Black Hill's Colour Control Room, which became the ROC for STV, Border, Grampian, and UTV regions in 1980

http://txfeatures.mb21.co.uk/blackhill/

[IndigoTucker]

I never understood the argument about the launch of TV-am, where commentators said that TV-am thought BBC Breakfast Time was going to be a hard news driven programme "newsnight with cornflakes" approach as one said, and so they chose to do the same. Why?

Peter Jay had a yearning for a television programme with a "mission to explain" - developed with John Birt. This apparently meant "high brow analytical journalism – as apposed to the adversarial style (at least theoretically) favoured by current affairs journalists." . Jay always meant for TV-am to be like this, so when he grabbed the franchise, ran with it. It of course tanked in days when put against Breakfast Time from the BBC Current Affairs department, but the "mission to explain" later led to the abolition of the split between news and current affairs at the BBC when John Birt took over.