Bit of nostalgia for the old folks...

eBay item # 330202590634

For the youngsters, hint: it's not as described!

Regards,

Simonm.

-- 
simonm|at|muircom|dot|demon|.|c|oh|dot|u|kay
SIMON MUIR, BRISTOL UK
EUROPEANS AGAINST THE EU                   http://www.eurofaq.freeuk.com/
GT250A'76  R80/RT'86  110CSW TDi'88  www.kc3ltd.co.uk/profile/eurofollie/

SpamTrapSeeSig wrote:
> Bit of nostalgia for the old folks...
>
> eBay item # 330202590634
>
> For the youngsters, hint: it's not as described!
>
> Regards,
>
> Simonm.

For this not-quite-so-youngster (but not in the trade), could you elucidate? 
What is it - autocue, caption light, what? I can't really make it out from 
the pictures: I can see what looks like a roll of (transparent) film, and 
one of the controls is "speed", and the text mentions a (missing) winding 
handle.
-- 
J. P. Gilliver                  |  Tel. +44 1634 203298

Essex home for sale, £59,950: see http://www.soft255.demon.co.uk/home/

In article <4799026b$1_1@glkas0286.greenlnk.net>,
	J. P. Gilliver wrote:
> SpamTrapSeeSig wrote:
>> Bit of nostalgia for the old folks...
>>
>> eBay item # 330202590634
>>
>> For the youngsters, hint: it's not as described!
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Simonm.

> For this not-quite-so-youngster (but not in the trade), could you elucidate? 
> What is it - autocue, caption light, what? I can't really make it out from 
> the pictures: I can see what looks like a roll of (transparent) film, and 
> one of the controls is "speed", and the text mentions a (missing) winding 
> handle.

Is it a credits roller?

-- 
Paul Martin

In article , Paul Martin 
 writes
>In article <4799026b$1_1@glkas0286.greenlnk.net>,
>       J. P. Gilliver wrote:
>> SpamTrapSeeSig wrote:
>>> Bit of nostalgia for the old folks...
>>>
>>> eBay item # 330202590634
>>>
>>> For the youngsters, hint: it's not as described!
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>>
>>> Simonm.
>
>> For this not-quite-so-youngster (but not in the trade), could you elucidate?
>> What is it - autocue, caption light, what? I can't really make it out from
>> the pictures: I can see what looks like a roll of (transparent) film, and
>> one of the controls is "speed", and the text mentions a (missing) winding
>> handle.
>
>Is it a credits roller?

Yep. A real roller-caption machine.

Like older telecines, they couldn't go very fast in either direction, so 
perish the director who rehearsed the opening of his programme too close 
to the live transmission. And they tended to jam up too.

The knob on the back swivelled it through 90deg.


Regards,

Simonm.

-- 
simonm|at|muircom|dot|demon|.|c|oh|dot|u|kay
SIMON MUIR, BRISTOL UK
EUROPEANS AGAINST THE EU                   http://www.eurofaq.freeuk.com/
GT250A'76  R80/RT'86  110CSW TDi'88  www.kc3ltd.co.uk/profile/eurofollie/

On Thu, 24 Jan 2008 21:42:38 -0000, J. P. Gilliver wrote:

> What is it - autocue, 

Nope. But I guess it could be used as one at a push but even less convient 
than paper based autocue was!

> caption light, 

That's better.

> what? I can't really make it out from the pictures: I can see what looks 
> like a roll of (transparent) film, 

I didn't think anything was loaded onto it. That would normally be matt 
black heavy paper with white letraset...

> and one of the controls is "speed", 

Along with stop and start... you must have it by now.

I haven't seen one is years, even longer actually used in anger. That one 
is in pretty damn good nick.

-- 
Cheers                                              new5pam@howhill.com
Dave.                                             pam is missing e-mail

"Dave Liquorice"  wrote in message 
news:nyyfbegfubjuvyypbz.jv6miw1.pminews@srv1.howhill.net...
> On Thu, 24 Jan 2008 21:42:38 -0000, J. P. Gilliver wrote:
>
>> What is it - autocue,
>
> Nope. But I guess it could be used as one at a push but even less convient
> than paper based autocue was!
>
>> caption light,
>
> That's better.
>
>> what? I can't really make it out from the pictures: I can see what looks
>> like a roll of (transparent) film,
>
> I didn't think anything was loaded onto it. That would normally be matt
> black heavy paper with white letraset...

Ah, did they use white lettering on a black background on a credits roller? 
For some reason I imagined that they used more conventional black lettering 
on a white background and reversed the image electronically before 
overlaying it onto the programme image.

When did broadcasters change from paper credits rollers and still caption 
cards to electronic ones? 1980s?

I noticed at one time there was a tendency for some entries on a credits 
roll to scroll right off the screen whereas adjacent ones disappeared 
abruptly just before they scrolled off the screen. Sometimes it was 
reproducable - eg actor's name scrolls off and character's name disappears 
abrubtly - and sometimes the behaviour occurred at random.

Would credits that did this have been paper-based or electronic?

In article , Mortimer 
 writes

>Ah, did they use white lettering on a black background on a credits roller?

Yes. Keying was much easier if blacks could drop below black (IYSWIM). 
Also that way, you can stop the lens down, whereas t'other way the lens 
has to be opened up if it's not keying properly.

>For some reason I imagined that they used more conventional black lettering
>on a white background and reversed the image electronically before
>overlaying it onto the programme image.

I never saw that done, but it's not impossible. "Portaprompt" 
reversed-out but I think that's for several reasons: quality didn't 
matter as much as legibilty; white paper allows quick changes; you don't 
want CRTs running at near peak white all the time for all sorts of good 
reasons.
>
>When did broadcasters change from paper credits rollers and still caption
>cards to electronic ones? 1980s?

When Astons arrived in the early 1980s. I last saw a unit like that one 
used in Bristol circa 1982.

>I noticed at one time there was a tendency for some entries on a credits
>roll to scroll right off the screen whereas adjacent ones disappeared
>abruptly just before they scrolled off the screen. Sometimes it was
>reproducable - eg actor's name scrolls off and character's name disappears
>abrubtly - and sometimes the behaviour occurred at random.

Depended on the vision mixer - person and equipment. The roller was 
sometimes constrained by wipes at the ends. I'm not sure quite why, 
except you can see from the pics that illumination wouldn't be even at 
the edges (top+bottom), so it may have been a keying issue. I've done 
shows where the roller disappeared or appeared mid-screen (done with a 
wipe), for artistic reasons.

>Would credits that did this have been paper-based or electronic?

I suspect what you're referring to may have been after paper rolls 
though. You'd need to talk to a VM though - they had the awkward job of 
setting rollers up (with racks).

Incidentally, the other thing that's missing from the item on eBay is 
the headphone extension Eddy box, camera-taped to the pedestal :-).


Regards,

Simonm.

-- 
simonm|at|muircom|dot|demon|.|c|oh|dot|u|kay
SIMON MUIR, BRISTOL UK
EUROPEANS AGAINST THE EU                   http://www.eurofaq.freeuk.com/
GT250A'76  R80/RT'86  110CSW TDi'88  www.kc3ltd.co.uk/profile/eurofollie/

Mortimer  wrote:

> Ah, did they use white lettering on a black background on a credits roller?
> For some reason I imagined that they used more conventional black lettering
> on a white background and reversed the image electronically before 
> overlaying it onto the programme image.

We used to ty to do it that way in our little tin-pot Poly tv studio
because it was easier and cheaper to make the captions that way, but it
was very difficult to get an even-looking result. Lighting and keying
levels etc were very fiddly. Of course these days with fancy electronic
graphics generation everyone *aims* for that unevenly-lit look.

> I noticed at one time there was a tendency for some entries on a credits
> roll to scroll right off the screen whereas adjacent ones disappeared
> abruptly just before they scrolled off the screen. Sometimes it was 
> reproducable - eg actor's name scrolls off and character's name disappears
> abrubtly - and sometimes the behaviour occurred at random.
> 
> Would credits that did this have been paper-based or electronic? 

I noticed that effect on early electronic rolling captions. Also, they
never quite got to the top of the frame. And all that was long before
Microsoft.

-- 
Alan Pemberton
Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England
To e-mail me directly, please visit
<http://www.pembers.freeserve.co.uk/index.html#Mail-me>

Dave Liquorice  wrote:

> I haven't seen one is years, even longer actually used in anger. That one
> is in pretty damn good nick.

The last one I saw in vision was on a TWTWTW repeat on BBC4 where the
credits crawled along the bottom of the screen over a wide shot of the
studio. But its output had obviously been so mangled by the film
transfer that it had been overlaid by an electronic fake. They seemed to
match pretty well.

One occasion that has stuck in my memory was a live tx of Juke Box Jury.
They used to have the names of the participants superimposed over their
faces as the caption machine rolled sideways R/L and the camera panned
in the opposite direction. I suppose it looked very slick for the time.

But on one occasion Sid James's face was accompanied bt the name 'Jimmy
James' which caused my dad great hilarity. The caption wobbled a bit and
disappeared, and a few seconds later the whole roll began again with the
correct names.

I often wonder what could have happened. I expect the mistake was
noticed in rehearsal and the whole lot was letrasetted again on the end
of the roll, but they forgot to tear the offending bit of roll off and
it got cued up wrongly for tx.

-- 
Alan Pemberton
Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England
To e-mail me directly, please visit
<http://www.pembers.freeserve.co.uk/index.html#Mail-me>

In message 
<1ibbkw7.1qlfxg5c87h34N%Spambox@pembers.freeserve.co.uk.invalid>, Alan 
Pemberton <Spambox@pembers.freeserve.co.uk.invalid> writes
>Dave Liquorice  wrote:
>
>> I haven't seen one is years, even longer actually used in anger. That one
>> is in pretty damn good nick.
>
>The last one I saw in vision was on a TWTWTW repeat on BBC4 where the
>credits crawled along the bottom of the screen over a wide shot of the
>studio. But its output had obviously been so mangled by the film
>transfer that it had been overlaid by an electronic fake. They seemed to
>match pretty well.

IIRC those were compilations and there were new credits to be added, so 
overlaying the originals wasn't necessarily only to hide their 
grottiness.

-- 
If one person has delusions, we call them psychotic. If, however, 1.5 billion
people have delusions we must apparently call them a religious group, and
respect their delusionary state.

On 27 Jan, 16:53, Spam...@pembers.freeserve.co.uk.invalid (Alan
Pemberton) wrote:
> Dave Liquorice  wrote:
> > I haven't seen one is years, even longer actually used in anger. That one
> > is in pretty damn good nick.
>
> The last one I saw in vision was on a TWTWTW repeat on BBC4 where the
> credits crawled along the bottom of the screen over a wide shot of the
> studio. But its output had obviously been so mangled by the film
> transfer that it had been overlaid by an electronic fake. They seemed to
> match pretty well.
>
> One occasion that has stuck in my memory was a live tx of Juke Box Jury.
> They used to have the names of the participants superimposed over their
> faces as the caption machine rolled sideways R/L and the camera panned
> in the opposite direction. I suppose it looked very slick for the time.
>
> But on one occasion Sid James's face was accompanied bt the name 'Jimmy
> James' which caused my dad great hilarity. The caption wobbled a bit and
> disappeared, and a few seconds later the whole roll began again with the
> correct names.
>
> I often wonder what could have happened. I expect the mistake was
> noticed in rehearsal and the whole lot was letrasetted again on the end
> of the roll, but they forgot to tear the offending bit of roll off and
> it got cued up wrongly for tx.

I wonder if real live TV was more entertaining than now because of
these quirks, or more irritating, or was just "what you were used to"
so you didn't really notice?

Cheers,
David.

In article ,
   SpamTrapSeeSig  wrote:
> Yep. A real roller-caption machine.

> Like older telecines, they couldn't go very fast in either direction, so 
> perish the director who rehearsed the opening of his programme too close 
> to the live transmission. And they tended to jam up too.


Dunno who remembers Joan Croft and Jane Shirley - they were respectively
director and floor manager on countless BBC1 Sunday evening classic
serials - mainly Dickens. And used to fight like cat and dog. Often over
the roller caption. Speed set and timed at rehearsal it was always wrong
on the take and Joan would accuse Jane or whoever of fiddling with it. ;-)

-- 
*Re-elect nobody

    Dave Plowman        dave@davenoise.co.uk           London SW
                  To e-mail, change noise into sound.