Presentation Pet Peeves

[CameronYoung]

Another one I've found.
Not strictly pres, but it's adverts that don't actually tell you what the product is, or what it's for.
One doing the rounds recently is Inovo. From the ad, all I know is it's a pant that I should use for 30 minutes.
But I'm left wondering:
Why should I use it?
What does it do?
Why does it appear to have some form of extractor fan on the side?

I could probably find that out from the website but I don't think I should have to go to your website to find out what you're advertising.

[Colm]

Anyone else follow-up when Inovo lady says 'I'm a firestarter' with 'Twisted firestarter'?

...As you were

[JohnnySmith]

Has anyone else found the positioning of the 'HD' logos on the BBC channels really lazy and unpleasing to look at?

[James2001]

Another one I've found.
Not strictly pres, but it's adverts that don't actually tell you what the product is, or what it's for.
One doing the rounds recently is Inovo. From the ad, all I know is it's a pant that I should use for 30 minutes.
But I'm left wondering:
Why should I use it?
What does it do?
Why does it appear to have some form of extractor fan on the side?

I could probably find that out from the website but I don't think I should have to go to your website to find out what you're advertising.

Speaking of adverts, those Just Eat adverts with the bloke trying to copy Matt Berry's unusual emphasis on words but failing badly is really irritating.

[Hellwyn Ballard]

The Homes Under the Hammer title sequence.

It's 18 years old (although its style feels even older - more like late 1990s), it's in glorious SD, and its "hero shots" are £5, £10, £20 and £50 notes that are all obsolete.

Plus I've always found it incredibly naff to see Elizabeth Fry, a 19th Century philanthropist, anti-homelessness and anti-slavery campaigner who features on the old £5 note, raising her eyebrows with the help of some dodgy CGI.

I doubt that Mrs Fry would have seen any benefit to society in the easy profits available to people fortunate enough to be able to pay cash for a house without needing a mortgage.

Anyway, political rant over, probably the reason they won't do new titles is because they've always interweaved new episodes with repeats in the broadcast schedule and it would ruin the seamlessness. They could always edit the new titles onto repeats to get around this problem, but I guess that would "involve too much work", like everything in TV nowadays.

[Mike]

And it comes from Birmingham and so is an”outside the M25 “ programme for the quota

Not exactly in the spirit of the rules.

However Ofcom said it's okay... and counts as outer-London produced programming

[JAS84]

The Homes Under the Hammer title sequence.

It's 18 years old (although its style feels even older - more like late 1990s), it's in glorious SD, and its "hero shots" are £5, £10, £20 and £50 notes that are all obsolete.

Plus I've always found it incredibly naff to see Elizabeth Fry, a 19th Century philanthropist, anti-homelessness and anti-slavery campaigner who features on the old £5 note, raising her eyebrows with the help of some dodgy CGI.

I doubt that Mrs Fry would have seen any benefit to society in the easy profits available to people fortunate enough to be able to pay cash for a house without needing a mortgage.

Anyway, political rant over, probably the reason they won't do new titles is because they've always interweaved new episodes with repeats in the broadcast schedule and it would ruin the seamlessness. They could always edit the new titles onto repeats to get around this problem, but I guess that would "involve too much work", like everything in TV nowadays.

Yeah, they shouldn't still be using SD titles if the show itself is in HD. The ship sailed on seamlessness when Lucy Alexander left the show, so new titles are long overdue.

[CameronYoung]

I think it's been mentioned before,
in news reports, cropping 4:3 video to 16:9. I don't understand it - surely it's better to show the original 4:3 video, or even crop it to 14:9?

[Neil Jones]

I think it's been mentioned before,
in news reports, cropping 4:3 video to 16:9. I don't understand it - surely it's better to show the original 4:3 video, or even crop it to 14:9?

News reports isn't so much of an issue in my book. Programmes (and stuff made to be seen again and again), yes, don't crop it. For a news report that you're probably only going to see once or twice, do what you like. It's usually just to highlight something in the report.

[CameronYoung]

Yeah, but it still annoys me.

What triggered me to post that actually was a report on ITV showing footage of Euro '96 in 16:9.
I think it's more the inconsistency with the cropping, sometimes it's 16:9, sometimes it's 14:9, or somewhere in between (equivilent to 16:10?), sometimes in the same report.

[swaggyboi128]

Yeah, but it still annoys me.

What triggered me to post that actually was a report on ITV showing footage of Euro '96 in 16:9.
I think it's more the inconsistency with the cropping, sometimes it's 16:9, sometimes it's 14:9, or somewhere in between (equivilent to 16:10?), sometimes in the same report.

Wouldn't 16:10 be 8:5?

[CameronYoung]

Yeah, but it still annoys me.

What triggered me to post that actually was a report on ITV showing footage of Euro '96 in 16:9.
I think it's more the inconsistency with the cropping, sometimes it's 16:9, sometimes it's 14:9, or somewhere in between (equivilent to 16:10?), sometimes in the same report.

Wouldn't 16:10 be 8:5?

Yes (I suppose in the same way 4:3 is 12:9). I thought it's generally quoted as 16:10 though. Maybe that's just a computers thing.

[Neil Jones]

Yeah, but it still annoys me.

What triggered me to post that actually was a report on ITV showing footage of Euro '96 in 16:9.
I think it's more the inconsistency with the cropping, sometimes it's 16:9, sometimes it's 14:9, or somewhere in between (equivilent to 16:10?), sometimes in the same report.

Except its not 16:9, it's just cropped 4:3. Euro 96 was, well, 1996 (clue's in the name ). You "make" 16:9 out of 4:3 by just basically chopping the top and the bottom of the picture off and zooming in a bit. Sometimes the end result depends on what you want to highlight - you'd probably just miss the on-screen score graphic (if those were being used, they were for Euro 2000 and they had appeared on football match coverage before that though).

Actually the whole Euro 2020 thing would make a good pub quiz question in a few years time - "Which is the odd one out - Euro 96, Euro 2008 or Euro 2020?".

[JasonB]

I don’t mind watching 4:3 content. Didn’t one channel get loads of complaints because they replaced the black bars with the programme behind them?

[Neil Jones]

I don’t mind watching 4:3 content. Didn’t one channel get loads of complaints because they replaced the black bars with the programme behind them?

Pretty sure all channels get complaints about black bars regardless of how thick they (the bars!) are. Seems to be because people think they're not getting full value out of their TV if every single pixel isn't in use, and then think everybody before 1998 appeared on TV looking short and fat because their TV isn't set up properly...

The whole "blurry" effect some networks/programmes use on the "curtains" to pad out a 4:3 image is incredibly irritating though.