Table of Contents

Production Team

Production Team

Contributing Authors

Editorial

TV Amateur

Sample Contents

DATV News

Ampex VR - 1000 #4 plaque dedication at Stanford university library

ESP8266 BASIC

Introducing ASRock’s DeskMini 110 Mini-STX Mini PC

More accurate, fluent sentences in Google Translate

DATV-Express team decides to build more boards

Analogue 8x1 Video and Audio Switcher - Part 2

Sony IR Hexadecimal Remote Button Codes

Amateur Television Quarterly

BBC History launches archive to mark 80 years of Television

MUSES advert

DKARS advert

DATV-Express Project - October update report

All down the Bar, except the VT Editor

DATV Express advert

Information

About this eBook

External links

Legal Niceties (the small print)

Copyright

Notice to Contributors

Coming up

CQ-DATV 42 Credits

Production Team

- Terry Mowles - VK5TM

- Ian Pawson - G8IQU

- Trevor Brown - G8CJS

Contributing Authors

- Richard Carden - VK4XRL

- Trevor Brown - G8CJS

- Ken Konechy - W6HHC

- Mike Stevens - G7GTN

Please note: articles in this magazine are provided with absolutely no warranty whatsoever; neither the contributors nor CQ-DATV accept any responsibility or liability for loss or damage resulting from readers choosing to apply this content to theirs or others computers and equipment.

Editorial

First of all the good news as they say:-

The DATV-Express, inventory was out of stock and online sales of the DATV exciter were halted, but after asking for a “show of hands” from hams who were interested in purchasing a board, the project team was flooded with stand-by orders and as of now the team has stand-by orders from all over the world totalling 30 boards. So forty-eight blank PCB boards have been ordered by Art WA8RMC and will be available mid December. This will enable the shipment completed boards by the end of December. The PayPal ordering code on the DATV-Express.com website will be turned on again as soon as new boards have been tested and are ready for delivery. The pricing will remain the same…US$300 + shipping (from USA) via PayPal. If you are willing to agree to a standby order, then send an e-mail to Support@DATV-Express.com.

Good news for this project, built and designed by amateurs for amateurs.

Now for the even better news there is not actually any bad news. The CQ-DATV website registration expires this month and the production team have made the decision to fund renewing the site and continue production of CQ-DATV as a free publication. We started production in February 2013 and then 3 years ago next month we took the rather brave decision to go monthly. Could an ATV magazine be delivered every month at no cost? well three years on using hind sight the answer has to be yes and looking at the download figures for last month alone, there is certainly demand. Hardly an issue goes by before more of you join our Facebook site, so is ATV dying? well not if CQ-DATV can help it. Yes there is always room for more copy between our covers and the burden of producing interesting articles has fallen on the shoulders of a smaller team than we envisaged, but as they say in Television circles that is due to circumstances beyond our control.

So who has stepped up to the plate in this issue, well Mike G7GTN and Richard VK4XRL, both having met through CQ-DATV, they have combined forces to bring you the software controlled vision switcher, part one was in issue 41, don’t panic it’s on the download site and in this issue they have delivered part two. Really pleased that these two enthusiasts met through CQ-DATV and have pooled their knowledge to provide you with this interesting project.

What else has happened well an 80 year celebration of broadcast Television in the UK, the beginnings were quite humble, but at CQ-DATV we could not let this pass without looking back at it origins and at Alexandra Palace where the UKs first television service began all those years ago.

Looking forward to next month’s issue Trevor and Mike have been combining their talents to look at the inexpensive wifi equipped micro controller called an ESP module, these are currently a brilliant replacement for PIC chips, in that they cost about the same, can be programmed via a USB port, using free software and wait for it in BASIC language, so if you need to control a TV repeater and never really got into PIC code these inexpensive modules maybe the solution, but you will have to wait for CQ-DATV 43 and well its only four weeks away so, not the end of the world, but in the mean time can we the CQ-DATV production team wish you the readers a Merry Christmas and a Happy new year and let’s all give a big grateful thank you to all of our contributors since February 2013 with who there would not be a CQ-DATV.

CQ-DATV

Editorial Team

CQ-DATV Production team

This magazine was created using :

TV Amateur

Sample Contents

TV Amateur is a German Language ATV Magazine It is published 4 times a year and if you would like to subscribe go to http://agaf-ev.org/

Please note the new URL

DATV News

Ampex VR - 1000 #4 plaque dedication at Stanford university library

This just in from quad list member Keith Graham, chair of the San Francisco SMPTE section:

“In June this year the the Silicon Valley y chapter of the IEEE, in conjunction with the San Francisco section of SMPTE unveiled an IEEE Historical Milestone plaque commemorating the 60th anniversary of the launch of the first commercially viable videotape recorder, the Ampex VR1000. The plaque is located at the Green Library at Stanford University where VR1000 #4 is on display.

I am pleased to say that the video of the event, along with reminiscenses from Fred Pfost, the last remaining member of the original development team, and other people with connections to Ampex in those days, was debuted at the SMPTE Annual Tech Conference in Hollywood last week.

The video is now available for viewing on the SMPTE SF YouTube page at this URL: https://youtu.be/CEgcf6WwVBw

Please feel free to pass on the link to anyone else you feel would enjoy the program.”

Keith I. Graham, Consultant - Broadcast and Rich Media

ESP8266 BASIC

What is an ESP8266?

Well an esp8266 is a microcontroller made by Espressif.

It is loaded with features. The most important being wifi. The best part is that they are dirt cheap and more powerful than an arduino. There is a variety of programming resources for these chips but one glaring gap. Basic. And thats where we come in. You are looking at the site for the first ESP8266 basic interpreter available and its not just any basic. Its a phansy basic (Yes, With a ph) that lets you make web enabled gui interfaces.

Why Basic? Why not?

Basic is a language beloved by millions of people. Its what many of us started out with and what the old timers used on there commodore 64s. Its how Microsoft got started and one of the reasons for the explosive growth of computers in the 80s. Basic is a simple but powerull language that lets you do amazing things with out needing a degree in computer science. ESP8266 Basic has been largely inspired by the work of Carl Gundle and his product run basic avilable at http://runbasic.com

Source: https://www.esp8266basic.com/

Introducing ASRock’s DeskMini 110 Mini-STX Mini PC

We’re excited about the new Mini-STX form factor, which fits a standard desktop processor onto a 140 x 147mm motherboard.

ASRock’s DeskMini 110 is a Barebones Mini PC supporting Socket 1151 Desktop CPUs up to 65W TDP on a Mini-STX board within a tiny 1.92 litre chassis.

The DeskMini 110 has an Intel H110 chipset, supports up to 32GB DDR4 RAM with VGA, HDMI and DisplayPort outputs, supports M.2 and 2x 2.5in HDD/SSD storage and an optional VESA mount.

Source: http://www.mini-itx.com/~DESKMINI-110

More accurate, fluent sentences in Google Translate

In 10 years, Google Translate has gone from supporting just a few languages to 103, connecting strangers, reaching across language barriers and even helping people find love. At the start, we pioneered large-scale statistical machine translation, which uses statistical models to translate text. Today, we’re introducing the next step in making Google Translate even better: Neural Machine Translation.

Neural Machine Translation has been generating exciting research results for a few years and in September, our researchers announced Google’s version of this technique. At a high level, the Neural system translates whole sentences at a time, rather than just piece by piece. It uses this broader context to help it figure out the most relevant translation, which it then rearranges and adjusts to be more like a human speaking with proper grammar. Since it’s easier to understand each sentence, translated paragraphs and articles are a lot smoother and easier to read. And this is all possible because of end-to-end learning system built on Neural Machine Translation, which basically means that the system learns over time to create better, more natural translations.

Today we’re putting Neural Machine Translation into action with a total of eight languages to and from English and French, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Turkish. These represent the native languages of around one-third of the world’s population, covering more than 35% of all Google Translate queries!

With this update, Google Translate is improving more in a single leap than we’ve seen in the last ten years combined. But this is just the beginning. While we’re starting with eight language pairs within Google Search the Google Translate app, and website; our goal is to eventually roll Neural Machine Translation out to all 103 languages and surfaces where you can access Google Translate.

Source: https://blog.google/products/translate/found-translation-more-accurate-fluent-sentences-google-translate/

DATV-Express team decides to build more boards

As you may have heard, the DATV-Express.com inventory is out of stock and online sales of the DATV exciter boards have been stopped on the project website. The DATV-Express project team now has decided to build another production lot of board.

After asking for a “show of hands” from hams who were interested in buying a board if more were to be built…the project team was flooded with stand-by orders by e-mail in November. As of now the team has stand-by orders from all over the world totaling 30 boards and currently plan to build 48 more boards.

Forty-eight blank PCB boards have been ordered by Art WA8RMC for delivery in mid-December. Therefore we should be able to ship completed boards by the end of December. The PayPal ordering code on the DATV-Express.com website will be turned on again as soon as new boards have been tested and ready for delivery.

Anyone holding back and waiting for production availability should enter a stand-by reservation now. No payments are required for a standby order by e-mail, just your commitment to buy a board or two when the project team completes this next production-lot. The pricing will remain the same…US$300 + shipping (from USA) via PayPal. If you are willing to agree to a standby order, then send an e-mail to

Support@DATV-Express.com

We are surprised by the DATV-Express board popularity and we thought the market was close to being saturated. That clearly is not the case. So, we will continue to have stock as long as there is demand for them. The project team plans to continue to provide support for existing customers.

Thank you for your support.

Kind regards….de the DATV-Express team

Want to be notified when issues of CQ-DATV are published? Then join our mailing list.

This is the new Apple Powered USB Light Bulb, I think?

Digital World

Analogue 8x1 Video and Audio Switcher - Part 2

Richard Carden VK4XRL and Mike Stevens G7GTN

In the last issue of CQ-DATV Richard VK4XRL and Mike G7GTN came up with a video and audio switcher using the 74HC4351P. In this part two article we add the three extra boards as shown in RED in the block diagram. The latch pin on the second channel is now fed from the Nano micro pin D6 and therefore the software needs to be updated to reflect this and for the LCD with one line for TX and the other for PV.

Let’s have a look at the latch requirements for this operation, in last month’s set-up we had LE1 set to high allowing S0, S1 and S2 to set the required input as dictated by the remote control buttons. Now with this new operation we have two separate switchers, although not shown on the block diagram they have parallel video and audio input connections so what we need to do is provide for a way to switch both buses. The latch LE1 is used as the PV bus and is therefore held HIGH as per the last article while LE2 is used to switch the TX bus.

So for this to happen the second latch is set to LOW and pulled HIGH under software control. Then we take it back to LOW with a delay of around 1sec otherwise data will switch through from PV. Therefore S0, S1 and S2 now just become pre-sets for the input selection with the TX switch being the +Vol Button. The LCD would look like this and the software allows you to change the TEXT as you require it. So in operation you select on PV what you require switching to the TX bus and then operate the +Vol button.

During the development of these different buttons usage it was obvious that all universal remotes are not all the same. It is therefore suggested you run the control code programme where the HEX code can be seen on the LCD screen. A new IR HEX code sheet has been prepared with an extra column to add your own HEX codes and thereby editing the SW8 code.

A test procedure is written into the code where pressing the zero button will allow both switchers to sequence through the inputs and when that sequence is completed both the TX and PV switchers will reset to input one. The Photo shows an earlier vision of software where the TX bus went to a SELECT caption and when the TX +Vol was selected it changed to what was on the PV bus, this has now been modified as both buses change to the reset input one position. But it does show you that you can change things if required for your own operation. I did however change the TX button to OK which works well.

The time and date is brought up on the LCD screen using button (+ channel) and as there is a temperature device on the RTC unit it can be accessed by button (- channel). There should be enough instructions within the code for any changes that maybe required for your situation.

Shown below is what I had set for the inputs while testing, remember though to pad these out to 13 characters using spaces.

char Str1[14] = "1-Testcard "; char Str2[14] = "2-23cm FM "; char Str3[14] = "3-23cm DATV "; char Str4[14] = "4-Camera One "; char Str5[14] = "5-Camera Two "; char Str6[14] = "6-vMix "; char Str7[14] = "7-MiniTuner "; char Str8[14] = "8-Ident Loop ";

Sony IR Hexadecimal Remote Button Codes

Numeric Buttons

Your HEX

Line No.

Zero

0x910

One

0x10

Two

0x810

Three

0x410

Four

0Xc10

Five

0x210

Six

0Xa10

Seven

0x610

Eight

0XE10

Nine

0x110

Control Buttons

Channel Up

0x90

Channel Down

0x890

Volume Up

0x490

Volume Down

0xC90

Favourite

0x37EE

DD0

Power

0XA90

Sleep

0x6D0

Up

0x90

2F0

Down

0x890

AF0

Left

0xAF0

CD0

Right

0x2F0

2D0

Sub-T

0xD38

OK

0x3f0

A70

Teletext Buttons

Text RED

0x338

Text Green

0xB38

Text Yellow

0x738

Text Blue

0xF8

Menu

70

EPG

6D25

EXIT

1D0

Additional External Code Libraries are required, these are supplied as an additional ZIP file from the magazines download page.

The file name is switcher_part2.zip

In part three we will provide an OSD unit that can be placed after the TX switcher which can have a number of different text messages controlled by the Nano micro via the remote control. My thanks to Mike G7GTN for his development of the software.

Amateur Television Quarterly

USA $22.00 year, Canada / Mexico $25.00 year DX $32.00 year (US $) Cyber: $15 year.

Published by ATV Quarterly Visa, M/C, AMEX PayPal via Cheques or Money Orders to Internet: www.atvquarterly.com P.O.Box 1594 Crestline CA 92325 email: wa6svt@atvquarterly.com tel (909) 428-6887

BBC History launches archive to mark 80 years of Television

To coincide with the 80th anniversary of the launch of the first British television service by the BBC on 2 November 1936, BBC History has today launched a new microsite that provides the public with access to archive material from the early days of television.

The archive, which can be viewed at http://bbc.co.uk/historyofthebbc/birth-of-tv contains a wealth of video and audio footage which tells the story of television - including, the invention of television, the opening night at Alexandra Palace in 1936, TV closure during the war and its resurrection in 1946, TV’s milestone moments such the Olympics and the Coronations of 1937 and 1953.

Some highlights of the history archive include:

- Technology battle: Early TV was a battle between two companies, the Marconi-EMI partnership and the Baird Company, each developing different technologies. Idiosyncratically, the press favoured the Baird Company technology, mainly because there was a 60-second delay in the image appearing on screen. At a special demo for the press this enabled journalists to run round and see themselves on the screen. In 1934 the Government asked the BBC to formally launch a regular service testing both systems.

- Launching the service: Early TV was a white-knuckle ride. Its first producer, Cecil Madden, recounts how his boss said they had four months to prepare for the first broadcast, but within hours the plans had changed and Cecil had only nine days to prepare for the BBC’s test transmissions, and hours to make a plan!

- First TV signature tune: For the Opening Night on 2 November, the new BBC Television Orchestra, conducted by Hyam Greenbaum, began playing - and the famous musical comedy star Adèle Dixon took to the studio floor to sing ‘Television’, the TV service’s first specially composed signature tune (‘A mighty maze of mystic magic rays is all about us in the blue’). Proceedings began at 3 o’clock in the afternoon before Dixon kicked-off a half-hour variety show at 3.30pm.

- Early output: The overall output of the new service was quite limited – an hour between 3 and 4 o’clock in the afternoon, and another between 9pm and 10pm. The BBC’s Director of Television, Gerald Cock, had ruled that there should be breaks between individual programmes in order to “avoid eye strain” for those watching at home, but this extended break was also designed to avoid interfering with viewers’ domestic life, including mealtimes and children’s bedtimes.

- TV and celebrity: One remarkable feature of these early years was the number of high-profile celebrities who were willing to make the journey to Alexandra Palace to go before the BBC cameras, which was down to the curiosity of many actors and singers wanting to see a TV set.

- First TV magazine programme: Early programmes included Picture Page. Presented by Joan Miller, it was the very first television magazine programme in the world. Its remit was simple: to place people in front of the camera ‘to be televised’. Such was the sheer novelty of the medium in the early years, it was enough to see before you a performance by a tap dancer or an interesting character or ‘type’ as they were sometimes referred to. During the first edition of Picture Page, Joan Miller - who was dubbed ‘Picture Page Girl’ - was sitting at a mock-up of a telephone exchange ‘switching’ the viewer through to each item in turn. What TV viewers didn’t know was that Miller was ‘cued-in’ by the studio director on each occasion by being given a ‘mild’ electrical shock through wires attached to her ankles.

- Rules for television staff: Working life at Alexandra Palace was becoming established and new rules were needed. No dogs (one of the on-screen presenters, Jasmine Bligh, once brought her Aberdeen terrier to work), no ‘drag’ on television (although a male entertainer dressed as half-man, half-woman was permitted) and no alcohol. Internal memos show the fear of management that if alcohol “got a foothold at Alexandra Palace it would sooner or later spread to Maida Vale and Broadcasting House, and possibly become unmanageable”.

- TV & WW2: On 1 September 1939, at the outbreak of war, Douglas Birkinshaw, the BBC engineer in charge at Alexandra Palace, received a message that transmissions should cease. The BBC’s pre-war television service ended abruptly with a Mickey Mouse cartoon and then, without ceremony, there was a total Closedown. An interview with Lord Orr Ewing in which he claims that Lord Swinton (Air Minister until 1938) told him that the reason the public service TV service was started was to secretly develop the manufacturing capacity for cathode ray tubes that could be used in radar, which subsequently helped win the Battle of Britain.

- Two Coronations: The Coronation of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth on 12 May 1937 gave the BBC Television Service its first major outside broadcasting challenge, which was a huge technological leap forward. Despite the equipment failing just as the procession approached, the BBC’s Tony Bridgwater recalls EMI engineer Bernard Greenhead giving the equipment “an almighty biff with his fist” - which managed to restart the unit just in time.

- The Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953 was a far more complex operation using more than 20 cameras in multiple locations. It was a seminal moment not just in British history, but in the development and popularity of television as a medium. BBC Director-General, Ian Jacob, said the Coronation “was the thing that made the Television Service take off… everybody from that moment on wanted to have television”.

- Mass Observation: In 1949 Mass Observation, the pioneering social research organisation that was launched in 1937 to document everyday life in Britain, asked how people felt about having television in their own homes. Some of their replies were fascinating: O. Barritt, a 28-year-old housewife, wrote that: “the worst of television, from a housewife’s point of view, is it requires a darkened room, so that knitting or mending is out of the question”. Other worries were expressed by Mrs P. Green, who wrote that: “a television set in the home would tend to make one lazy, whereas if you go out to a show it means extra sprucing up (a joy to a woman who has been busy around the house most of the day)”. Forty-two year-old Esther Home could not afford to buy tickets for Wimbledon or other sporting events, but having a television set now meant that she could watch tennis at home and “in comfort I will watch the Ascot races, and also see the dresses of the women walking in the paddock”.

Speaking about the archive, Robert Seatter, Head of BBC History, says: “We are delighted to mark this momentous occasion by sharing much never-before-seen material from the BBC archives. The anecdotes, images and recordings offer today’s audiences a fascinating behind-the-scenes insight into the early days of television.

“It is also great to be doing this in partnership with media history experts from the University of Sussex and other UK research centres, who set our BBC story in the wider context of what was happening in communications and society.”

Professor David Hendy, Professor of Media and Cultural History at the University of Sussex, says: “These fascinating accounts, from the BBC’s own collection of oral history interviews, take us straight back to a time when the future of TV wasn’t yet known, when everything was new and uncertain. They offer us as never before the real inside story of those who set television going on its now 80 year-long journey. And a very human story it is: a tale of risk-taking, pioneering spirit, rivalry, hope, anxiety - and, of course, the slow working out of how to make popular art out of an obscure bit of rather cumbersome technology.”

The BBC History archive project is a collaboration with The Sussex Humanities Lab, University of Sussex; Centre for Media History, Aberystwyth University; Department of Media and Communication, University of Leicester and The National Media Museum.

DATV-Express Project - October update report

By Ken W6HHC

Charles G4GUO was able to correct the last reported problem for DVB-S2 protocol and has released v1.23 software for Windows. Also, an experimental set of coding for DVB-T protocol (2 MHz and 1 MHz channel-bandwidths only) was included in that Windows software release.

Block Diagram for v1.23 running DVB-S2 protocol. Both CODECs and the DVB-S2 protocol encoding are run on the Windows PC.

Charles points out that the current v1.23 software for DVB-T is running close to the limit of the USB-2 real-world thruput limits and the software requires a fast and well-designed PC for the DVB-T transmissions to be received without problems.

Ken W6HHC completed the Users Guide for Windows (draft 10) to now include DVB-S2 and DVB-T operations. This latest draft is based on the v1.23 software). The latest software for Windows and Users Guide for Windows PDF and a companion NOTES.TXT file can now be downloaded from the project web site at http://WWW.DATV-Express.com using the DOWNLOADS page.

During the month of October, the last DATV-Express board in inventory was shipped. Currently, the PayPal coding has been removed from the DATV-Express.com website and board sales have been stopped. The project team is looking for a “show of hands” via e-mail to see if there are enough hams willing to agree to a standby order…if more boards were to be built. No payments are required for a “show of hands” e-mail, just your commitment to buy a board or two if the project team builds another production-lot. The pricing will remain the same…US$300 + shipping (from USA) via PayPal.

If you are willing to agree to a standby order, then send an e-mail to Support@DATV-Express.com

We currently have a list of seven standby orders, and need a total of 16-to-20 orders or more to proceed with another board production-run.

“Project speed set to slow” …de Ken W6HHC

All down the Bar, except the VT Editor

(It's a line from a BBC Christmas tape) Trevor Brown explains:-

It's now almost 10 years since I worked in a VT department, but I still get asked about Christmas tapes. If you have never seen one, let me explain.

I think they evolved in different ways, before video tape, they were the domain of the film department, who collected out takes (the more embarrassing the better) and they would assemble this film for viewing at the annual Christmas party hence the Christmas part of the title. The material was similar to what you see on main stream out take shows, but that material can only be shown with the permission of the artist; I suspect those rules did not apply to these private showings.

The tradition expanded when video tape arrived, the out-takes would be collected by VT and again assembled into a single programme for viewing at Christmas, (the tape part), but the tradition changed by the inclusion of material often shot for the occasion (see the Hot Gossip Link). The tapes also got a much wider audience, in that they were networked around all the ITV companies and this grew into a contest to see who could produce the best tape, with its own judging panel. There was even an award which was a large inscribed rubidium disc from an HS 100 slow motion machine. It looked a little like a DVD only larger and much heavier. Each year it would be inscribed with the winning companies' name and it would reside in their VT department for the next 12 months. It must still exist somewhere and I would love to know where. (Yorkshire Television did win it and I had the pleasure of seeing it every day for 12 months, mounted on our department wall.

The tradition gathered momentum and the productions got more and more elaborate and attracted wider involvement of staff, it was getting competitive, and there is nothing like a competition to up the stakes. The artistes began to get involved, they had always been involved in the outtakes and when they screwed up a take they would often end up with Merry Christmas VT, a phrase I think originally coined by Noel Edmonds, but now the artists were turning up in the club bar asking for someone from the VT department and coming up with an idea for the Christmas tape. This got to the level at Yorkshire Television where the then MD turned up to record a spoof announcement for one year's offering.

The ITV tapes were generally about 10 to 20 mins long although there was no time limit on productions in the contest rules. The next change was when we saw a BBC Christmas tape, officially there were two made by the BBC the first one was called White Powder Christmas, White Powder was a tape backing problem with Memorex video tape which clogged up the VT machines and put many productions at risk, Memorex did produce some of the best performing video tape at a time of analogue technology where generations were lost in editing and duplication. As such their Chroma 90 tape became the industry standard until this problem. I think naming the production after a VT problem showed that Christmas tapes had now firmly become the domain of VTR.

White Powder Christmas was much longer than any of the ITV tapes and showed the production muscle that the BBC could put together. This tape was produced in the year the BBC had its strikes and much of the specially shot footage reflects this era. This was followed by Good King Memorex and was the last Christmas tape officially made by the BBC and included spoof material featuring a prominent royal, which attracted press attention and a clamp down on all Christmas tape production at the BBC, in a world where all controversial material is screened by lawyers and often has to be signed off at a very high level in the company, it was inevitable these flourishing underground productions would face the axe. There was one final BBC tape called an Easter Tape which was presumably to get around a poorly worded BBC memo of not producing Christmas tapes.

The BBC tapes had a different content to ITV tapes and often had a higher music content, with songs specially adapted for the production and performed by leading artist such as Suzy Quattro (see the link) singing Sports PA. The rumour goes this was written by a member of the VT department (My lips are sealed on the name) department and performed on rehearsal. The words written on the back of a roll of wallpaper purchased during the lunch break and pulled over scaffold poles as an improvised Autocue. The artistes did have a much higher involvement and Legs and co, (for those of you that have been around as long as I have) did have a dance routine performed in the VT area and again featured an adapted song to VT engineering. The faculties booking department performed what has now become a classic known as 4050 from Good King Memorex . My own personal favourite is "Rip Scratch", which was a send up of using RCA machines in a linear edit suite and is again part of Good King Memorex. At Yorkshire Television when that production was made, all the editing was done on RCA machines and many of the jibes struck home, I still have the scars.

ITV was not going to be outdone and Thames took Hot Gossip who were working on the Kenny Everett show at the time, up into their VT area and produced a raunchy version of the BBC legs and co production.

The adapted music still lives with me every time I hear a track on the radio that was adapted to a Christmas tape, from Pink Floyd's "Another Brick In The Wall" to Run Around Sue. There was no doubt that planning and a great deal of production effort went into these productions at every level.

By the time I left YTV in 1998 Christmas productions had disappeared and the Rubidium disc had long since vacated the VT wall. Most of the tapes were produced as a team effort although there was often a single motivating person at each company I won't name names and embarrass anyone, most of the tapes have been lost but the good news is there are clips available on the net for you to view just follow the links.

The technical quality of some of the material that can be reached by the links does not reflect that of the original productions which were all produced to full broadcast specification, none of us would compromise on a Christmas tape, they always got the latest and most up to date technology used on them.

If nothing else it proves that the engineers were not boring, least not in the VT department

Trevor Brown, Ex VT Editor Yorkshire Television

Please be warned some of the programmes contain Bad language and sorry for any missing links, these keep changing, but Google 'Christmas Tapes' for more.

The BBC story: http://www.vtoldboys.com/

Hot Gossip at Thames: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fattrSxsras

HS100 info: http://www.vtoldboys.com/slo70_3.htm

Suzie Quatro: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gi0WsOBwRBI

Good King Memorex: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x19bfw9_good-king-memorex-bbc-vt-1979_fun

Instant Replay (legs and Co) Part of White Powder Christmas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AurAjnvnDF0

Information

About this eBook

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Many articles include programming code or configuration examples. that will 'wrap' on smaller displays.  To optimise the presentation of these elements, view the eBook in single-column, landscape mode and adjust the font size to the smallest setting.

External links

If you have an eBook reader that does not have WiFi then you will not be able to use the hyper-links in this publication.

If you have an eBook reader that has WiFi then you will be able too providing you are in a WiFi zone.

But if you have a Kindle 3G then yes, but only to Amazon, and there is not a lot of ATV material on their site.

Smart phone or tablet reading apps are ok providing that you have a WiFi or 3G/4G data connection.

Note: These links will fire up your devices browser and if you are using 3G/4G then you will incur data usages charges.

The Internet is a living thing that is constantly evolving. Whilst all external links are checked at the date of publication, they may not be valid in the future.

Legal Niceties (the small print)

E&OE. Whilst every care is taken in the production of this publication, dotMOBI accepts no legal responsibility for the advice, data and opinions expressed. dotMOBI neither endorses nor is it responsible for the content of advertisements or the activities of those advertisers. No guarantee of accuracy is implied or given for the material herein. dotMOBI expressly disclaims all liability to any person in respect of anything and in respect of the consequences of anything done or omitted to be done wholly or partly in reliance upon the whole or any part of this publication.

As the regulations for the operation of radio frequency equipment vary in different countries, readers are advised to check that building or operating any piece of equipment described in dotMOBI will not contravene the rules that apply in their own country.

All copyrights and trademarks mentioned in this publication are acknowledged and no infringement of the intellectual copyright of others is intended.

Copyright

The articles contained in this publication remain the copyright of their respective authors and NOT dotMOBI. Any reproduction of such articles must be approved by the author of that article.

Notice to Contributors

Authors are alone responsible for the content of their articles, including factual and legal accuracy, and opinions expressed by them may not reflect the editorial stance of the publication. Material submitted to dotMOBI should not infringe the copyright of other writers or bodies. Contributions are accepted for publication on this basis alone.

dotMOBI publications - http://cq-datv.mobi

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