A Mole in Daylight
The Motion Picture Research Council Camera Crane, manufactured by Mole-Richardson under licence, known as the MPRC Crane in official documents but universally known as the Mole Crane, was generally confined to the studios and never saw the light of day. What a surprise to see one in broad daylight in a Sky Atlantic production! Mind you, it was only as a prop!
Crane Training
Most of us learnt how to swing a Mole by watching, learning, and getting it wrong. Later, the BBC establishment instituted some training for the Mole crews, and here are some examples.
There was also a BBC film about Manual Handling – and this shows a Nike Crane and a Vinten ped in use, but there seems to be little in the way of manual handling training.
EastEnders
The episode for Thursday 28th April 2022 showed Jean Slater, who is bipolar, suffering with delusions in a manic phase, and chases round a funfair in Southend and then heads out to sea.
Karl Neilson was the director, and here he shares some insights into how the episode was conceived and shot.
Eidophor
First TO: What’s an Eido for?
Second TO: Ei dunno!
It wasn’t funny then, and certainly isn’t now
In the mid nineteen sixties, scheduled for the theatre, spending all afternoon and evening sitting in the circle next to a great grey-green greasy oily smelly smoky machine while a couple of worthy but dull old ladies are the subject of “This Is Your Life” – memories are made of this…
Hullabaloo and Custard
More in connection with the start of BBC 2.
Lime Grove before the BBC
A booklet about the Gaumont-British studios (previously Gainsborough Studios) at Lime Grove surfaced a second time, this time provoking some interesting comments.
Roger Bunce and The Studio of Earthly Delights
Roger Bunce was a studio cameraman (including on Crew 14) but was also a talented artist, animator and writer of satirical comedy. Roger drew some excellent cartoons for the Guild of Television Cameramen’s early magazine.
Roger was fascinated by the weird and wonderful work of the Dutch artist Hieronymus Bosch (1450-1516), and wondered what he would have made of a TV Studio as source of Earthly Delights
Spot the Error!
Bernie set a quiz question…Spot the Error!
Once again, a piece of historic television equipment was being used as a prop in the new television programme – but could it have worked?
Staff List 1974
Television Technical Operations Staff List for August 1974.
TO 16 course
Mike DuBoulay has found the course schedule for T.O. 16
With this schedule, it is possible to give some sort of idea of what it was like at Wood Norton Hall at the time of T.O. 16. This page gathers together some existing images and material from around the Tech Ops site – and includes the Wood Norton Canteen Menu for the start of the course!
Was I really in the studio with – Yoko Ono?
Yet another day doing something to do with current affairs down in Lime Grove… it was only more than half a century later I realised who we had been working with that day!
