Temple of Peace and BBC Training

From Mike Cotton

Mike doesn’t know who these chaps are, only that he took the picture at Paestum in Italy, the Temple of Peace c 273 BC.

As he says, health and safety, let alone common sense, were obviously not an issue with them!

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from Roger Bunce

BRITISH BROADCASTING CORPORATION ENGINEERING TRAINING DEPARTMENT

C Engineering Examination No.122 Part 2 May 1977 Television

Full marks Total: 100

You are required to remain awake for FIVE questions.

Each question is given a maximum of 20 marks. The mark allocated to eachpart is shown in brackets on the right hand side of the page and will be dependent upon the size of the bribe. Marks will be deducted for wrongess.

  1. a. With the aid of a diagram, explain the function of the drop-out compensator used in a panning handle (4)

b. Why is a round lens used when rectangular pictures are required? (4)

C. Which end of the camera should be pointed at the subject material in order to obtain acceptable interlaced pictures when working in the PAL mode? (2)

d. Why is it dangerous to swallow a Plumbicon tube? (4)

e. How many cameras would it take to completely cover the floor of TC6 using 1)EMI 2001 and 2) Praktika Super TL (4)

How would these numbers differ if a paying audience was involved?(2)

  1. a. Discuss the problems which might arise when NATLOCK operations are attempted with the following:
    1. Stationary source and moving studio (4)
    2. Stationary studio and scanner with spongy brakes (4)
    3. Regional studio and producer with exhausted budget (ignoring overruns) (4)
    4. No NATLOCK equipment (4)

b. The phrase “You want locking up mate!” on a control line obviously refers to a timing error at the mixing point. How could this error be quickly overcome, and suggest a suitable reply to send on reverse talkback. (2)

c. Compose an award-winning overture using NATLOCK tones. (2)

  1. a. Using the attached Ordnance Survey Map, describe the operation of the following parts of a Video Tape Recorder:
    1. Amtec
    2. Colortec
    3. StarTrec
    4. Claw assembly

b. Explain why a Video Tape Recorder produces excellent pictures under low light conditions. (20)

  1. a. Without using your hands, explain the operation of a Dansette Line Store standards converter. (10)

b. Explain the meaning of the following terms:

  1. Camera cable stretching (2)
  2. Lens crushing (2)
  3. Gammon correction (2)
  4. Moreover – OK? (2)
  5. Veal and hame Turnover (2)
  6. a. What is Elsan Runaway, and why is it more noticeable on Wednesday night? (4)

b. Explain the requirement for different pan heights in the ground floor toilets in Ashbridge. Make particular reference to Whitbread DPA in your answer. (6)

c. Why is it necessary to keep involuntary bowel movements to an absolute minimum during programme transmission in the studio? Suggest methods by which these can be overcome using a few corks and a bit of string. Illustrate your diagram with detailed anatomical diagrams.(10)

  1. a. Choose one of the following: i)CSO (6)
  2. What is colour subcarrier? Is it
    1. A red transporter for underwater vessels
    2. An African machine-gunner
    3. A Hoover keymatic programme unit
    4. All of the above? (6)
  3. How fast will a Designs Department vectorscope go? Verify your answer with some form of irrelevant complicated calculation using sums. (6)
  4. What type of fault in a vision mixer gives rise to Nationwide? (4)
  5. a. Which of the following items of studio equipment require a safety harness?
    1. Heron camera crane
    2. Fisher microphone boom
    3. Jack Warner (6)

b. Spell the following technical terms:

  1. Chromaticity
  2. Intermodulation
  3. Synchronisation
  4. Film (4)

c. Explain the meaning of the following broadcasting terms if they occurred in the script of a documentary programme dealing with family planning:

  1. Tip projection
  2. Insertion loss
  3. Reproducing head
  4. Wobbulator
  5. Peaking
  6. Dropout (10)
  7. a. What is more annoying to the standard 1931 CIE man?
    1. Hanover bars
    2. Moire patterning
    3. Premature ejaculation (4)

b. A colour is matched by 2 tins Brilliant White, 1 tin Magnolia and 2.5 tins Signal Red. Plot the resultant colour on the attached D.U.L.U.X. colour chart. Suggest a near match in Magicote. Will this go

with orange flowered curtains? (16)

c. Are you sure this is the May 1977 Exam paper? (0)

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From Peter Fox

BBC Induction Course.

Colonel Chilvers was the resident BBC expert on nuclear defence and he gave us an induction course lecture on the effects of atomic warfare, He told us enthusiastically about the “foul dust” that would rain down for a mile or two around “ground zero” which was going to be Charing Cross station. He was fairly certain of that. (also conveniently, the hub of Late Night Transport although we didn’t know about that yet)

The greatest danger was, we were told, the ensuing firestorm. Dresden and Cologne may have been mentioned but his demonstration involved a dummy birthday cake adorned with about twenty Prices’ standard candles (each, no doubt radiating one lumen, but we didn’t know about those either, yet.) These were lit and allowed to burn for a while. Convincingly the smoke and flame from each candle was deflected inwards towards an increasingly concentrated burning area above the centre of the cake. The cool air drawn in from the sides fed the flames until the candles went into overdrive and started melting and collapsing inwards. Brilliant.

I can’t recall how it was put out or, come to think of it, anything else on that two week induction course except my first BBC meal. At 1.15pm on the 2nd of October 1962 in the Broadcasting House canteen, I had Spam Fritters. They were absolutely awful and I can tell you that I never in the following 42 years had spam fritters ever again anywhere. It may have been a BBC psychological ploy though, because however awful any future canteen meal might be I could always somehow manage to eat it, telling myself : “At least this isn’t as bad as spam fritters.”

Peter Fox TO14

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(We used, in those days of cold war, to discuss what we would actually do in the event of the four minute warning of incoming nuclear missiles, given that we were a prime target. Apart from the obvious, standing on the top of the East Tower at Television Centre seemed to be favourite.)



 

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